Planning and Developing for More AI/Data Center Power Demand

The US power grid is undergoing a structural transformation—and asset owners, operators, and developers need to take into account new challenges and new opportunities.

The rapid buildout of data centers for artificial intelligence workloads has revolutionized power demand. A single large-scale AI data center can require as much electricity as a major city. With 16 planned to come online in the next two years alone, the landscape is quickly changing faster than the grid’s permitting timelines and interconnection queues can accommodate.

For asset developers and managers, this gap between data center power demand and supply creates immediate, concrete challenges: where to site new projects, which load forecasts to plan against, and how to model development and operation economics when fuel costs, supply chains, and regulatory incentives are in flux.

How should you respond?

The team sat down with three industry experts at a recent user conference:

• Jesse Jenkins is a professor of energy systems engineering and policy at Princeton University, where he leads research on electricity markets, clean energy infrastructure deployment, and energy policy. He is also co-founder and CTO of Firma Power LLC and co-host of the energy podcast Shift Key.

• Judd Rogers is vice president of development for new projects at Scout Clean Energy, where he oversees the company's wind, solar, and storage development pipeline.

• Matt Futch is managing director of resource planning and power procurement at Black and Veatch, where he leads a team delivering services to electric and gas utilities, data centers, independent system operators, independent power producers, and transmission/generation developers.
  

Together, they address five critical challenges facing asset developers and managers and the key takeaways for market participants planning to succeed amid spiking data center power demand in a changing grid landscape.

Download the white paper to see five key takeaways to help you operate successfully in the grid of the future.