After taking office today, President Donald Trump announced that his top priorities include bolstering the nation’s energy sector – which could help boost the power grid’s capacity for artificial intelligence.
In its first published brief, the Trump White House said that it plans to “unleash American energy,” and will “declare an energy emergency.”
Among those plans, the administration’s team confirmed to the New York Times that one of Trump’s first executive orders (EO) will aim to harness untapped natural resources in Alaska, which will “enable the country to generate more energy to power artificial intelligence,” according to the story.
The expected EO could be respondent to mounting electrical demands across the country as data centers put strain on current power grid capabilities.
The president’s pick to lead the Interior Department, Doug Burgum, the former governor of North Dakota, said last week during his Senate confirmation hearing that the U.S. is in an AI arms race with other countries, such as China, noting that he aims to meet the power needs of the emerging technology’s industry.
Increased “baseload” electricity from coal and other sources would be used to help power data centers and combat the “electricity crisis,” the nation is currently encountering, Burgum told senators.
Before leaving office, the Biden administration also issued an EO to expand power grid capacities by directing the Departments of Defense and Energy to lease Federal government sites to private sector companies to streamline building AI infrastructure while drawing power from new clean energy sources.
