So can you supply the data centers with electricity from square miles of solar backed by batteries in deserts with brackish water aquifers... on federal lands?
I did ask GPT questions about projected Data center power consumption and the proportion of that currently from natural gas. We do get power from other sources including nuclear including hydro including solar. But the two big sources were coal and natural gas with movement away from cold towards natural gas to increase its proportion.
We are currently consuming about 1.1 trillion cubic meters of natural gas per year in the US. That number is growing even without the data centers. We are not importing hardly any and that means we are producing 1.1 trillion cubic meters per year.
My recall is GPT projected about a 20% increase in natural gas consumption derived from the AI data centers. This adds to our non AI increase in consumption growth.
That is serious. It is not overwhelming. But it becomes overwhelming if that 1.1 trillion cubic meters produced declines.