Guthrie and Obernolte Send Letter to Energy Secretary Granholm In Support of the Energy Sector’s Role in Advancing AI

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Congressman Brett Guthrie (KY-02), a senior member of the House Energy & Commerce Committee, and Congressman Jay Obernolte (CA-23), Chairman of the bipartisan Task Force on Artificial Intelligence (AI), sent a letter with their GOP colleagues to Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm in support of the energy sector's role in advancing U.S. leadership in AI. This letter highlights the dangers posed by an authoritarian regime leading the world in next generation AI and urges the Biden-Harris administration to address the risks facing our electric grid that can undermine future development.

Key Excerpt

"In order for the United States to be positioned for global leadership in next generation AI deployment, our critical energy infrastructure needs to serve as a secure foundation that can be leveraged for continued research and development. Without the necessary foundational infrastructure that can support AI models, we risk forfeiting leadership to authoritarian states like China."

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"Importantly, AI is playing a key role in efforts to develop advanced nuclear fusion technologies that can revolutionize the power generation sector and provide zero-emission baseload resources that can fuel next generation job-creating industries. Machine learning methods being developed in conjunction with federal partners can help harness the power of fusion energy by responding in milliseconds to instabilities within fusion reactions to maintain constant power generation."

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"The CCP is pouring resources into building the necessary energy production apparatus to meet their own electricity demands from energy-intensive AI data centers. It continues to be reported that China remains on pace to construct the equivalent of two new coal plants per week. Their command-and-control style of governance allows their state to quickly construct the baseload generation and distribution infrastructure necessary to support the power needs of data centers. As you develop a final report, we strongly urge your department to work with your peer agencies to address the constraints on our electric grid and ensure continued US leadership in AI development."

Click here to read the full letter.

Background

• The Department of Energy' Office of Cybersecurity, Energy Security, and Emergency Response (CESER) is developing a report titled "Potential Benefits and Risks of Artificial Intelligence (AI) for Critical Energy Infrastructure" pursuant to Executive Order 14110.

• As part of the Department's work to develop this report, this letter strongly urges the Biden-Harris administration to take seriously the threats posed by adversarial nations like China, address reliability concerns facing our electric grid, and foster innovation to affirm U.S. leadership in AI development.

• Importantly, the energy industry is already utilizing AI models to improve grid reliability and resiliency, increase oil and gas production, and develop cutting edge technologies of the future like nuclear fusion energy.

• AI holds enormous promise for our future, yet we are faced with the risk of ceding leadership to authoritarian regimes like the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), who is developing AI through a military style lens and utilizing their surveillance state to train their AI models.

• It is projected that AI data centers could consume upwards of 20 percent of our nation's electricity production over the next decade.

• While the Biden-Harris administration is putting the reliability of electric grid at risk through expansive regulations, the CCP is on pace to construct the equivalent of 2 new coal plants per week to meet projected increases in electricity demand.

Click Here to read the full letter.

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