Data centers and the race to power AI (part 2)

Madison Goldberg (0:03)

Welcome to Ask MIT Climate. I'm Madison Goldberg, and this is the second half of our deep dive into data centers and the energy system. If you haven't listened to part one, by the way, we'd suggest catching up on that first. It'll help this episode make more sense.

But as a quick recap, last time we talked about the rush to build data centers amid the AI boom, and more specifically, how the rapid build out of these huge, concentrated electricity users can create challenges for people and for a US power grid that might not be prepared for this.

Costa Samaras (0:37)

The power sector is under threat from extreme impacts from climate change. It's under threat from new demands that are appearing faster than the grid is used to.

And it's under threat from its own age.

Madison Goldberg (0:53)

Costa Samaras is a professor at Carnegie Mellon University, where he directs the Scott Institute for Energy Innovation. In our last episode, he asked this question.

Costa Samaras (1:03)

How do we add lots of new electricity demand in ways that are good for the communities and good for the country and good for the climate?

Madison Goldberg (1:12)

Because ultimately, he says, this task, growing the grid while also making the whole system cleaner, cheaper and more reliable, matters regardless of what happens with data centers.

It's also what we're going to need to do to tackle climate change. As we switch from gasoline cars to electric vehicles and from natural gas furnaces to heat pumps.

Costa Samaras (1:34)

Data centers are only part of the new electricity demand that we're going to see.

Madison Goldberg (1:38)

Of course, electricity use and climate change are not the only concerns people have when it comes to data centers. And before we dig in, we wanted to acknowledge that communities all over the country are grappling with lots of decisions in this moment, including whether to allow data centers at all.

For this episode, we spoke with our guests about managing data centers' electricity demand with the climate and our energy system in mind. So when it comes to data centers that do get built, we hope this episode helps you think about the policies you'd want to see in place for their energy use. To give ourselves a shot at emerging from this moment more prepared for cleaner cars and buildings we'll need, and not less.

Okay, let's get into it. There are way more ideas on the table than we have time for. But we'll go over some of the main ones our guests are thinking about. Let's start by sorting them into a couple of buckets. Here's the first.

Costa Samaras (2:35)

Get more out of the existing grid immediately.

Madison Goldberg (2:38)

These are ways to bring more demand onto the grid, whether it's data centers or electric vehicles or whatever, without stressing the system or triggering costly upgrades.

One option is good old energy efficiency. If I switch out incandescent bulbs for LEDs, I can make my room just as bright with much less electricity. Sure, we need to think way bigger when it comes to data centers, but we can push for efficiency from them too.

Vijay Gadepally (3:06)

And so whether it's better cooling technology for the data center, more efficient AI algorithms, more efficient computing technologies, I think those are all coming.

Madison Goldberg (3:16)

That's Vijay Gadepally. He's a senior scientist at MIT Lincoln Laboratory and the co-founder of two AI infrastructure companies.

Now, the industry has already seen big efficiency improvements over time. But Dr. Gadepally points out a caveat here. As it gets less energy intensive and cheaper to use AI models, that could have its own knock-on effects.

Vijay Gadepally (3:41)

When something comes cheaper, there is often a rebound effect where the net usage actually goes up. For example, what if we come up with a brand new model that's inherently far more efficient that requires a lot less compute? I still think that even if that happens, our demands are insatiable, there's a fairly good chance that we'll just use it more, and we'll start to use it in things that we weren't necessarily using it in before.

Madison Goldberg (4:07)

There's another set of ideas under this get more from the grid umbrella.

One of Dr. Gadepally's companies aims to make data centers' power use more responsive to real world conditions, offering what's called load flexibility. For example, consider what happens when electricity demand is at its highest, like when lots of people are cranking air conditioners on a summer afternoon. If a data center adds to those peaks, that could be a recipe for grid stress and extra costs. But what if you could shape a data center's electricity demand so it doesn't pile on when the grid is already stressed?