Chevron New Energies President Jeff Gustavson said the Houston-based energy company’s plans to build natural gas power stations to support U.S. artificial intelligence data center infrastructure are a “win-win” for the country, national security, customers, and consumers.
Gustavson told the Washington Examiner that the energy company plans to build natural gas power plants that will be directly connected to data centers used by technology companies for artificial intelligence and other services.
It is an energy race to support today’s technology revolution that is strikingly similar to the race for oil during the country’s industrial revolution in Western Pennsylvania, when Edwin Drake discovered oil in Titusville. That discovery happened during a critical time for manufacturers who were desperately looking for cheaper energy sources to support their booming industries.
Just as the industrial revolution reshaped the economy from agrarian to industrial, AI is reshaping the economy today, and it requires a voluminous amount of electricity to support it.
Gustavson, who grew up in the oil and gas industry following his father around in Colorado, said the plan is to have Chevron’s first plant online within three years.
“We’ve been looking more and more at this space, talking to customers, largely the hyperscalers, the ones that are building out these big data centers,” he said, adding that it became clear that their need for reliable power was significant.
“They want it as fast as possible because there is a bit of an AI race going on, not just with companies in the U.S. but between countries globally, and so there are national security concerns with that,” he said.
“We hit on it, as they did, that natural gas should be a big part of the solution because of our abundant U.S. natural gas resources,” he said.
Gustavson said natural gas has a lower carbon footprint than other forms of energy, “and we think we can make it lower still with new technologies.”
Gustavson said the most important thing for AI data center customers is having a reliable power source 24/7, “which is exactly what these customers are looking for.”
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Chevron is not alone in this race to supply power. Many power producers are bulking up for the impending need to supply AI data centers. Last fall, Constellation Energy, the owner of the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, announced a deal with Microsoft to allocate 100% of the plant’s power to the tech giant.
And many are investing specifically in natural gas generating capacity. Constellation, which has a large fleet of nuclear power plants, agreed this month to buy rival Calpine, which owns many natural gas plants, for $16.4 billion.