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[Music]
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in just a short space of time AI has
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rapidly transformed from a niche area of
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computer science into a ubiquitous Force
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reshaping Modern Life AI regulation
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generative AI I just wait for the AI to
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do it but to fuel AI it needs to process
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data lots of data and that needs scores
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of massive data centers across the world
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construction projects are underway but
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building data centers is only one part
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where do we get the power to run them
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this is the central question facing the
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future of AI because these AI operations
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need power and a lot of
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it the main bottleneck for AI was
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initially computing power were there
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enough chips to process the data but now
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energy is being seen as the critical
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Factor how do we power the data
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[Music]
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sensus I think we would probably build
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out bigger clusters than we currently
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can if we could get the energy to do it
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the term data center is becoming ever
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more vague it largely describes a
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building or section of a building that
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is used to store Digital Data along with
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the compute power needed to manage and
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distribute this information this is
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normally accessed remotely via some sort
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of network the most obvious example of
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this being the internet having large
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racks of computers working 24 hours a
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day to manage this data drives the large
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power drawer power consumption increases
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exponentially with AI data centers
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firstly it requires a huge amount of
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information to be stored fed through and
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created when training the machine
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learning
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algorithms secondly the end AI tools
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require massive computational resources
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including large amounts of gpus to
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process and analyze large data sets when
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generating the end result large language
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models like chat GPT and image
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generation models like Dary and mid
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Journey cannot be processed on devices
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like laptops and phones they require
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communication with cloud data centers
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for every
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transaction James Walker is the chief
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executive officer and director of Nano
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nuclear energy Inc a company looking to
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provide Cutting Edge portable micro
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reactors and other micro reactor
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Technologies we've spoken to a number of
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um people that are trying to build data
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centers at the moment and some of the
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projections they require will go up to
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sort of 2 gaw and those are just the
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conversations we're having I'm sure
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there are other conversations that are
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being had at the moment where they are
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asking for a lot more than that
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President Trump and his team Envision a
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futur in AI development where the US
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leads the world powering everything from
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autonomous vehicles to military
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AI but let's talk numbers a typical AI
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data center can consume as much
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electricity as a small City and when you
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multiply that by hundreds or even
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thousands of centers the demand starts
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to look well pretty intense founder of
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dig Economist Alex deis tells us how
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these Digital Trends have accelerated
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energy consumption during the previous
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decade they were responsible for at
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least 1% of global electricity
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consumption and that percentag is like
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increasing fast over the past few years
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due to Trends such as digital currency
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mining uh and also recently artificial
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intelligence which is also extremely
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energy hungry as well so you know in the
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coming years it's already been estimated
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that data centers are going to be
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responsible for you know 3 to 4% of
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global electricity consumption uh so
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it's quite significant to put that into
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perspective estimates suggest that data
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centers are currently consuming more
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than the total energy consumption of
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France we spoke to technology analyst
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Jack gold who tells us why this is such
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a massive problem Elon Musk built the
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new xai plant in Nashville I believe it
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was we looked at the power required to
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to run that thing and it's the
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equivalent of about 55 or 60,000 homes
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and where you going to get that from
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most uh electrical generation at least
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in in the US is already uh on the edge
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that that is to say that you can't
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really increase it by 10 or 15 or 20% it
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the plants won't handle it and we
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already have brown outs right in the
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summer when it gets real hot and
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everyone's got their air conditioning on
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the energy grid is an interconnected
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distribution network of power lines and
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substations delivering current from the
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source of generation to your house while
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managing the voltage and amplitude to
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power home electronics at a consistent
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and accepted level modern power
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generation is made up of multiple
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different methods and Technologies
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primarily including coal gas nuclear
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solar and wind each of these offer
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benefits and downsides often being
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implemented for different use cases and
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locations for example
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solar works better in Sunny climates and
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wind turbines are often placed offshore
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where there is more uninterrupted wind
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whether it's a few hundred megawatts or
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multiple gws these generation systems
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are only designed to be able to provide
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a certain amount of power to Any Given
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area when a higher amount of energy is
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being consumed than expected it creates
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a strain on the available resources and
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can limit Supply to end users building
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new plants can be slow costly and
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complicated so the question arises does
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the United States or any developed
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country have the energy infrastructure
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to support massive expansion it's true
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some parts of the US are already
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experiencing power shortages because of
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data census States like California and
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Arizona which have long struggled with
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electricity demand are seeing increased
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strain on their grids due to the rapid
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expansion of data censors and while AI
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is pushing us to The Cutting Edge ofch
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technology it's also pushing our
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existing energy grids to their limits
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whenever a big energy consumer shows up
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on your power grid whether it's Crypt
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Miner or artificial intelligence based
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data center they start consuming a whole
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lot of power and the supply typically
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doesn't just go up like it takes a long
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time to increase your available power
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supply the only thing that might happen
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is that there are some redundant energy
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sources that you can react activate some
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old um coal based power plants that you
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can maybe trigger to to provide the
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power that you need but one of the
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issues they're having is that they just
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can't extend uh or increase their power
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supply anymore they're already maxed out
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so in that case the only consequence is
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like okay they're just going to be
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paying more for uh Power because this
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are simple laws of supply and demand
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Supply is the same demand goes up so
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prices go up as AI accelerates it's Al
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only make things more challenging some
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US states are actively pushing to become
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the next tech hubs for these AI data
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centers because they have Surplus power
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States like Wyoming Texas and North
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Dakota have vast SES of untapped energy
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potential Wyoming has been making big
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moves with wind energy while Texas is
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already home to some of the world's
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largest data
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centers these states have a unique
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opportunity to attract datadriven
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Industries but it's not just about
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having extra power they'll need the
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infrastructure to support it too of
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course building new data centers isn't
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all smooth saling the big cloud
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providers haven't been able to build
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data centers in areas where they would
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like to because there isn't enough power
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to power them nuclear is one way to do
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that it is also risky in the sense that
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it takes a long time for regulations to
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be put in place to allow you to build a
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new plant it can take a decade the
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really big plants that we built in the
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past take a long time to construct even
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if once you get the regulation nuclear
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seems like a good option for power
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generation as it doesn't create
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greenhouse gases however these plants
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are complicated from both a legal and
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construction standpoint as well as
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highly expensive and timec consuming to
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build not to mention aspects like
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nuclear waste management and the expense
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of eventual
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decommissioning for example the new
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hinley points SE site in the UK is
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currently predicted to cost £46 billion
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or $58 billion and not to be completed
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until
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2031 that's a 6-year delay on completion
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and a staggering 28 billion over the
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original £18 billion
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budget renewable energy sources like
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wind and solar are growing but they
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can't provide the consistent energy data
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centers demand Renewables like solar and
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wind are heavily dependent dependent on
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environmental conditions no wind means
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the turbines can't spin too many clouds
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and the solar panels become
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inefficient this creates an
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unpredictable and inconsistent method of
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power generation energy storage
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facilities are being widely developed to
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account for this
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inconsistency including lithium ion
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battery plants and renewable more
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eco-friendly Alternatives like gravity
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batteries and hydro storage
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facilities however these are systems
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that need to rely on a considerable
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amount of redundancy both in storage and
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for extra generation in optimal
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conditions which takes up more space and
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resources to
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achieve the problem with them is that
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they are too intermittent the data
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centers in AI need very little downtime
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on an annual basis and you can obviously
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supplement that by having a a very large
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footprint dedicated to say solo with big
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storage facilities but then you're
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getting into quite a lot of expense and
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you're still not drisking it and you
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still need to have a lot of thought back
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systems for when power is intermittent
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and it is not the right season and
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conditions aren't optimal and your
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storage facility is being run down on
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and and then you run the risk of the
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entire operation shutting down and
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needing to fall back on something like
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diesel that's why Tech giants like
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Google Amazon and Microsoft are backing
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startups looking to provide the next
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generation of nuclear power plants there
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are a number of startup companies are
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trying to build smaller nuke plants and
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they think they can build it very
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quickly the question becomes regulations
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will the government allow it uh and and
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that's to be seen now with the new Trump
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Administration coming on board it's much
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more likely they're going to be
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favorably inclined to allow that kind of
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technology in my opinion it's actually a
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good idea smrs or small modular reactors
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seem to be the magic answer to a lot of
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these power
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concerns companies like last energy and
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Rolls-Royce are looking to provide a
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bolt-on solution where data centers are
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able to have their own personal new
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nuclear power plant to directly generate
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electricity for their needs the modular
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aspect allows them to scale up as needed
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there's also talk about implementing
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these into areas like container ships to
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address shipping emissions numbers are
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currently being thrown around like the
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ability for a ship to run for 30 years
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without refueling they've essentially
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done an assessment of all the available
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Power Systems that are available to them
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and and decided that it's really only
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feasible that that amount of power can
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be generated by nucle
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it has additional benefits too like high
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base load power you can put it wherever
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you want but their energy projections
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are huge like I think over the the next
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20 years they're going to require
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somewhere in the region about 30 to 40%
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of um increase in power that the current
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the United States is currently utilizing
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although in development these smrs still
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have a long way to go predominantly in
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regulation after all safety is a major
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concern with anything nuclear for the
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time being we're seeing in companies
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like Microsoft striking Direct Energy
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deals with the likes of the 3M Island
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nuclear facility this will provide them
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power when it reopens properly in 2028
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after suffering the worst nuclear
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incident in US history in
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1979 in the meantime there's the
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question of how to balance energy usage
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for consumers versus AI operations
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initially the new data centers
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envisioned by Stargate will need power
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from somewhere they will come up with
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interest
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Solutions I think they're probably going
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to use gas problem with that obviously
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is that that's not feasible in all
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locations to run gas to remote locations
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um to do data centers and that kind of
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thing it's would be the same problem if
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you were to try to install transmission
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lines from grids to to for your data
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centers and a lot of the grids cannot
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afford to lose that much power to a Data
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Center and I think that happened to
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Amazon very recently where what they
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wanted to buy Off the Grid got shut down
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essentially and the utility provider was
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not allowed to provide them that power
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because it was it was too significant a
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portion of of what the utility company
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was able to provide to the the local
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population will people have enough power
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in their homes or will we have to choose
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between keeping the lights on and
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powering the AI of the future but it's
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not just power that data centers consume
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at an alarming rate all the power
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consumption creates Heat and the GPU
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chips processing AI data needs to be
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called that means fresh water and a lot
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of of it an average data center is
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estimated to use about 300,000 gallons
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or 1.2 million L of water every day just
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for cooling that's roughly the
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equivalent to the water usage of 100,000
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homes one Innovative idea is to build
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underwater data centers and use the
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oceans to call the AI processing chips
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naturally Microsoft has already
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experimented with an underwater data pod
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in the waters of Scotland the container
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behind me it fits on a it fits on a
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trailer it fits on a cargo ship and it
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allows us to actually build up this data
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center to any size that we want one of
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the upsides of the Stargate initiative
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touted by President Trump is hundreds of
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thousands of jobs that may be the case
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in construction but data centers need a
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few people to operate them once built
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they are not a Powerhouse for employment
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as Sweden discovered they gave power
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subsidies to data centers for like 6
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years 7even years since 2017 and they
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top last year um then they realized like
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okay we're not getting a lot of jobs
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from that uh we would prefer to put this
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power in steel manufacturing which is
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more labor intensive there's no easy
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answer here but one thing is certain
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ai's power demand will only keep growing
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can the US and the rest of the world
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handle it it depends on what time
00:14:50
Horizon you're talking about I mean in
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in one year things could be dramatically
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worse than today in five years you would
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expect that things have kind of you know
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calmed down and in 10 years or that's so
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far away
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like the world could be looking
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completely different by then indeed in
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the short term president Trump's
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Stargate initiative will be a massive
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challenge for power generation in the US
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even with some states having free energy
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Supply capacity the overall strain on
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the grid could push it to Breaking Point
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with grid upgrades on the table the
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future of AI powered America will depend
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on how we Balance power technology and
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the
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environment remember to hit the
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