Gas Pipeline Players in Talks To Fuel AI Datacenter Demand (theregister.com) 42
Proximity to natural gas lines could become just as desirable for datacenter operators as high-speed fiber-optic networks as they scramble to satiate AI's ever growing thirst for power. From a report: Speaking to analysts during their respective earnings call this week, executives at Energy Transfer LP and Williams Companies, both of which operate pipelines across the US, revealed they were in talks with datacenter operators to supply them with large quantities of natural gas. "We are, in four different states, in discussions with multiple datacenters of different sizes. Some of them, or many of them, want to put generation on site ... So it's an enormous opportunity for us," Mackie McCrea, co-CEO of Energy Transfer LP, told Wall Street, according to a transcript.
Energy Transfer LP's pipelines currently span 15 states in the USA, serving 185 power plants. Looking at the opportunity afforded by datacenter hookups, McCrea estimated that power demand could increase by 30 to 40 gigawatts over the next six to eight years. "We believe we are extremely well positioned to benefit from the anticipated rise in natural gas needs," Energy Transfer LP co-CEO Tom Long added. Energy Transfer LP isn't the only pipeline operator eager to take advantage of skyrocketing datacenter power demands. Speaking to analysts earlier this week, Williams Companies CEO Alan Armstrong expressed optimism about the firm's ability to capitalize on this demand.
Energy Transfer LP's pipelines currently span 15 states in the USA, serving 185 power plants. Looking at the opportunity afforded by datacenter hookups, McCrea estimated that power demand could increase by 30 to 40 gigawatts over the next six to eight years. "We believe we are extremely well positioned to benefit from the anticipated rise in natural gas needs," Energy Transfer LP co-CEO Tom Long added. Energy Transfer LP isn't the only pipeline operator eager to take advantage of skyrocketing datacenter power demands. Speaking to analysts earlier this week, Williams Companies CEO Alan Armstrong expressed optimism about the firm's ability to capitalize on this demand.
Gas okay now? (Score:3)
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So fossil fuels are OK now if they're going to supply data centers for AI?
People thought when the AI folks said they were "going green" they meant environment friendly, when they really meant bank account friendly. Silly people.
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Choices, maybe you want choices? (Score:2)
We know that AI and datacenters are using huge amounts of energy.
The discussion is how/what/where/and when to regulate this electricity and energy usage.
The same regulatory hand which changes how data centers use electricity can be used to regulate individual aspects of your daily life.
Neither for or against this, left, right or center. Transferring yet more authority to regulators for special cases like data centers may not be such a good long term move.
How about first, not allowing tax subsidies for comm
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This is just our daily "pretend that AI uses way more power than it does" post.
AI used maybe 20 TWh last year. Video gaming consumed ~250 TWh. The usual technique is to conflate "AI power consumption" with "all datacentre power consumption". Google's datacentre power consumption has doubled between 2019 and 2023. AI had almost nothing to do with that.
AI is certainly a fast growing part, and probably a couple years of exponential growth are locked in. But all of the fantastical numbers (most of all, VC-Br
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I forgot to add one part, which is:
Let's say you actually agree with both premises. That everyone always wants the best new models and AI will massively succeed, creating the requisite many trillions of dollars of economic growth, such that some percentage of that ultimately goes to fund said chip purchases and power. And that AI is now consuming some single-digit percentage of world power consumption. Well, then you're also creating huge growth in tax revenues. Which if the environment is your top priori
Re: Gas okay now? (Score:2)
"Well, then you're also creating huge growth in tax revenues. Which if the environment is your top priority, you can just dump that into environmental spending."
This is your dumbest take yet. Can != Will, and also it always costs more to clean up the problem than to make it. The taxes are also limited to a percentage of profits, not COST, so this is even a more worthless proposal than it might at first appear.
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If people care about other priorities more than the environment, that is their choice. The simple fact is that they'd have the money to do so if they chose. Money that they don't have now.
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Gas okay now?
Maybe they asked the AI to solve fusion power and are separating hydrogen out of sea water to use as fusion fuel.
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So fossil fuels are OK now if they're going to supply data centers for AI?
It's not.
The only way I'd say this is even remotely okay, is if they were using hydrogen fuel cells modified to use natural gas. Otherwise, hell no.
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100% this is for fuel cells, and theres technology that allows us to reuse the carbon atom to generate more methane.
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This is most likely to be used in fuel cells, where we dont burn methane but capture the carbon and use the hydrogen. Newest technology allows us to generate more methane from the carbon molecule, and use that "green" methane instead of mined.
Theres a lot of technology thats moving us pass burning or even drilling for methane.
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Until the data centers are willing to shut down at sundown, yes. Until they are willing to run at reduced capacity on cloudy days, also yes.
Tax that shit to hell (Score:4, Interesting)
If you're building new datacenters and power them with anything but CO2 neutral energy, you need to pay for all externalities, and that means you should be taxed into oblivion. Getting kinda sympathetic to environmental vigilantism reading these stories. How deaf, dumb and greedy can you be?
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It's only a problem because Americans decided as a whole that their businesses need not pay for externalities as a matter of course.
Americans have also decided that consumers don't need to pay for externalities either. Sure, businesses could spend more to be greener (pay for externalities), but those costs would be passed on to consumers, and consumers primarily make their purchasing decisions on cost. Our purchasing decisions drive businesses to lower costs, and cost lowering is frequently done by leveraging externalities.
But rich business owners and stockholders make too much money, if they made less money we would all be better you m
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Sure, businesses could spend more to be greener (pay for externalities), but those costs would be passed on to consumers, and consumers primarily make their purchasing decisions on cost.
Consumers haven't been asking for AI anyway, so might as well pass on the damn costs and let it fail in the marketplace when few people feel it's worth the money.
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"Externalities" can't be definitively proven in advance. You only know after the fact which enterprises leave behind a mess in need of cleanup and which don't.
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What needs to be understood by the general public is that nobody with actual resources, wealth, or influence is taking this problem seriously enough to put their money where their moths are.
What they will do is run some feel good scam-y advertising about how 'green' and carbon neutral they are, they might even buy some 'offsets' etc to and pay people to do something they would have done anyway. What they NEVER do is chose not to engage in their desired activity, they never invest the actual cost of making
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"...not saying ecology isn't important..." (Score:2)
Which you follow immediately with an argument that other things are more important. Rather disingenuous and quite a transparent fallacy, wouldn't you agree?
At the end of the day, you're not giving us anything to believe or understand here, you're just denigrating those who apparently are saying things you don't like. Rather like somebody trapped in their (second?) childhood.
BTW, contrary to your obvious disrespect for the assertions of a group of scientists, science is not the boogeyman here. Science h
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What I am saying the vast majority of the 'technocrats' and the people telling you things like 'trust the science' are not in it to save the planet, they are in it to establish themselves as a new aristocracy.
Most of the people "telling you things" are wealthy and well-connected, because it's difficult to spread a message far and wide on an average person's income. There are plenty of folks who think we shouldn't be trashing the environment and don't have any sort of ulterior motives behind their beliefs, but I suppose because they're not out making headlines, their opinion doesn't count.
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If you're building new datacenters and power them with anything but CO2 neutral energy, you need to pay for all externalities, and that means you should be taxed into oblivion. Getting kinda sympathetic to environmental vigilantism reading these stories. How deaf, dumb and greedy can you be?
Easier, cheaper solution: just tell them 'no'.
"Just say 'No'?" (Score:2)
Yeah, that worked great the first time around, didn't it?
Humor aside, go ahead and tell 'em 'no'. As long as they don't break the law, I get the impression they'll just ignore you - does the expression 'there's gold in them thar hills!' ring any bells?
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This is pants-on-head stupid (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't know if these people are mentally ill or if they're just criminals.
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Don't even bother trying to argue with
AI is silly (Score:2)
Anyone old enough to remember these 3dfx commercials?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
I sort of feel like this is the punchline with AI right now. We could be using it to accelerate @folding at home or something worthwhile. Instead we're using it to enable the grammatically and artistically challenged.
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FWIW, I agree. Watson might've made a good candidate for the job. IBM's Blue Gene still would.
I wonder how many qbits it would take to solve a protien-folding problem?
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I guess that's the whole idiocracy thing at play right? Paraphrasing, "The world smartest scientist were focused on restoring hair loss and erections"
Dig and die (Score:2)
High pressure gas pipelines can be a good place to put long distance optical fibers, because they get disrupted less often than other routes. In my old company part of our East Coast fiber was known as the "dig and die" section.
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I have two words for you: "collateral damage".
One (two part) question - how much do you have to pay a tech nerd to work in a hazardous environment (as will periodically be necessary to service network hardware, it's more than two tin cans and a string here, we're going to need appreciable quantities of A/C current right next to the petroleum), and do you want anybody not trained primarily in liquid petroleum pipeline operations touching anything even remotely associated with infrastructure in the "dig and
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Good point. I think probably the active parts involving amplifiers, power supplies, etc. were put in Intermediate Laser Amplifier huts a safe distance away from the pipeline, so we're just talking about passive fiber cable running close to the pipeline.
I believe it was high pressure natural gas rather than liquid petroleum, but it's obviously a bad idea to accidentally dig up either of these.
Your .sig is vaguely appropriate here :)
Reduce gas flaring (Score:2)
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They will continue to flare because there's no financially practical way to capture that gas and deliver it to where it can be put to productive use.
Very smart people have already thought about this long ago.
Flaring is better than venting because carbon dioxide is far less dangerous than venting methane to the atmosphere.
What a list... (Score:2)