Xcel Energy CEO says US must scale up power infrastructure to meet AI challenge

The US must scale up its power infrastructure at a rapid pace not seen in at least 10 years to compete in a world of artificial intelligence, Xcel Energy CEO Bob Frenzel said Tuesday.

“We need to build at a pace of generation and transmission that we haven’t seen in the past decade,” Frenzel said at Semafor World Economy in Washington, DC. “It’s not impossible to achieve, but it’s gonna take a real committed effort from the federal government, state, and local governments.”

Frenzel pointed to the ambitious projects undertaken from the 1940s to 1960s, such as the interstate highway system, ports, airports, and the American electric grid, described as one of the greatest engineering feats of the 20th century.

The US needs to speed up the citing, permitting, and construction process of similarly large-scale infrastructure projects today, even if they make people “somewhat uncomfortable,” he added.

Frenzel also said that the conflict in Iran has shown the importance of maintaining a “resilient” national energy program, pointing to the importance of developing alternative energy sources such as wind and solar farms and nuclear reactors.

Speaking on the same panel at Semafor World Economy, Edison International CEO Pedro J. Pizarro said that the US needed every possible energy source in order to meet demand. “For us, all of the above means all of the above,” said Pizarro, citing former US President Barack Obama’s policy toward embracing all forms of energy generation.

If US consumers shift toward EVs instead of gas vehicles, their overall energy cost may drop, he added.