OPINION:
Do you use ChatGPT? How many times a day?
Publicly launched in November 2022, ChatGPT reached 100 million monthly active users in its first two months to become the fastest-growing application in history at that time. By February 2025, it had 400 million weekly active users.
How much energy do you think ChatGPT uses? Currently, about 39.98 million kWh per day enough to charge 8 million phones each year. That’s more electricity than at least 117 countries consume in a year!
Artificial intelligence (AI) is already increasing energy demand as it rapidly transforms our lives and can revolutionize health care, manufacturing, energy systems, emergency response, national defense, and more.
AI uses data to work. So do the devices you use daily to map your route to work or vacation, check the weather, take your telehealth appointment, program your thermostat, alarm system or refrigerator, or watch that show or sports event everyone’s talking about that you then must text or post about on social media.
That data is processed in data centers the size of sports arenas that warehouse thousands of computer servers, which handle internet transactions and algorithms worldwide. Data centers need energy to power the computers and equipment to do that 24/7 and to cool it all down.
Lots of it.
In 2023, data centers used 4.4% of total U.S. electricity. By 2028, they are expected to use as much as 12%. To put that in perspective, a recent study of the impact of Virginia’s emergence as a global data center hub, the Joint Legislative Review Commission, noted that one data center campus can use more power than is generated by a large nuclear reactor at Dominion’s existing North Anna Power Station. And one Microsoft data center can use as much power as the city of Seattle. This proliferation of AI coincides with dramatic growth of the internet-of-things, advanced manufacturing, electrification of transportation and buildings, the rise of telehealth and more.
Simply put, our current energy infrastructure, much of it designed and built in the 20th century, cannot meet the staggering demands of the 21st century. Our energy policy must evolve to reflect this reality while minimizing the devastating impact energy production can have on vulnerable communities and our fragile planet and keeping electricity affordable and reliable for American families. Clean energy and energy efficiency are two necessary components of any 21st-century energy policy sufficient to meet the needs of today and tomorrow.
As a policymaker for nearly two decades, I have witnessed and tried to get ahead of these trends. My efforts as a state legislator culminated in the passage of the Virginia Clean Economy Act of 2020, which unlocked the potential of wind and solar energy in Virginia while mitigating energy demand through energy efficiency programs. Shortly thereafter, the 117th Congress took historic steps towards modernizing our energy policy with the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and the Inflation Reduction Act through tax credits, grants, and other incentives promoting and accelerating the use of clean energy and energy efficiency technologies. Now, as a member of Congress, I remain laser-focused on building on these critical first steps.
Meanwhile, the Trump administration and congressional Republicans actively undermine our ability to meet growing energy demands without increasing prices and health risks for American families or further endangering our planet. Congressional Republicans adopted a budget resolution that sets the stage for repealing the energy tax credits, which would have incentivized well over 90% of the electricity generation poised to come onto the grid. The Trump administration looks to cancel a host of grants and loans that would modernize the electric grid and build new energy generation. President Donald Trump has essentially declared war on wind and solar power generation and allowed polluting coal plants set for retirement to continue operating, despite expert agreement that coal generation is more expensive and damaging to our planet and the health of our communities than solar, wind and even some forms of natural gas. At a time when the government, the private sector and research universities should harness and unleash new technologies to meet the moment, the Trump administration’s decimation of the federal workforce, attacks on research universities, and tariffs impacting the energy sector hinder our ability to do so.
This makes no sense.
As a mother, I constantly think about the world our children will inherit, and the quality of their lives relies on the energy policies we adopt today. We must consider our children, our environment, our economy, our communities and our global status. Clean energy and energy efficiency cannot be a footnote or afterthought. I will continue fighting to ensure both remain part of our 21st-century energy policy.
• Rep. Jennifer McClellan is the first Black woman to represent Virginia in Congress and serves as a leadership member in the Congressional Black Caucus and the New Democrat Coalition. In the current 119th Congress, McClellan sits on the House Energy and Commerce Committee.
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