US Energy Secretary Open to Foreign Funding for AI Data Centers

(Bloomberg) -- US Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm signaled she’s open to tech companies receiving foreign investment to build data centers in the US, potentially adding a key voice of support for OpenAI CEO Sam Altman’s effort to line up overseas investors for costly AI infrastructure projects.

“Money is green,” Granholm said at a conference hosted by the Special Competitive Studies Project on Thursday, in response to a question about whether the US government cares where the capital comes from. “As long as there’s some boundaries on them, I think it’s fine.”

Granholm, who attended a White House roundtable this month with Altman and other executives on AI infrastructure, said at Thursday’s event that any funding deals should consider what kind of access foreign investors have to intellectual property and ensure that data centers are built in the US. 

Altman has been seeking to raise billions in funding from investors in the Middle East and other markets to expand the physical infrastructure needed to support the future development of artificial intelligence. He has also met with US officials to get them on board with the plan. 

Altman and his team aim to start with investments in the US, including building data centers, increasing energy capacity, and expanding semiconductor manufacturing, Bloomberg has reported. 

Related:DOE Report Exposes Critical Impact of AI on Data Center Power Consumption

After the White House meeting this month, OpenAI shared a document with government officials outlining the economic and national security benefits of building massive data centers in various US states that would each use as much power as entire cities. But energy executives have said powering these data centers would be a challenge.

At the conference, Granholm said the Department of Energy has been working closely with large AI companies to address the increasing power demand from data centers and create a “concierge service” to help them get the support they need.