US Energy Chief urges data center supporters to fight back against their opponents

Chris Wright, the U.S. Energy secretary, said that critics of data centers are "overblown" at a?Amazon Web Services event on Tuesday.

Wright listed the concerns that opponents have raised regarding the boom of the facilities, including the use of water and electricity and that artificial intelligence will harm communities and take away jobs.

He said, "These are things that everybody is saying. Right now, in the polls, they're winning."

Wright, the former CEO of the oilfield services?company Liberty Energy compared the situation to the opposition he encountered over the drilling method?for gas and oil known as fracking. Wright stated that "they cannot win and will not win". This month, a /Ipsos poll showed that only 1 in 3 Americans approve of the rapid?pace at which data centers are being built. The issue is on the minds and campaigns of voters ahead of the midterm elections scheduled for November 3.

Wright, without going into detail, said that opponents of data centers raise real concerns. Wright also mentioned the possibility that artificial intelligence might enable "some bad" things. The issues are not unreal; they're "just overblown." He encouraged supporters to talk with their skeptical neighbors. "You should be incredibly proud of what you are doing... Share a little bit?of that pride and?those facts?with everyone around you."

He said, "We will roll over opposition to data centres faster than we would otherwise do."

Investors are also raging over data centers. Kevin O'Leary - a television personality and celebrity investor - recently apologized for his comments that opponents to his 40,000 acre data center in Utah are funded by China or the Chinese Communist Party. He said he "had no evidence." O'Leary agreed to reduce the scope of his project in order to protect wildlife. (Reporting and editing by Matthew Lewis in Washington, Timothy Gardner)

(source: Reuters)