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Exxon Mobil and Chevron are leaping into the race to power artificial intelligence data centers, as the 2 oil majors wager tech firms will in the end flip to pure fuel to meet their large power wants.
Exxon unveiled plans this week to construct a pure fuel plant to power a data heart. The oil main says it will then use carbon capture and storage expertise to scale back the emissions of the plant by 90%.
“We’re working with different massive cap industrials to quickly deploy an answer that would supply each excessive reliability and low carbon depth power to meet the rising demand for computing power for artificial intelligence,” Exxon Chief Monetary Officer Kathryn Mikells instructed Wall Road analysts Wednesday with out disclosing names of the businesses’ the oil main is working with on the mission.
The fuel plant wouldn’t depend on the electrical grid and can be impartial of utilities, permitting quicker set up than conventional power era initiatives, Mikells mentioned. Exxon has not disclosed a buyer or a timeline for the mission.
Exxon has invested closely in constructing a carbon seize community alongside the Gulf Coast with greater than 900 miles of pipeline to transport CO2 from a number of industrial prospects to everlasting storage websites. The oil main estimates decarbonizing AI data centers might characterize up to 20% of its complete addressable marketplace for carbon seize and storage by 2050.
Chevron can be engaged on methods to power data centers, mentioned Jeff Gustavson, president of the oil firm’s new power enterprise, on the Reuters NEXT convention on Wednesday.
“That is one thing that our firm could be very nicely positioned to take part in,” Gustavson mentioned. Chevron is a serious nationwide fuel producer with power era tools and really massive tracts of land that might be used for data centers, the manager mentioned.
Gasoline over nuclear
Alphabet, Amazon, Microsoft and Meta have primarily purchased wind and solar power for his or her data centers as they search to mitigate the affect of their companies on the local weather. However the power wants of artificial intelligence are growing so large that the tech firms are looking for sources of electrical energy which might be extra dependable than renewable power.
The tech firms have proven a rising curiosity in nuclear power as a consequence. Microsoft helps to deliver the Three Mile Island nuclear reactor again on-line by buying power from the plant. Amazon and Alphabet’s Google unit are investing in next-generation, small nuclear reactors. Meta lately known as on firms to ship it proposals to build new nuclear plants.
However the fossil gasoline business and power analysts have argued for months that the tech sector will in the end have to embrace natural gas as a result of nuclear vegetation merely take too lengthy to construct.
Exxon CEO Darren Woods took a swipe at nuclear power Wednesday and claimed his firm is best positioned than any within the U.S. to meet the power wants of AI within the rapid and close to time period.
“In case you’re betting on nuclear and one thing coming down the street, there is a lengthy street forward of us,” Woods instructed Wall Road analysts on Wednesday. The small nuclear reactors that tech firms are investing will not be anticipated to attain commercialization till the 2030s.
Exxon will not be trying to begin a power era enterprise, the CEO mentioned. The corporate plans use its experience main massive initiatives to help set up power era for data centers within the early levels of the AI ramp up, Woods mentioned.
As soon as the early ramp up is completed, Exxon will deal with trapping and storing emissions related to data centers, and supplying decarbonized pure fuel to the power vegetation that run AI, Woods mentioned.