Series
The Utility-AI Leadership Edge Part I: How Utility COOs Can Harness AI to Deliver Resilience, Reliability, and Growth
AI is transforming utility operations as COOs face soaring electrification, data-center load, extreme weather, and aging infrastructure. The shift from reactive to predictive, AI-driven management is now essential for reliability, resilience, and meeting rising customer expectations.
Managing Data Center Uncertainty Part III — The Utilization Paradox: Scarcity and Waste Inside AI Infrastructure
AI’s energy problem isn’t shortage—it’s misalignment. GPU clusters run at just 60–70% utilization due to data bottlenecks, creating hidden flexibility. With minimal peak curtailment, the grid could integrate ~100 GW of new load. Smarter governance—not more power—is the real solution.
Managing Data Center Uncertainty Part II — Phantom Data Centers: How Strategic Opacity Drives Overbuild
AI developers are inflating power demand with phantom data centers—projects that exist on paper but never connect. Utilities build for the illusion, regulators approve the excess, and ratepayers bear the cost. Increased transparency can break the cycle.
The Cognitive Grid Part I: Why the Grid Is Now an Intelligence Problem
AI is turning electricity from a passive utility into active intelligence. As algorithms shape forecasting and dispatch, power becomes adaptive and moral. Cognitive Infrastructure Theory (CIT) argues that the grid’s greatest challenge isn’t capacity—but governance.
Managing Data Center Uncertainty Part I — The Uncertainty Problem
AI has broken the grid’s forecasting logic. Data-center demand could double—or stall—by 2028. The problem isn’t prediction, it’s governance. Smarter rules, transparent data, and flexible pricing—not overbuild—will determine how well the grid survives the AI era.