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ARTICLE · 11 AUGUST 2025

Trump Administration Gives Data Centers A Big Push

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As information systems have expanded, the electricity needs of data centers have grown exponentially, largely from crypto-mining and artificial intelligence (AI).

United StatesEnergy and Natural Resources
Gail Suchman
Gail Suchman
Mark F. Sundback
Mark F. Sundback
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As information systems have expanded, the electricity needs of data centers have grown exponentially, largely from crypto-mining and artificial intelligence (AI). Data centers operate at high load factors and require dedicated reliable electricity for significant computation and cooling demands.

For the last few years, many data centers constructed in the U.S. have emphasized their use of renewable energy. With the Administration's change of policy regarding wind and solar generation, and its desire to return to fossil-fuel derived electricity, it has prioritized powering data centers with traditional power resources.

On July 23, 2025, the Trump Administration issued an Executive Order for Accelerating Federal Permitting of Data Center Infrastructure (E.O. 14148) ("EO"). The EO defines a "Data Center Project" as "a facility that requires greater than 100 MW of new load dedicated to AI inference, training, simulation, or synthetic data generation."

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