By Nikki Luke, College of Tennessee and Conor Harrison, College of South Carolina
As Winter Storm Fern swept throughout america in late January 2026, bringing ice, snow and freezing temperatures, it left greater than 1,000,000 individuals with out energy, largely within the Southeast.
Scrambling to fulfill greater than common demand, PJM, the nonprofit firm that operates the grid serving a lot of the mid-Atlantic U.S., requested for federal permission to generate extra energy, even when it brought about excessive ranges of air air pollution from burning comparatively soiled fuels.
Power Secretary Chris Wright agreed and took one other step, too. He approved PJM and ERCOT – the corporate that manages the Texas energy grid – in addition to Duke Power, a significant electrical energy provider within the Southeast, to inform knowledge facilities and different massive power-consuming companies to activate their backup turbines.
The objective was to verify there was sufficient energy obtainable to serve prospects because the storm hit. Typically, these services energy themselves and don’t ship energy again to the grid. However Wright defined that their “industrial diesel turbines” may “generate 35 gigawatts of energy, or sufficient electrical energy to energy many hundreds of thousands of properties.”
We’re students of the electrical energy business who stay and work within the Southeast. Within the wake of Winter Storm Fern, we see alternatives to energy knowledge facilities with much less air pollution whereas serving to communities put together for, get by and recuperate from winter storms.
Information facilities use huge portions of vitality
Earlier than Wright’s order, it was exhausting to say whether or not knowledge facilities would cut back the quantity of electrical energy they take from the grid throughout storms or different emergencies.
This can be a urgent query, as a result of knowledge facilities’ energy calls for to assist generative synthetic intelligence are already driving up electrical energy costs in congested grids like PJM’s.
And knowledge facilities are anticipated to want solely extra energy. Estimates range extensively, however the Lawrence Berkeley Nationwide Lab anticipates that the share of electrical energy manufacturing within the U.S. utilized by knowledge facilities may spike from 4.4% in 2023 to between 6.7% and 12% by 2028. PJM expects a peak load progress of 32 gigawatts by 2030 – sufficient energy to produce 30 million new properties, however almost all going to new knowledge facilities. PJM’s job is to coordinate that vitality – and work out how a lot the general public, or others, ought to pay to produce it.
The race to construct new knowledge facilities and discover the electrical energy to energy them has sparked huge public backlash about how knowledge facilities will inflate family vitality prices. Different issues are that power-hungry knowledge facilities fed by pure gasoline turbines can harm air high quality, eat water and intensify local weather harm. Many knowledge facilities are positioned, or proposed, in communities already burdened by excessive ranges of air pollution.
Native ordinances, laws created by state utility commissions and proposed federal legal guidelines have tried to guard ratepayers from value hikes and require knowledge facilities to pay for the transmission and era infrastructure they want.
All the time-on connections?
Along with inserting an growing burden on the grid, many knowledge facilities have requested utility firms for energy connections which are energetic 99.999% of the time.
However because the Nineteen Seventies, utilities have inspired “demand response” packages, by which massive energy customers agree to scale back their demand throughout peak occasions like Winter Storm Fern. In return, utilities provide monetary incentives reminiscent of invoice credit for participation.
Through the years, demand response packages have helped utility firms and energy grid managers decrease electrical energy demand at peak occasions in summer time and winter. The proliferation of good meters permits residential prospects and smaller companies to take part in these efforts as effectively. When aggregated with rooftop photo voltaic, batteries and electrical automobiles, these distributed vitality assets may be dispatched as “digital energy vegetation.”
A special method
The phrases of information middle agreements with native governments and utilities typically aren’t obtainable to the general public. That makes it exhausting to find out whether or not knowledge facilities may or would quickly cut back their energy use.
In some circumstances, uninterrupted entry to energy is important to take care of vital knowledge programs, reminiscent of medical information, financial institution accounts and airline reservation programs.
But, knowledge middle demand has spiked with the AI increase, and builders have more and more been keen to think about demand response. In August 2025, Google introduced new agreements with Indiana Michigan Energy and the Tennessee Valley Authority to supply “knowledge middle demand response by focusing on machine studying workloads,” shifting “non-urgent compute duties” away from occasions when the grid is strained. A number of new firms have additionally been based particularly to assist AI knowledge facilities shift workloads and even use in-house battery storage to quickly transfer knowledge facilities’ energy use off the grid throughout energy shortages.
Flexibility for the longer term
One examine has discovered that if knowledge facilities would decide to utilizing energy flexibly, an extra 100 gigawatts of capability – the quantity that may energy round 70 million households – could possibly be added to the grid with out including new era and transmission.
In one other occasion, researchers demonstrated how knowledge facilities may put money into offsite era by digital energy vegetation to fulfill their era wants. Putting in photo voltaic panels with battery storage at companies and houses can increase obtainable electrical energy extra shortly and cheaply than constructing a brand new full-size energy plant. Digital energy vegetation additionally present flexibility as grid operators can faucet into batteries, shift thermostats or shut down home equipment in intervals of peak demand. These initiatives can even profit the buildings the place they’re hosted.
Distributed vitality era and storage, alongside winterizing energy strains and utilizing renewables, are key methods to assist maintain the lights on throughout and after winter storms.
These efforts could make a giant distinction in locations like Nashville, Tennessee, the place greater than 230,000 prospects had been with out energy on the peak of outages throughout Fern, not as a result of there wasn’t sufficient electrical energy for his or her properties however as a result of their energy strains had been down.
The way forward for AI is unsure. Analysts warning that the AI business could show to be a speculative bubble: If demand flatlines, they are saying, electrical energy prospects could find yourself paying for grid enhancements and new era constructed to fulfill wants that may not truly exist.
Onsite diesel turbines are an emergency resolution for big customers reminiscent of knowledge facilities to scale back pressure on the grid. But, this isn’t a long-term resolution to winter storms. As a substitute, if knowledge facilities, utilities, regulators and grid operators are keen to additionally think about offsite distributed vitality to fulfill electrical energy demand, then their investments may assist maintain vitality costs down, cut back air air pollution and hurt to the local weather, and assist everybody keep powered up throughout summer time warmth and winter chilly.
In regards to the Creator:
Nikki Luke, Assistant Professor of Human Geography, College of Tennessee and Conor Harrison, Affiliate Professor of Financial Geography, College of South Carolina
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