During Wednesday’s House Appropriations Committee hearing, Rep. Michael Guest (R-MS) questioned Energy Secretary Chris Wright about competing in the international artificial intelligence race.
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00:03At this time, I would like to recognize my distinguished friend from the great state
00:07of Mississippi, the chairman of the House Ethics Committee, Congressman Guest.
00:13Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
00:14Mr. Secretary, thank you for being with us today.
00:17I want to thank you for ending the pause on LNG exports.
00:22I want to thank you for your commitment to replenish our strategic petroleum reserve.
00:28And I also want to thank you for setting an agency goal that you list as unleashing American
00:32energy dominance while strengthening our national security.
00:37I noticed in your testimony on page three, you talk about the importance of AI, artificial
00:42intelligence.
00:44You refer to it as the next Manhattan Project.
00:46I've also heard it referred to as the next space race.
00:51You list there that we need all energy sources to power the global AI race and meet growing
00:57data center energy demands, including nuclear, gas, geothermal, coal, while also ensuring
01:06the security of the grid.
01:08And so I would ask if you would just take a brief moment to talk to the committee about
01:14how the department is planning to meet the growing energy needs, not only of data centers,
01:21which are extremely important.
01:22But also we know it as advanced manufacturing as we bring more advanced manufacturing online.
01:28The energy needs of transportation now as we see more vehicles being electrified.
01:33So can you just tell us briefly your goal as to how you would like to see the Department
01:39of Energy move forward to make sure that we have the energy necessary to compete in this
01:45AI race?
01:46Fantastic.
01:47Love the question and love the premise of how critical AI is.
01:52And I've called it the next Manhattan Project for a reason.
01:56I'm sure you're aware, you know, in the original Manhattan Project, Nazi Germany was also trying
02:02to develop atomic bomb.
02:04So the cost of being second was just devastating.
02:07Like that was a race, not you want to win.
02:10We had to win.
02:11And I think AI has similar overlay, you know, we, we see the great commercial and personal
02:17lifestyle uses of AI already, but its uses will be dramatically impactful to basic science.
02:24And maybe I'll get to that later, but also to national defense.
02:27If we are lagging, if we're behind China in AI, our sovereignty, our national defense is
02:34at risk.
02:34I think it is not an option for us to get second in AI.
02:38And I think in the last administration where we saw very little growth in America's energy
02:43production capacity, we were on a road where we were not going to lead in AI.
02:49So as I think you and I both believe, we need to lean in.
02:52And if we're going to win AI, it is an energy intensive manufacturing industry.
02:58We have to enable the growth, dramatic growth of American energy production if we are to lead
03:03in AI.
03:04Fortunately, we have the resources, we have the businesses, and we have the technologies
03:08here to invest in those energy things.
03:11The main thing I view the department and the government as a whole is to get out of the
03:15way and to enable private businesses and enterprises to bring the hundreds of billions of dollars
03:22of capital investment that will be needed to lead in AI.
03:27You mentioned LNG exports and natural gas.
03:29Today, natural gas is by far the U.S.'s largest source of electricity.
03:35It's fast to stand up.
03:37We got a lot of capacity rooms to grow there.
03:39We want to remove barriers to growing that.
03:42Nuclear I think has a huge runway.
03:45It's not grown in the United States for decades, but it could and it should.
03:49That is another reliable, affordable, dispatchable energy source, very well suited for AI.
03:55Coal.
03:56Coal is the largest source of electricity in the United States for decades and on the globe
04:02for a hundred years.
04:03And we've been dramatically shrinking our coal capacity when we want to grow our electricity
04:08generating capacity.
04:09That just makes no sense.
04:10Mr. Secretary, I agree with you.
04:12This is a race we can't afford to lose.
04:14You mentioned nuclear as being a key component.
04:17We've heard a lot about SMRs, small modular reactors.
04:20But I also want to talk more about large scale nuclear reactors.
04:23In my home state of Mississippi, we have the Grand Gulf Nuclear Power Facility, which is
04:29the most powerful single unit nuclear power plant in the United States.
04:33It is also one of the most efficient and most reliable.
04:37The facility there that has operated that nuclear power facility has an existing early site permit
04:47that expires in 2027.
04:50So that permit, which existed for 20 years, will soon expire.
04:54They have indicated to me that they would like to renew that permit, but have also talked
04:59about that being cost prohibited, that it is projected to cost tens of millions of dollars
05:04just to renew a permit where there has been very little done.
05:08And so in my last few seconds here, can you talk about how important it is to cut red tape
05:13and to streamline the permitting process for projects such as that?
05:18Just central.
05:19Look, our nation became great.
05:21We have gorgeous buildings like the one we're in right now because before in America, we built big,
05:26grand things with a reasonable balance between being safe, being careful of the local environment,
05:32and making stuff happen.
05:33Now that balance has swung so far, it's easy to stop something, it's hard to do something.
05:39I am all in on trying to change that.
05:41You've got a great nuclear power plant with a fantastic operating record.
05:45It should be a quick audit of how it's working, what it's doing, and it should be easier and much cheaper
05:50to extend that permit and keep the plan operating.
05:53I am fully aligned with that objective.
05:55And thank you for raising it publicly.
05:57Thank you, Mr. Secretary and Mr. Chairman, I yield back.