United States President Joe Biden signed an executive order on Tuesday to accelerate the development of next-generation artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure in the country.
According to the order, the US Department of Defense and the US Department of Energy will lease federal sites to host gigawatt-scale AI data centers, enable interconnection of AI infrastructure to the electric grid and lower electricity prices for consumers. The Department of Interior will also provide developers with lands suitable for clean energy that can support the AI data centers.
The developers building AI infrastructure on the federal sites will have to pay the full costs of building and maintaining the infrastructure, procure new clean energy generation resources that meet their electricity needs and that can be delivered to the AI data centers, and they will have to meet safety and security requirements. They will also have to buy "an appropriate" amount of domestically manufactured semiconductors.
