What does affordable energy abundance require?

At peak demand we got two to three percent from wind, solar and batteries. The traditional grid has to supply everything and that's at peak demand. So if you have traditional sources that can supply at peak demand, of course they can supply it every other time as well.

Is that why the utilities keep raising the prices? It's just the complexity of servicing all of this and building all of this?

Because you're adding new sources on and you have to build new transmission lines and you've got to operate the traditional sources in a more complicated fashion. And when the wind blows, what happens when the wind blows? Nuclear power plants operate relatively steady. Coal plants you can turn up and down but slowly. So when the wind starts to blow, natural gas turns down a little bit. You generate a little less electricity to balance out the increased wind power. The government pays that wind power producer four cents a kilowatt hour in a subsidy to pay it. That's straight from the federal government to the provider of that wind power.

Well, you're going to need the grid no matter what for industrial use. I mean, that's the foundation of industrial use. I mean, the scale of what we have to do just for industrial, but here's a good step for you, so a one gigawatt AI factory, if you wanted to do all solar, right, and I'm a big solar bull, okay, if you want to do all solar because solar's capacity factor is 20% because the sun doesn't shine all the time, with a capacity factor of 20%, a one gigawatt data center needs five gigawatts of solar. Each gigawatt of solar takes up 7,000 acres. So at five gigawatts, that's 35,000 acres. That's bigger than San Francisco. So where are you going to find the people, you know?

Very few people will embrace a nuclear reactor adjacent to their house. But nonetheless, I do think nuclear is actually very safe. There's a lot of scaremongering and propaganda around fission. Let's see if we can talk about fission. Fission is actually very safe. They obviously have this on the Navy. US Navy has this on submarines and aircraft carriers and with people really working right. I mean, submarines are pretty crowded place and they have a nuclear powered submarine. So I think fission is fine as an option. The regulatory environment makes it very difficult to actually get that done. Then it is important to appreciate just the sheer magnitude of the power of the sun. So this is here are some just important basic facts. Even Wikipedia has these facts, right?

Well, you're going to need the grid no matter what for industrial use. I mean, that's the foundation of industrial use. I mean, the scale of what we have to do just for industrial, but here's a good step for you, so a one gigawatt AI factory, if you wanted to do all solar, right, and I'm a big solar bull, okay, if you want to do all solar because solar's capacity factor is 20% because the sun doesn't shine all the time, with a capacity factor of 20%, a one gigawatt data center needs five gigawatts of solar. Each gigawatt of solar takes up 7,000 acres. So at five gigawatts, that's 35,000 acres. That's bigger than San Francisco. So where are you going to find the people, you know?

And that's how you power your data center. When that runs out or is so backlogged, you have to do what's called behind the meter, which means on your own property that you own, you build something for yourself. Now there's a problem with that. You would think, well, that's smart. Yes, but like in everything in America, there's regulation on top of regulation on top of regulation. And one of the most complicated regulatory schemes that you have to overcome is clean air permitting. So even if you say you're going to do behind the meter, then you're like, well, what can I do? Solar you can do, but it takes too much space for most places. Batteries you can do, but you need to generate the electricity in the first place.

I think this understanding has always been there. When I've talked to the hyperscalers, they also tell me that their plan is not to draw from the grid, is to basically set up their own power generation behind the meter. It's called co-location. In fact, I think ultimately this will bring down rates for residential consumers for two reasons. One is that when the data centers create their own power, they can sell back or donate back to the grid when they connect. They don't have to connect to the grid, but once they do, they can donate back. Then second, there's a number of fixed costs in power generation. It's not just variable. There's these large fixed costs. As you increase scale, those fixed costs get amortized over a greater amount of supply, and that brings down the variable rate, basically the meter rate for everybody.

And that's how you power your data center. When that runs out or is so backlogged, you have to do what's called behind the meter, which means on your own property that you own, you build something for yourself. Now there's a problem with that. You would think, well, that's smart. Yes, but like in everything in America, there's regulation on top of regulation on top of regulation. And one of the most complicated regulatory schemes that you have to overcome is clean air permitting. So even if you say you're going to do behind the meter, then you're like, well, what can I do? Solar you can do, but it takes too much space for most places. Batteries you can do, but you need to generate the electricity in the first place.

And that's how you power your data center. When that runs out or is so backlogged, you have to do what's called behind the meter, which means on your own property that you own, you build something for yourself. Now there's a problem with that. You would think, well, that's smart. Yes, but like in everything in America, there's regulation on top of regulation on top of regulation. And one of the most complicated regulatory schemes that you have to overcome is clean air permitting. So even if you say you're going to do behind the meter, then you're like, well, what can I do? Solar you can do, but it takes too much space for most places. Batteries you can do, but you need to generate the electricity in the first place.

Well, you're going to need the grid no matter what for industrial use. I mean, that's the foundation of industrial use. I mean, the scale of what we have to do just for industrial, but here's a good step for you, so a one gigawatt AI factory, if you wanted to do all solar, right, and I'm a big solar bull, okay, if you want to do all solar because solar's capacity factor is 20% because the sun doesn't shine all the time, with a capacity factor of 20%, a one gigawatt data center needs five gigawatts of solar. Each gigawatt of solar takes up 7,000 acres. So at five gigawatts, that's 35,000 acres. That's bigger than San Francisco. So where are you going to find the people, you know?