U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright addressed a gathering at an Amazon Web Services conference on Tuesday and urged those who support the expansion of data centers to actively rebut critics, saying the worries surrounding the facilities have been "overblown." Wright identified several commonly cited objections, including the strains on water and power resources and fears that artificial intelligence deployed in the centers could cost jobs and harm communities.
"These are the things that everyone is saying and right now in the polls, they are winning," Wright said, noting the public debate is tilting toward opponents in recent surveys.
Wright, who previously served as chief executive of oilfield services firm Liberty Energy, drew a parallel between current resistance to data center projects and the pushback he experienced over the oil and gas drilling technique known as fracking. He expressed confidence that opponents will not prevail, saying, "They cannot win and they will not win."
A Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted this month found that only one in three Americans approve of the rapid pace at which data centers are being built, an issue the survey indicated is resonating with voters and political campaigns ahead of the November 3 midterm elections.
Wright acknowledged that opponents have raised legitimate points, including that AI enabled by data centers could permit "some bad things," though he did not provide further detail. He emphasized that the concerns are not entirely without merit but argued they are exaggerated: "It is not that the issues are unreal, they’re just overblown."
To counter that, Wright urged supporters to engage directly with skeptical neighbors and to highlight the positive aspects of their work. "You should be over-the-top proud of what you’re doing ... share a little bit of that pride and those facts with everyone around you," he said.
Speaking bluntly about the political dynamics, Wright added: "We’ll roll over the opposition to data centers faster than we otherwise should."
The debate over data centers has also caught the attention of investors. Celebrity investor and television personality Kevin O'Leary recently retreated from remarks suggesting opponents to his planned 40,000-acre data center in Utah were funded by China or the Chinese Communist Party, saying he had "no evidence" to support that claim. O'Leary has agreed to scale back the Utah project to protect wildlife.