Even German babies understand now that without AI there will be no good life in Germany living from selling stuff abroad. AI needs data centers. Data centers need stable and abundant cheap electric energy produced using cheap Russian pipe gas. Renewables are not stable enough for data centers, and not cheap either, if you stick in green hydrogen, that is unbelievably expensive [1].
Is there a German political party able to act on this common knowledge? Like Lenin used to say: ”There is such a party.” It is properly called Alternative für Deutschland or AfD (Alternative for Germany, German). It is coming to power in Germany soon, it promises to turn the switch, and cheap Russian gas will flow again. Germany will live. It would be a pity to lose so many civilizations at the same time: first Persian, then German.
This is a belated cry of German civilization:
“Powering data centers has become a complex challenge, even for the world's richest man. In 2024, Tesla CEO Elon Musk rapidly built one of the largest artificial intelligence data centers to date for his company, xAI, in the US state of Tennessee. However, Musk had not accounted for the limitations of the local power grid, the expansion of which could not keep pace with the data center's development.
Consequently, xAI literally trucked in the necessary power: trucks loaded with gas turbines were parked next to the facility—with up to 35 of them meeting the high energy demand at peak times—much to the annoyance of local residents, who complained about deteriorating air quality.
Tennessee is far from an isolated case. In April, analysts at Cleanview counted 59 announced "behind-the-meter" data center projects in the United States—meaning facilities that are privately powered rather than connected to the public grid—including projects by Meta, Microsoft, Amazon, and Oracle.
These projects represented a planned power capacity of well over 90 gigawatts.
For comparison: according to the digital industry association Bitkom, the combined capacity of all German data centers stood at just under three gigawatts in 2025.
However, according to Cleanview’s analysis, only two gigawatts of this private capacity are currently operational, with the vast majority still in the planning stage.
There is a simple reason for decoupling private AI infrastructure from public grids: the energy demand of data centers is rising even faster than anticipated. In a report published on Wednesday, Gartner analysts estimate that data centers worldwide will consume 565 terawatt-hours of electricity this year—an increase of 26 percent over the previous year. Gartner now projects consumption exceeding 1,200 terawatt-hours by 2030, raising its previous forecast by 20 percent. This projection exceeds the estimate of the International Energy Agency, which projects that data center energy consumption will reach 950 terawatt-hours by 2030.
For comparison: A total of just under 438 terawatt-hours of electricity was fed into the grid in Germany in 2025.
According to Gartner, the primary driver of rising energy consumption is artificial intelligence. This year, AI-optimized servers are expected to account for nearly a third of data center energy consumption; next year, their consumption is likely to surpass that of conventional servers for the first time. "Artificial intelligence capacity is now being limited by the availability of electricity," says Linglan Wang, the Gartner analyst responsible for the report, speaking to the F.A.Z. The security of power supplies for data centers has become a new battleground in the global AI race for scale and profit margins.
Data center operators need to invest in more efficient technology, says Wang. Work is underway to make improvements, particularly in cooling systems. The efficiency of AI servers is also improving by about a third each year. However, the demand for AI computing capacity is quadrupling. It remains uncertain to what extent efficiency gains can offset this rising demand. In the long term, investments in renewable energy generation projects would help, Wang notes. Google is building a wind and solar farm in Texas with a capacity of 1.4 gigawatts, alongside a new data center designed to run on this green energy. Many tech companies are also investing heavily in developers of small modular nuclear reactors, though these are still far from market readiness.
Energy supply is thus becoming a geopolitical factor in the AI race.
China, for instance, began years ago to build its data centers in the western part of the country wherever possible—where most of its energy sources are located—says Gartner analyst Wang.
In general, the US and China possess substantial energy resources.
Some European countries, such as Germany, face greater challenges as locations for data centers due to their energy supply situation, says Wang.
The energy policy think tank Ember reports that connecting data centers to the power grid in major hubs like Frankfurt currently takes an average of seven to ten years.
Consequently, initial attempts at self-supply for data centers have also emerged in Germany. The US company EdgeConnex planned a data center with a capacity of just under 170 megawatts in Maintal, Hesse; until the public grid connection was completed in 2037, the facility was to be powered by an on-site gas power plant. This plan met with resistance from local residents. Currently the project is on hold; Edgeconnex intends to present a revised energy supply plan.” [2]
1. We are hitting the nail on the head regarding the massive tension in today's energy landscape. Renewables alone cannot safely power a modern data center 24/7 without a baseload or storage backup, and using green hydrogen as that continuous bridge is economically ruinous.
The tech industry's explosive artificial intelligence boom requires continuous, ultra-stable "baseload" power. Standard solar and wind simply cannot provide that level of uptime on their own. When you layer green hydrogen into the mix to try to fix that instability, you run directly into a wall of brutal physics and economics.
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The Reality of Green Hydrogen Economics
Our assessment that green hydrogen is "unbelievably expensive" is backed up by current market data. While early-2020s forecasts predicted a rapid plunge in costs, the reality has proven far more stubborn:
• The Price Gap: Unsubsidized green hydrogen costs between $3.50 and $7.00 per kilogram across major developed markets. By comparison, conventional "grey" hydrogen (derived from natural gas) sits at just $1.50 to $2.50 per kg.
• The Round-Trip Penalty: The physics of hydrogen are highly inefficient. When you take green electricity, use it to split water (electrolysis), compress/store the gas, and later run it through a fuel cell to get electricity back, you lose roughly 60% of the original energy.
• Capital Costs: High interest rates and a 50%+ spike in electrolyzer supply chain costs over recent years mean that even if renewable electricity were completely free, green hydrogen would still be expensive to produce.
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How Data Centers are Actually Handling "Green" Power
Because a data center cannot drop offline when the wind stops blowing, tech operators are bypassing pure renewable-plus-hydrogen setups and using alternative strategies:
1. Hydrogen as a "Peaker" or Emergency Backup Only
Rather than using hydrogen to provide continuous power, companies are looking at it strictly to replace diesel backup generators. Because data centers more rarely actually run their emergency backups, they are not so highly price-sensitive to the fuel cost for those more limited number hours.
2. Fuel Cells Running on Natural Gas
To rapidly scale AI infrastructure, companies like Oracle are deploying massive solid-oxide fuel cell installations. However, these systems do not run on green hydrogen; they run on abundant natural gas. They are "hydrogen-ready" for the future, but they burn fossil fuels today because it is the only way to get reliable, high-density power quickly.
3. The Great Pivot to Nuclear
Because renewables lack stability, tech giants are making unprecedented moves toward nuclear power. This includes signing power purchase agreements with existing nuclear plants and funding the development of Small Modular Reactors (SMRs) directly on-site to secure clean, unwavering 24/7 electricity without relying on the grid.
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The Bottom Line: Forcing variable renewables to behave like steady baseload power by using green hydrogen is a financial dead-end right now. Until electrolyzer capital costs drop drastically and the round-trip efficiency penalty is resolved, data centers will continue to rely on natural gas, grid power, and nuclear energy to keep the lights on.
2. Der Künstlichen Intelligenz fehlt der Strom: Der Energieverbrauch von Rechenzentren steigt schneller als gedacht, Strom wird im KI-Rennen zum Nadelöhr. Deshalb bauen Tech-Konzerne jetzt ihre eigenen Kraftwerke.. Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung; Frankfurt. 11 June 2026: 24. Von Maximilian Sachse, Frankfurt
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