China's push for green power use in AI projects faces hurdles, experts say

By Che Pan and Eduardo Baptista

BEIJING, June 22 (Reuters) - China's thrust to ramp up renewable powerfulness for its fast-expanding AI information centre assemblage is moving into hurdles, arsenic manufacture experts pass that forecasting ‌peak request remains hard and grid operators are wary of taking connected added risk.

Ensuring reliable energy ‌for AI-focused information centres has go a strategical priority, underscored successful China's 2026 authorities enactment study released earlier this year, which pledged stronger ​integration betwixt computing infrastructure and powerfulness proviso networks.

A cardinal portion of that effort is an ambitious program to transmission much greenish energy straight into the rapidly increasing information centre industry. Authorities purpose for renewables to proviso four-fifths of the sector's full powerfulness depletion by 2030, a crisp emergence from conscionable 11% successful 2023.

Power request from China's information centres is ‌projected to emergence by 300 cardinal to ⁠500 cardinal kilowatt-hours betwixt 2026 and 2030, accounting for 18% of full energy request maturation implicit the period, according to Pei Shanpeng, a manager of Chinese powerfulness steadfast State ⁠Power Investment Corp.

The bottommost scope of the estimation is astir equivalent to the UK's full yearly powerfulness consumption.

However, contempt booming request from China's information centres, the assemblage is simply a mediocre acceptable for greenish powerfulness providers compared with accepted energy-intensive industries ​such arsenic ​aluminium smelting, mostly due to the fact that its highest request is harder to ​predict, they say.

"At slightest for now, they ‌do not look to beryllium precise flexible (in managing powerfulness demand)," Pei said astatine an manufacture league successful Beijing past week.

"From what we understand, they (data centres) cannot truly set powerfulness depletion load much. GPUs are precise expensive, truthful erstwhile they are purchased, operators privation to usage them arsenic rapidly and arsenic intensively arsenic possible."

He said the propulsion to grow greenish powerfulness usage by information centres is aimed much astatine cutting emissions than lowering energy costs.

Experts besides said ‌wider adoption of nonstop green-power links to information centres could look ​resistance from grid operators, who interest specified networks would spot energy ​sales diminution and marque it harder to retrieve ​hefty investments successful transmission and organisation infrastructure if request slows oregon falls.

China's propulsion to ‌build nonstop grid networks for AI workloads comes ​as its fast-tracked information centre ​rollout has already started straining the powerfulness assemblage successful definite areas, expanding some mean and highest grid loads and forcing operators to equilibrium rising request with reliability risks, experts said.