US tech giants have pledged to the White House to cover the power costs of their artificial intelligence data centers, which the Trump administration says will ensure consumers don’t pay higher utility bills.
Signed on Wednesday by Amazon, Google, Meta, Microsoft, OpenAI, Oracle and xAI, the agreement commits companies to “build, supply or purchase” the energy needed to build and operate data centers and not pass the cost on to consumers.
“Data centers (…) They need PR help,” said US President Donald Trump at a round table attended by government officials and representatives of Big Tech companies.
“People think that if the data center comes in, their electricity prices will go up, and it’s not going to happen. It’s not going to happen — and it’s not going to happen again for the areas where this happened,” he added.
According to a Harvard Kennedy School report from February, data centers across the US are growing on the back of AI, but the power-hungry technology is demanding more than available capacity in some parts of the country.
Data centers could account for up to 12% of all US electricity consumption by 2028, the report said. Data from the US Energy Information Administration shows that residential energy prices will increase by 6% in 2025 and are expected to continue to rise through 2027 and 2028.
Voters are worried about bills ahead of the midterms
Trump announced the pledge in his State of the Union address, and it comes ahead of November’s midterm elections, where voters are worried about the cost of living and the impact of AI data centers on the energy grid.
“Some centers have been rejected by communities for that, and now I think it’s going to be reversed,” Trump said, referring to data centers that have been canceled after local residents opposed the projects.
related to: Mining companies move deeper into AI, HPC as MARA can sell Bitcoin
The pledge promises that companies will pay for all new energy infrastructure required for their data centers and pay the costs of online infrastructure and energy, regardless of whether they use it or not.
The companies also pledged to hire locally, offer skills development programs and put their backup generators on the grid to avoid power shortages.
It’s unclear how Big Tech will follow through on its promises, and the White House has not said how the companies will follow through.
Eye AI: IronClaw competes with OpenClaw, Olas launches bots for Polymarket
