White House to host Big Tech in pledge to rein in power costs

2 weeks ago 10

Jarrett Renshaw and Laila Kearney

Wed, February 25, 2026 astatine 11:06 AM CST 2 min read

By Jarrett Renshaw and Laila Kearney

Feb 25 (REUTERS) - The White House plans to big starring information halfway and artificial quality companies including ‌Microsoft, Anthropic and Meta Platforms successful aboriginal March to formalize a ‌deal to shield consumers from rising energy costs, according to 2 sources acquainted with the ​plans.

The gathering is expected to beforehand an inaugural President Donald Trump unveiled during his State of the Union code connected Tuesday, successful which helium said helium had told large exertion firms they indispensable physique their ain powerfulness plants to tally ‌the rapidly-expanding fleet of ⁠data centers and different artificial quality infrastructure.

The pledge nether treatment is expected to lucifer commitments already offered earlier this twelvemonth ⁠by Microsoft to put successful caller energy procreation and ratio measures, the sources said.

"We admit the Administration’s enactment to guarantee that information centers don’t lend to higher ​electricity prices ​for consumers," said Brad Smith, Microsoft's ​Vice Chair and President. The institution ‌did not accidental whether it would beryllium successful attendance adjacent week oregon whether it would motion immoderate caller pledge.

The White House did not instantly respond to requests for comment. A spokesperson for Meta declined to remark and Anthropic did not instantly respond to a petition for comment.

Trump has made the ‌global AI race, and securing the immense amounts ​of energy needed to powerfulness it, a ​primary absorption of his 2nd ​term. That agenda, however, has go politically precarious up of ‌the midterms arsenic vigor request maturation ​from information centers pushes ​up powerfulness bills implicit a wide swath of the country.

The caller proliferation of elephantine information halfway projects — needed for the enlargement of artificial ​intelligence technologies — has been ‌met with expanding section and authorities protests implicit concerns of rising ​bills and contamination tied to the developments.

(Reporting by Laila Kearney and ​Jarrett Renshaw; editing by Timothy Gardner)

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