Trump and Tech Giants Converge in Pittsburgh to Promote AI-Powered Energy Future

Trump and the Energy Industry Are Eager to Power AI With Fossil Fuels

At a Pittsburgh summit, the Trump administration, energy executives, and tech barons joined as one to promote AI as the future of fossil fuels. AI is "not my thing," President Donald Trump admitted during a speech in Pittsburgh on Tuesday. However, the president said during his remarks at the Energy and Innovation Summit, his advisors had told him just how important energy was to the future of AI. "You need double the electric of what we have right now, and maybe even more than that," Trump said, recalling a conversation with "David" -- most likely White House AI czar David Sacks, a panelist at the summit. "I said, what, are you kidding? That's double the electric that we have. Take everything we have and double it." At the high-profile summit on Tuesday -- where panelists and attendees included, in addition to Sacks, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, Google president and chief investment officer Ruth Porat, and ExxonMobil CEO Darren Woods -- companies announced $92 billion in investments across various energy and AI-related ventures. These are just the latest in recent breakneck rollouts in investment around AI and energy infrastructure. A day before the Pittsburgh meeting, Mark Zuckerberg shared on Threads that Meta would be building "titan clusters" of data centers to supercharge its AI efforts. The one closest to coming online, dubbed Prometheus, is located in Ohio, and will be powered by onsite gas generation, SemiAnalysis reported last week. For an administration committed to advancing the future of fossil fuels, the location of the event was significant. Pennsylvania sits on the Marcellus and Utica shale formations, which supercharged Pennsylvania's fracking boom in the late 2000s and early 2010s. The state is still the country's second-most prolific natural gas producer. Pennsylvania-based natural gas had a big role at the summit: The CEO of Pittsburgh-based natural gas company EQT, Toby Rice -- who dubs himself the "people's champion of natural gas" -- moderated one of the panels and sat onstage with the president during his speech. All this new demand from AI is welcome news for the natural gas industry in the US, the world's top producer and exporter of liquefied natural gas. Global gas markets have been facing a mounting supply glut for years. Following a warm winter last year, Morgan Stanley predicted gas supply could reach "multi-decade highs" over the next few years. A jolt of new demand -- like the demand represented by massive data centers -- could revitalize the industry and help drive prices back up. Natural gas from Pennsylvania and the Appalachian region, in particular, has faced market challenges both from ultra-cheap natural gas from the Permian Basin in Texas and New Mexico as well as a lack of infrastructure to carry supply out of the region. These economic headwinds are "why the industry is doing their best to sort of create this drumbeat or this narrative around the need for AI data centers," says Clark Williams-Derry, an energy finance analyst at the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis. It appears to be working. Pipeline companies are already pitching new projects to truck gas from the northeast -- responding, they say, to data center demand.

Energy and Innovation Summit Brings Government and Industry Leadership to CMU

Pennsylvania's national competitiveness as a hub for AI and energy technology brought the nation's top decision-makers to Carnegie Mellon University July 15 for the inaugural Energy and Innovation Summit. This gathering, convened by U.S. Sen. David McCormick and attended by U.S. President Donald Trump, saw energy sector experts, tech industry leaders and a bipartisan group of government officials from Pennsylvania including Gov. Josh Shapiro coalesce to discuss the future of energy technology. "When we started to talk about this summit, I knew immediately we wanted to do Carnegie Mellon," McCormick said. "A leading AI university, an incubator of great talent for our country." By hosting the summit, and through a series of faculty-authored position statements(opens in new window), Carnegie Mellon brought to bear its top-tier research and innovation on AI and energy. The 29 statements are focused on four key areas of impact: meeting AI energy demand, maximizing sustainability and protecting communities, boosting cybersecurity and defense, and accelerating innovation and discovery. They tackle some of society's toughest challenges today while pioneering new solutions for tomorrow. "For 125 years, CMU has been at the heart of the technological revolutions that have redefined industries, remade communities, and propelled our nation forward," CMU President Farnam Jahanian said. "We bring people together -- across sectors, across disciplines, and diverse perspectives -- to tackle the most pressing challenges of our time. And today is no exception." The Industry and Academic Expo which underpinned the event brought academia together with corporate partners and policymakers to strengthen Pennsylvania's rich ecosystems of industry and higher education. From live robotics demonstrations to displays marking progress in nuclear fusion and engineering, dozens of exhibits lined the halls of Carnegie Mellon's Cohon University Center to highlight the innovative work from across the state, including several from CMU. Representing the university's work in iron and steelmaking research and materials science, Bryan Webler, professor and co-director of the Center for Iron and Steelmaking Research and Sandra DeVincent Wolf, executive director of the Manufacturing Futures Institute and NextManufacturing Center, attended the event together and explained how the event presented a critical opportunity for their fields and associated industries. "Pittsburgh's long-standing history in materials and manufacturing -- specifically metals -- makes this the perfect place for the expo to happen," DeVincent Wolf explained. "A lot of people don't know that 40% of all of the metal powder that is produced in the U.S. is produced within an hour of here." The expo also served to connect faculty with the financial partners and leaders from varying levels of government who support CMU's academic enterprise. "There's been really big investment into the Pittsburgh ecosystem," Webler said. "Not just from the federal government, but the state government, and even different nations that have been really committed to bringing Pittsburgh into the advanced manufacturing era." School of Computer Science Research Professor Jeff Schneider(opens in new window) was on hand to showcase Carnegie Mellon's progress in the development of nuclear fusion. Much of the day's discussions centered on the need for data centers for AI and their large power demand. Schneider explained that CMU's ongoing research in fusion could allow for stable and sustainable energy output. "What's exciting about Pittsburgh is, being the center of AI, we're the ones that can play a pivotal role in how we discover nuclear fusion," he said. "I hope to get people more excited about it and get more support." Pittsburgh's role as an incubator for groundbreaking technology was a consistent theme, and a number of CMU-affiliated businesses and organizations -- Pittsburgh-based Astrobotic, Carnegie Robotics, Skild AI and Gecko Robotics among them -- participated alongside key university partners such as Google, NVIDIA, Amazon Web Services and Westinghouse. The summit also featured several panel discussions that gathered leaders to explore in-depth topics related to energy and the innovation economy. The first discussion of the day was titled "The AI Race And How To Win It," where academic and industry leaders, including Jahanian himself, discussed the importance of talent and knowledge of the kind that Carnegie Mellon seeks to foster. "The truth is that we cannot win the AI race without winning the race for talent," Jahanian said during the discussion. "CMU has been in this journey behind the science of learning for more than two or three decades." Other panels focused on the opportunities and challenges for energy, labor, data center development and further areas of innovation in Pennsylvania, including the growing need for an equipped workforce and expertise in artificial intelligence. The discussions featured contributions from United States Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick, Sen. McCormick, Gov. Shapiro, Pennsylvania Senate President Pro Tempore Kim Ward and others. Chief executives from approximately 50 companies, including household names like Google, Meta and Amazon Web Services, joined President Trump for a power-packed event to round out the day. The robust discussion featured a number of announcements from industry leaders which will help to shape the future of AI and energy. "We're back in Pittsburgh to announce the largest package of investments in the history of the commonwealth of Pennsylvania," Trump said. "This is a really triumphant day for the people of the commonwealth, and for the United States of America." University leaders view the summit as a springboard for ongoing efforts to showcase CMU's pivotal role in facilitating critical conversations about the future of energy, technology, business and society in America. As home of the Wilton E. Scott Institute for Energy Innovation, Block Center for Technology and Society, and Carnegie Mellon Institute for Strategy & Technology, answering questions of global competitiveness and meaningful innovation have consistently remained a strength of the university, and a key part of its mission to foster knowledge and pursue work that matters. "This summit offered our faculty a valuable opportunity to share their work with leaders across government and industry," said Theresa Mayer, vice president for research at Carnegie Mellon. "It was not just a chance to showcase innovation, but to help shape the national dialogue on energy, technology and competitiveness. When researchers are in conversation with decision makers, it opens the door to new partnerships and ensures that university expertise informs the strategies that move our country forward."

Trump Hails $92 Billion in Investments for AI, Energy Projects

President Donald Trump hailed more than $92 billion in investments in artificial intelligence and energy infrastructure during a visit to Pennsylvania, highlighting his efforts to bolster US competitiveness in the AI field. "Today's commitments are ensuring the future is going to be designed, built and made right here in Pennsylvania and right here in Pittsburgh and, I have to say, right here in the United States of America," Trump said Tuesday at the inaugural Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit at Carnegie Mellon University.

Trump joins tech and energy executives amid AI push

PITTSBURGH, Pennsylvania, July 15 (Reuters) - President Donald Trump will join executives from some of the largest U.S. tech and energy companies for a summit in Pittsburgh on Tuesday as the administration prepares fresh measures to power the U.S. expansion of artificial intelligence. Top economic rivals U.S. and China are locked in a technological arms race over who can dominate AI as the technology takes on increasing importance everywhere from corporate boardrooms to the battlefield. The Energy and Innovation Summit at Carnegie Mellon University is expected to bring tech executives and officials from top energy and tech firms including Meta (META.O), opens new tab, Microsoft (MSFT.O), opens new tab, Alphabet (GOOGL.O), opens new tab and Exxon Mobil to discuss how to position the U.S. as a leader in AI. Trump will use the summit - put together by U.S. Senator Dave McCormick, a Republican ally from Pennsylvania - to announce some $70 billion in artificial intelligence and energy investments in the state. Big Tech is scrambling to secure vast amounts of electricity supplies to power the energy-guzzling data centers needed for its rapid expansion of artificial intelligence. The CEOs expected to attend include Khaldoon Al-Mubarak of Mubadala, Rene Hass of SoftBank, Larry Fink of BlackRock, Darren Woods of ExxonMobil, Brendan Bechtel of Bechtel and Dario Amodei of Anthropic. The White House is considering executive actions in the coming weeks to make it easier for power-generating projects to connect to the grid and also provide federal land on which to build the data centers needed to expand AI technology, Reuters previously reported. The administration is also weighing streamlining permitting for data centers by creating a nationwide Clean Water Act permit, rather than requiring companies to seek permits on a state-by-state basis. Mike Sommers, head of the influential American Petroleum Institute, said executive action is welcomed to unlock the energy needed to power the data centers, but a more durable solution is needed. "Real durable permitting reform requires an act of Congress, not just an executive order," Sommers said in an interview with Reuters. Trump ordered his administration in January to produce an AI Action Plan that would make "America the world capital in artificial intelligence" and reduce regulatory barriers to its rapid expansion. That report, which includes input from the National Security Council, is due by July 23. The White House is considering making July 23 "AI Action Day" to draw attention to the report and demonstrate its commitment to expanding the industry, Reuters has reported. U.S. power demand is hitting record highs this year after nearly two decades of stagnation as AI and cloud computing data centers balloon in numbers and size across the country. The demand is also leading to unprecedented deals between the power industry and technology companies, including the attempted restart of the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania between Constellation Energy and Microsoft. The surge has led to concerns about power shortages that threaten to raise electricity bills and increase the risk of blackouts, while slowing Big Tech in its global race against countries like China to dominate artificial intelligence. Reporting by Jarrett Renshaw; Laila Kearney contributed reporting from New York; Editing by Colleen Jenkins and Stephen Coates Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles., opens new tab

Trump and Sen. Dave McCormick team up to promote energy investments in Pennsylvania

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Donald Trump and Sen. David McCormick of Pennsylvania will jointly announce roughly $70 billion of energy investments in the state Tuesday as the president travels to Pittsburgh for a conference with dozens of top executives to promote his energy and technology agenda. The Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit will be held at Carnegie Mellon University, and it comes as the state's political and business leaders are working to forge the city into a hub for robotics, artificial intelligence and energy. Trump has repeatedly pledged U.S. "energy dominance" in the global market, and Pennsylvania -- a swing state critical to his wins in 2016 and 2024 -- is at the forefront of that agenda, in large part due to its coal industry that the Republican administration has taken several steps to bolster. Neither the White House nor McCormick's office gave breakdowns of the $70 billion or what the investments entail. McCormick, a Republican first-term senator who is organizing the inaugural event, says the summit is meant to bring together top energy companies and AI leaders, global investors and labor behind Trump's energy policies and priorities. He says the investments will spur tens of thousands of jobs in Pennsylvania. "Pennsylvania is uniquely positioned because of abundant energy, of incredible skilled workers, technology," McCormick said in a Fox News interview Monday promoting the summit. "We need to win the battle for AI innovation in America, and Pennsylvania is at the center of it." The list of participating CEOs includes leaders from global behemoths like Blackstone, SoftBank, Amazon Web Services, BlackRock and ExxonMobil and local companies such as the Pittsburgh-based Gecko Robotics, which deploys AI to bolster energy capacity. Gov. Josh Shapiro, a Democrat, will also attend. Administration officials speaking at the summit include White House crypto czar David Sacks, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and Energy Secretary Chris Wright. In the Fox News interview, McCormick credited his wife, Dina Powell McCormick, with the idea for a summit. Powell McCormick served as Trump's deputy national security adviser in his first term and is a former Goldman Sachs executive who is now at BDT & MSD Partners, a merchant bank. Pittsburgh is home to Carnegie Mellon University, a prestigious engineering school, plus a growing industry of small robotics firms and a so-called " AI Avenue " that's home to offices for Google and other AI firms. It also sits in the middle of the prolific Marcellus Shale natural gas reservoir. Pennsylvania has scored several big investment wins in recent months, some of it driven by federal manufacturing policy and others by the ravenous need for electricity from the fast-growing AI business. Nippon Steel just bought U.S. Steel for almost $15 billion, getting Trump's approval after pledging to invest billions alone in U.S. Steel's Pittsburgh-area plants. Amazon will spend $20 billion on two data center complexes in Pennsylvania, with more to come, while a one-time coal-fired power plant is being turned into the nation's largest gas-fired power plant to fuel a data center campus. Meanwhile, Microsoft says it is spending $1.6 billion to reopen the lone functional nuclear reactor on Three Mile Island under a long-term power supply agreement for its data centers. Shapiro, elected in 2022, has been pushing for the state to land a big multibillion-dollar industrial project, like a semiconductor factory or an electric vehicle plant. In his first budget speech, Shapiro -- who is viewed as a potential White House contender in 2028 -- told lawmakers that Pennsylvania needs to "get in the game" and warned that it would take money. He didn't land a mega project, but he instead has worked to play up big investments by Amazon and Microsoft, as well as Nippon Steel, as he prepares to seek a second term. ___ Levy reported from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

Trump Hails $90 Billion in AI Infrastructure Investments at Pennsylvania Summit

Trump administration officials say winning the artificial intelligence race with China is a top priority. President Trump visited Pittsburgh on Tuesday to praise companies for investing more than $90 billion in data centers and other energy projects in Pennsylvania, aimed at accelerating the development of artificial intelligence. "Today's commitments are ensuring that the future is going to be designed, built and made right here in Pennsylvania and right here in Pittsburgh, and I have to say, right here in the United States of America," Mr. Trump said at the Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit at Carnegie Mellon University. The event was organized by Senator David McCormick, Republican of Pennsylvania, who brought together Trump administration officials and executives from technology and fossil fuel companies, including Amazon Web Services, Anthropic, Google, ExxonMobil and Westinghouse. At the event, the private equity firm Blackstone announced that it would invest $25 billion in new data centers and energy infrastructure, including natural gas power plants. Google said it would invest another $25 billion in data centers and announced a separate $3 billion plan to upgrade two of Pennsylvania's existing hydroelectric dams to produce more electricity. CoreWeave, an A.I. cloud company, said it would invest $6 billion in a large data center near Lancaster, Pa. Trump administration officials have said that winning the artificial intelligence race with China is a top priority. Officials have also said they want to make it easier to approve new natural gas and nuclear power plants to supply the enormous quantities of electricity needed to supply data centers. On his first day in office, Mr. Trump declared a "national energy emergency," saying the country did not have enough power to meet its growing needs for A.I. and ordering agencies to roll back environmental rules. Critics have said the Trump administration, by cutting research funding and gutting scientific agencies, has made it easier for China to catch up to the United States in the A.I. race. On Monday, the chipmaker Nvidia also said that the administration had lifted restrictions on selling certain types of A.I. chips to China. At the event in Pennsylvania, some executives said the state was an attractive place for artificial intelligence development because of its cheap natural gas. While companies in the region have managed to extract large amounts of gas from underground shale rock over the years through fracking, there often are not enough pipelines to ship all that gas to other states. Jon Gray, the president of Blackstone, said that his company would look at teaming up with utilities and developers to build data centers closer to new gas plants. "What makes us so excited about this area is that you can co-locate the data centers next to the source of power," he said. Environmentalists have criticized the Trump administration's plans to bypass environmental reviews and expand the use of fossil fuels like oil, natural gas and coal, saying that doing so will worsen air pollution and climate change. At the summit, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum dismissed those concerns. "I mean, really, this administration had identified early that there are two existential threats, and neither one of them is climate change," he said. "One is Iran getting a nuclear weapon. And then two is losing the A.I. arms race."

In Pennsylvania, Trump touts jobs, hails 'AI technological revolution'

President Donald Trump traveled to Pennsylvania Tuesday to claim credit for billions of dollars in investments that companies have planned, which he said would make the key swing state "a leading hub" for energy and artificial intelligence. The visit was the latest effort by the White House to tout what the president and his aides call the "Trump Effect." Many of the deals for which the president has taken credit predate his presidency, however, or are part of companies' existing plans to partake in the AI gold rush. "We believe that America's destiny is to dominate every industry and be the first in every technology," Trump said in Pittsburgh. "And that includes being the world's No. 1 superpower in artificial intelligence." Trump spoke at an event organized by Sen. David McCormick (R), who said 20 companies had pledged to invest $56 billion in the state's energy infrastructure and $36 billion in new data centers that will need the additional power. The list of 20 investments included deals that have not yet been finalized, as well as previously reported energy ventures. Private equity giant Blackstone, for example, promised to invest $25 billion in energy infrastructure and data centers in coming years. The company says it is under contract for several data centers but did not specify how many. Westinghouse Electric Corporation's plans to deploy 10 large nuclear reactors were first reported more than a month ago by the Financial Times. The company estimates that the projects would have a $6 billion impact, but it doesn't project construction to begin until 2030. Other nuclear projects in the U.S. have been plagued by extensive delays. Trump highlighted his dealmaking prowess at the event at a time when the economy has begun showing signs of strain, related in part to his policies. Inflation increased in June, with prices rising 2.7 percent as tariffs began to boost prices of furniture and other everyday goods. Trump downplayed the news Tuesday, saying the inflation report was "very good, very much inside the margin." Amid economic uncertainty, Americans are spending less, including on their summer vacations. Those could prove troubling political signs for Trump, who swept swing states last year in part because voters thought he would usher in relief after the high inflation of 2022 and 2023. One-third of swing-state deciders who ultimately voted for Trump cited the economy as the reason they voted for him in a post-election Washington Post-Schar School poll. White House officials also minimized the rise in inflation, which was up from a 2.4 percent annual pace a month ago. Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro (D) expressed skepticism about whether the pledged $90 billion in investments in his state would materialize, vowing to a group of reporters that he would be "working to hold them to the commitment." "There's a difference between what someone says in a press release today and when shovels go into the ground in the future," he said, standing in front of Carnegie Mellon University's squash courts about an hour before the president was scheduled to arrive on campus. Shapiro said he had talked to "some of the CEOs" who announced investments, but not all of them. He said he has had no contact with the Trump administration about Tuesday's announcements. How much impact the multibillion-dollar announcements would have on the Keystone State's economy was not immediately clear. While some of the deals could create thousands of temporary jobs -- constructing new data centers or energy infrastructure, for example -- the projections companies released here showed relatively few long-term positions. Capital Power announced $3 billion over the next decade to improve a gas facility in Shamokin Dam, for example. The venture is expected to create 30 jobs once construction finishes. Blackstone projected that its $25 billion venture would create 6,000 construction jobs and 3,000 permanent jobs. In May, Pennsylvania had more than 6.2 million jobs, according to government statistics. In Pittsburgh, Trump was surrounded by dozens of tech, finance and energy leaders, who have largely sought to embrace the Trump administration despite at times clashing with his populist policies. Palantir CEO Alex Karp, BlackRock CEO Larry Fink, Google chief investment officer Ruth Porat and Amazon Web Services CEO Matt Garman were among the attendees. (Amazon founder Jeff Bezos owns The Washington Post). Some details about the investments began to emerge on Tuesday morning, as tech companies rolled out announcements. Google said it would invest more than $25 billion in data centers across the PJM power grid, which provides electricity across 13 states and the District of Columbia. The company also announced a partnership with Brookfield Asset Management, which will allow it to access hydroelectric power to support its data centers. Brookfield touted the $3 billion deal as "the world's largest corporate clean power deal," at a time when the Trump administration has sought to claw back many of the environmental friendly initiatives implemented by the Biden administration through the massive legislative package which passed Congress earlier this month. Shapiro criticized that legislation, calling Trump hypocritical. "It's somewhat ironic that we are here talking about energy jobs when the bill that the president is touting would gut 26,000 energy jobs," he said. Trump has claimed credit for a series of multibillion dollar data-center and technology deals since he won the election, some of which were in the works long before his victory. During his first week in office, he appeared at the White House with tech CEOs to take credit for a multibillion dollar data center known as "Stargate." The deal had been in the works since at least March of last year. During his Middle East trip in May, the White House announced dozens of deals it said Trump had secured during his visits to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. A Washington Post analysis found at least half a dozen of those contracts were announced before Trump took office.

Live updates: Trump heading to Pittsburgh for major energy and AI summit

President Donald Trump is heading to Pittsburgh on Tuesday to speak at a major summit on energy and artificial intelligence. The gathering, organized by Sen. Dave McCormick (R-Pennsylvania), aims to showcase his state's potential as a leader in innovation and is drawing industry leaders and global investors. Trump, meanwhile, is pushing the Senate to move forward with legislation to claw back more than $9 billion in previously approved foreign aid and funding for public broadcasting. The House has already passed a rescissions bill, as it is known. The Senate faces a Friday deadline to get the legislation to Trump's desk.

Sneak peek: Trump, McCormick plan $70 billion in AI, energy announcements for Pennsylvania

The inaugural Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit, at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, aims to ignite "Pennsylvania's incredible potential to power the AI revolution," McCormick says. Why it matters: In addition to Trump's attendance, McCormick has drawn energy and AI leaders from around the world, including over 60 CEOs, to showcase the economic and national-security benefits of building AI infrastructure such as data centers and power generation. Zoom in: McCormick will say the $70 billion in investment represents the "largest investment commitment in these industries in terms of dollars for the state and jobs created in the history of the Commonwealth," organizers tell Axios in a preview. * "Anticipated investments include new data centers, new power generation and grid infrastructure to meet surging data center demand, along with AI training programs and apprenticeships for businesses," the preview says. * Blackstone president and COO Jon Gray will announce a $25 billion investment in data-center and energy infrastructure development in Northeast Pennsylvania, along with a joint venture for increased power generation. The project is expected to bring 6,000 construction jobs annually, plus 3,000 permanent jobs. Behind the scenes: McCormick and his wife, Dina Powell McCormick, are hosting events showing off Pittsburgh's most iconic venues to summit attendees coming from around the world. McCormick said in a statement to Axios: "President Trump has put together a bold strategy to strengthen and maintain America's AI and energy dominance." * McCormick said the summit "is the first of its kind to convene the top CEOs and leaders from energy, AI, labor, and the world's largest sources of capital, demonstrating that Pennsylvania is ready to lead in the AI and energy revolution." Among the CEOs expected to attend: ExxonMobil's Darren Woods, Chevron's Mike Wirth, BlackRock's Larry Fink, Palantir's Alex Karp, Anthropic's Dario Amodei, Amazon Web Services' Matt Garman, Bechtel's Brendan Bechtel, Bridgewater's Nir Bar Dea, GIC's Lim Chow Kiat (Singapore), Brookfield's Bruce Flatt, CPP Investments' John Graham and EQT's Toby Rice. * Also attending are Ruth Porat, Alphabet and Google's president and chief investment officer; Raj Agrawal, KKR's global head of real assets; and Khaldoon Khalifa Al Mubarak, managing director and group CEO of Mubadala Investment Company (Abu Dhabi). Trump administration officials: Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent; Interior Secretary Doug Burgum; Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick; Energy Secretary Chris Wright; Environmental Protection Agency administrator Lee Zeldin; White House chief of staff Susie Wiles; and David Sacks, White House AI and crypto czar.

Five key takeaways from the AI-energy summit with Trump

Why it matters: Big investments unveiled in Pittsburgh -- plus C-suite and Cabinet wattage there -- highlight how fueling data centers is a massive challenge and opportunity. Some takeaways from the daylong event at Carnegie Mellon University organized by Sen. Dave McCormick (R-Pa.) ... 💵 1. The numbers are eye-popping. The biggest announcement was Blackstone's plan to invest $25 billion in data centers and gas-fired energy in Pennsylvania, and its new joint venture with PPL. * Catch up quick: Others include CoreWeave pledging $6 billion for data center development in Lancaster, and Homer City Redevelopment planning what McCormick's office called $15 billion in gas purchases from producer EQT Corp. for a computing campus. * The bottom line: All told, the senator's office tallied over $90 billion worth of planned investments. * What we're watching: Follow-through. "We're going to be working with these companies to hold them to the commitments," Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro (D) told reporters on the sidelines. 🏭 2. Fossil fuels and nuclear dominated. While Google's hydro deal with Brookfield got plenty of love, the overall event was light on renewables, and DOE head Chris Wright knocked wind and solar. Trump went after wind, too. * The big picture: "You need the natural gas or coal infrastructure in order to provide these giant AI data centers the power that they need," Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick claimed onstage. (Democrats respond that wind, solar and batteries are cheaper and faster.) * The intrigue: The lineup favored message over debate, with environmental voices lacking, and Energy Secretary Chris Wright bashed "crazy train" European and Democratic energy policies. * Fun fact: The most extensive climate comments I heard came from, yes, Exxon CEO Darren Woods. He called for "thoughtful" ways to deal with emissions without sacrificing economic growth, and discussed the oil giant's work on CO2 capture and hydrogen. 🗳️3. It was a possible 2028 preview. Shapiro is a potential Democratic White House contender, and used his appearance at a GOP-organized event to appeal to the center. * Case in point: Shapiro noted the state's legislative power split between the parties. "For me to get any bill to my desk requires votes from the Republican Party and the Democratic Party, and I think if you enter every discussion focused on your differences, you'll never get anything done," he said. 🧑🤝🧑4. Co-location got more love from Trump. The president's remarks again promoted building new generating facilities that directly supply data centers instead of feeding power grids, calling it a faster approach. * Context: Companies including Exxon and Chevron are planning to build gas plants to directly power AI infrastructure. Blackstone President Jon Gray called putting data centers adjacent power sources the "special sauce," noting it avoids new transmission needs. * Yes, but: The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission is still weighing how it considers co-location. 📁5. A bipartisan permitting overhaul is a must. Trump touted his team's executive efforts to speed project approvals, but a top executive -- Bechtel Group CEO Brendan Bechtel -- said permitting legislation is vital. * Why it matters: "It is the single biggest thing that could help enable this AI and energy infrastructure build-out," said Bechtel, who's also a top official with the Business Roundtable. * State of play: "The thing that the Business Roundtable is really focused on gearing up for the fourth quarter this year is helping push for bipartisan, durable permit reform," he said. "Unfortunately, you cannot do good, long-term balanced permit reform through executive order only." Ryan Deto and Daniel Moore contributed

Pittsburgh makes big AI pitch with natural gas backing

Why it matters: National figures are converging on the city Tuesday to pitch Pennsylvania as a future hub for energy-powered AI -- and local companies, civic leaders and lawmakers want to lead the charge. Context: President Trump and Sen. Dave McCormick will be in Pittsburgh on Tuesday to promote a $70 billion plan to boost natural gas and data center development across Pennsylvania. What they're saying: Shiv Rao, CEO of AI medical documentation platform Abridge, said at the AI Horizons Summit event in the Strip District that Pittsburgh was key in launching his fast-growing company because the local talent was primed to be early in development of AI technology. Zoom in: Nicholas Robinson of Cerberus Capital Management said AI driven by domestic power is a national security matter and leaders like Sen. McCormick told him he is intent on making that point. * Carnegie Robotics CEO John Barnes said he wants to see autonomous technologies expanded into the military, saying commercial companies like his are set up well to operate with the Department of Defense. * Alan Shepard, president and CFO of natural gas company CNX Resources, said the Appalachian region has "everything that is needed for AI, including the power right under our feet." Pennsylvania held 106 trillion cubic feet of natural gas reserves as of 2022, the second most in the nation, just behind Texas, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. * Gecko Robotics CEO Jake Loosararian said AI and robotics can help aging power plants in the Pittsburgh and Ohio Valley region run more efficiently and increase output. Caveat: Efforts to reinvent Pittsburgh after the collapse of the steel industry have come and gone. * Fracking expanded in the 2010s, but the promised downstream manufacturing jobs never materialized. * Autonomous vehicle companies boomed starting in 2015, and then moved, sold off or shut down by 2022. State of play: Monday's preview event came across as a sales pitch to national investors, with leaders trying to make the case that Pittsburgh is a smart bet for AI -- and that the $70 billion investment is only the beginning. * "We are open for business," said Rick Siger, state secretary of economic development for Gov. Josh Shapiro. What's next: Robinson, of Cerberus Capital Management, hinted Monday that multiple large business deals would be announced over the next few days.

Trump to unveil $70bn AI and energy plan at summit with oil and tech bigwigs

Pittsburgh event angers climate groups as Trump ties AI expansion to oil and gas, sidelining renewable energy Donald Trump will join big oil and technology bosses on Tuesday at a major artificial intelligence and energy summit in Pittsburgh, outraging environmentalists and community organizations. The event comes weeks after the passage of a megabill that experts say could stymy AI growth with its attacks on renewable energy. The inaugural Pennsylvania energy and innovation summit, held at Carnegie Mellon University, will attempt to position the state as an AI leader, showcasing the technological innovation being developed in the city and the widespread availability of fossil fuel reserves to power them. At the gathering, Trump will announce $70bn in AI and energy investments for the state, Axios first reported, in a move the event's host Republican Pennsylvania senator Dave McCormick says will be a boon to local economies. But activists say the investment, which will boost planet-heating energy production, will have disastrous consequences for the climate and for nearby communities. "Pennsylvanians are paying the price for decisions made behind closed doors: higher utility bills, contaminated water, poor air quality, and worsening health," said Hilary Flint, Pennsylvania field organizing manager at the non-profit Center for Oil and Gas Organizing. Flint signed a Tuesday letter to Pennsylvania governor Josh Shapiro opposing his plans to work with Trump to expand AI, along with dozens of organizations and individuals. The event also comes less than two weeks after Republicans on Capitol Hill passed a Trump-backed budget bill which could dramatically increase the spending and effort needed to power AI data centers, thanks to its rollback of green energy tax credits. Renewable energy is almost always cheaper to build and easier to bring online than fossil fuels. Many tech executives invited to the event have said the availability of wind and solar are essential to the success of AI. Microsoft's Satya Nadella said last May that powering data centers with renewable energy would "drive down the cost of AI", while OpenAI head Sam Altman said months earlier that "there's no way" to grow his industry without a "breakthrough" in affordable clean energy technology. Tech giants Google and its parent company Alphabet, as well as Meta have also both invested in wind and solar to power data centers. But the oil industry, whose top brass are also at the Pittsburgh summit, lobbied in favor of the megabill's green energy incentive rollbacks. "It includes almost all of our priorities," Mike Sommers, president of the American Petroleum Institute, the fossil fuel industry's largest lobbying group, told CNBC about the legislation. Sommers is on the guest list for the event. The gathering, to which no public interest consumer or environmental groups were invited, is expected to severely downplay the climate and health consequences of this technological expansion fueled by oil and gas. Data centers used for AI are highly resource intensive, sometimes consuming as much power as entire cities. By the end of the decade, data processing, mainly for AI, is expected to consume more electricity in the US alone than manufacturing steel, cement, chemicals and all other energy-intensive goods combined, according to the International Energy Agency. "Political leaders should be investing their time meeting with frontline communities, environmental scientists, and renewable energy leaders and using their political muscle to create a just transition to renewable energy -- not attending summits that double down on old, dirty energy," said Jess Conard, Appalachia director at the environmental group Beyond Plastics, who lives in the nearby town of East Palestine, Ohio. "Fossil fuels aren't progress, no matter how you try to rebrand them." Critics have also raised concerns about security and privacy in the wake of AI's growth. The New York Times and other plaintiffs, including prominent authors Ta-Nehisi Coates, Michael Chabon and Junot Díaz and the comedian Sarah Silverman, are suing OpenAI and Microsoft for copyright infringement; OpenAI has also received scrutiny for reported labor misconduct. Both OpenAI and Microsoft have defended their positions around copyright infringement allegations. "Trump's radical AI plan is yet another example of the President siding with powerful corporations ahead of the American people," said Tyson Slocum, director of the energy program at the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen.

Pittsburgh lands spotlight in $90B AI and energy investment push

Why it matters: Pittsburgh has reinvented itself since the steel industry collapse, staving off economic fallout, but those efforts haven't created a booming and fast-growing metropolis. * The region's and state's biggest leaders are confident it could reach those heights if it can attract enough investment for AI. Driving the news: President Trump, Sen. Dave McCormick, Gov. Josh Shapiro and dozens of leaders in tech, energy and diplomacy visited Carnegie Mellon University for the Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit on Tuesday. * McCormick announced $90 billion of investment from about 20 companies in Pennsylvania's energy and tech sectors at the summit. Between the lines: American Petroleum president and CEO Mike Sommers told Axios there is a growing realization that AI is going to bring about a new industrial revolution, and Pennsylvania has the natural gas to fuel it. * Pennsylvania was second only to Texas in volume of natural gas reserves as of 2023, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. What they're saying: McCormick said it's about signaling to the world that Pennsylvania is worth investing in. * "A big part of the opportunity is to sell our story," he said. * Shapiro said he will work to ensure the commitments made at the summit make their way back to Pittsburgh and Western Pennsylvania. "We are really committed to this region. I hope today has a catalyzing effect." Yes, but: Nuclear technology has big appeal too, and Cranberry-based Westinghouse plays a big role in that, said Brookfield Asset Management CEO Bruce Flatt. * Westinghouse, which builds nuclear power plants domestically and internationally, recently pledged to place 10 new reactors in America. Ryan's thought bubble: Presidential administrations love to use Pennsylvania to boost their efforts, and Tuesday's summit felt like the Republican version of the Biden administration coming to the city to boost its workforce efforts and sell its infrastructure bill. The other side: State Rep. Elizabeth Fiedler (D-Philadelphia) chairs the state House energy committee, and she said in a statement that Trump's efforts to raise energy prices and hurt renewable energy production as part of the "big, beautiful bill" are antithetical to Tuesday's summit. * "Temperatures are rising, people are running out of money, and now Trump and his billionaire friends are pushing prices even higher in their war against the clean energy revolution." The bottom line: The investments are a massive influx of private funding into the state, and leaders are bullish that the number will grow.

Trump pledges more power to match AI investments in Pennsylvania

Why it matters: Trump's endorsement of building new power plants -- and locating data centers right next to them -- reflects the growing thirst for electricity from the energy-intensive facilities. * Trump said the U.S. is already winning the artificial intelligence race with China, and that the new investments are crucial to keeping that status. * "Today's commitments are ensuring that the future is going to be designed, built and made right here in Pennsylvania and right here in Pittsburgh, and, I have to say, right here in the United States of America," Trump said alongside Pennsylvania Sen. David McCormick. Driving the news: Trump's remarks at an inaugural AI and energy summit in Pittsburgh backed coal, natural gas, nuclear and hydropower plants to feed AI demand. * Trump touted $56 billion in investment that he said would feed expanding energy infrastructure in addition to more than $36 billion for new data centers. * Blackstone announced at the summit it plans to invest $25 billion in American data centers and energy generation to drive AI innovation. Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro said he wants to ensure companies follow through on their pledges. * "There's a difference between what someone has said in a press release today and when shovels go into the ground in the future ... We're going to be working with these companies to hold them to the commitments," Shapiro, a Democrat, told reporters. Between the lines: Both political parties agree that rising energy demand is a national challenge, but energy policy around AI has broken along starkly political lines. * Trump and Republican lawmakers have seized on rising energy demand to keep coal and gas plants open while seeking to fast-track new fossil fuel plants. * Democrats respond that wind, solar, and batteries are the cheapest and quickest way to add power supply. * China is "opening up coal-fired plants all over the place," Trump said Tuesday. "And we're entitled and allowed now to do that, too." Zoom out: Trump said he supports allowing data centers to build their own power plants to get around delays in expanding the aging power grid. * "You're going to build your own electric factory, and you're going to make your own electricity," Trump said. "So this way you can have a great plant, and what you'll do is, if you have excess, you can sell it back into the grid." * U.S. energy regulators have been weighing arguments that so-called co-location arrangements could raise power prices for other grid customers. * The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has rejected a proposal from Talen Energy to feed Amazon data centers with nuclear energy. Some GOP lawmakers have pressed the commission to allow it. Trump also promised to tackle one of the biggest challenges that both parties have identified: permitting delays. * He praised EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin for speeding up the process and approving power plants. Zeldin recently began to seek to repeal rules regulating carbon dioxide emissions and mercury and hazardous air pollutants from power plants. * Speaking to Westinghouse officials, Trump said his nuclear regulators "will be very safe, but we're fast and safe. And you're going to get a whole different group of people." * The Trump White House is in the midst of a "total and complete reform" of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and recently fired a Democratic commissioner. -- With assistance from Ryan Deto.

Sen. David McCormick on the battle for AI innovation: 'Pennsylvania is at the center of it'

The Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit will be held at Carnegie Mellon University, and it comes as the state's political and business leaders are working to forge the city into a hub for robotics, artificial intelligence and energy. Trump has repeatedly pledged U.S. "energy dominance" in the global market, and Pennsylvania -- a swing state critical to his wins in 2016 and 2024 -- is at the forefront of that agenda, in large part due to its coal industry that the Republican administration has taken several steps to bolster. Neither the White House nor McCormick's office gave breakdowns of the $70 billion or what the investments entail. McCormick, a Republican first-term senator who is organizing the inaugural event, says the summit is meant to bring together top energy companies and AI leaders, global investors and labor behind Trump's energy policies and priorities. He says the investments will spur tens of thousands of jobs in Pennsylvania. "Pennsylvania is uniquely positioned because of abundant energy, of incredible skilled workers, technology," McCormick said in a Fox News interview Monday promoting the summit. "We need to win the battle for AI innovation in America, and Pennsylvania is at the center of it." The list of participating CEOs includes leaders from global behemoths like Blackstone, SoftBank, Amazon Web Services, BlackRock and ExxonMobil and local companies such as the Pittsburgh-based Gecko Robotics, which deploys AI to bolster energy capacity. Gov. Josh Shapiro, a Democrat, will also attend. Administration officials speaking at the summit include White House crypto czar David Sacks, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and Energy Secretary Chris Wright. In the Fox News interview, McCormick credited his wife, Dina Powell McCormick, with the idea for a summit. Powell McCormick served as Trump's deputy national security adviser in his first term and is a former Goldman Sachs executive who is now at BDT & MSD Partners, a merchant bank. Pittsburgh is home to Carnegie Mellon University, a prestigious engineering school, plus a growing industry of small robotics firms and a so-called "AI Avenue" that's home to offices for Google and other AI firms. It also sits in the middle of the prolific Marcellus Shale natural gas reservoir. Pennsylvania has scored several big investment wins in recent months, some of it driven by federal manufacturing policy and others by the ravenous need for electricity from the fast-growing AI business. Nippon Steel just bought U.S. Steel for almost $15 billion, getting Trump's approval after pledging to invest billions alone in U.S. Steel's Pittsburgh-area plants. Amazon will spend $20 billion on two data center complexes in Pennsylvania, with more to come, while a one-time coal-fired power plant is being turned into the nation's largest gas-fired power plant to fuel a data center campus. Meanwhile, Microsoft says it is spending $1.6 billion to reopen the lone functional nuclear reactor on Three Mile Island under a long-term power supply agreement for its data centers. Shapiro, elected in 2022, has been pushing for the state to land a big multibillion-dollar industrial project, like a semiconductor factory or an electric vehicle plant. In his first budget speech, Shapiro -- who is viewed as a potential White House contender in 2028 -- told lawmakers that Pennsylvania needs to "get in the game" and warned that it would take money. He didn't land a mega project, but he instead has worked to play up big investments by Amazon and Microsoft, as well as Nippon Steel, as he prepares to seek a second term.

Trump to unveil investments to power AI boom

US President Donald Trump heads to Pennsylvania on Tuesday to announce energy and infrastructure deals intended to meet big tech's soaring demand for electricity needed to fuel the AI boom. Trump will make the announcement at the inaugural Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit at Carnegie Mellon University. The tech world has fully embraced generative AI as the next wave of technology, but fears are growing that its massive electricity needs cannot be met by current infrastructure, particularly in the United States. Generative AI requires enormous computing power, mainly to run the energy-hungry processors from Nvidia, the California-based company that has become the world's most valuable company by market capitalization. Officials expect that by 2028, tech companies will need as much as five gigawatts of power for AI -- enough electricity to power roughly five million homes. According to an official who spoke to Bloomberg, Trump's announcement will total $70 billion in investments. Top executives from BlackRock, Palantir, Anthropic, Exxon and Chevron are slated to participate, the official said. The funding will cover new data centers, power generation, grid infrastructure, AI training, and apprenticeship programs. Google said it is committing $25 billion to build AI-ready data centers in Pennsylvania and surrounding regions. "We support President Trump's clear and urgent direction that our nation invest in AI... so that America can continue to lead in AI," said Ruth Porat, Google's president and chief investment officer, who attended the event. The search engine giant also announced a partnership with Brookfield Asset Management to modernize two hydropower facilities in Pennsylvania, representing 670 MW of capacity on the regional grid. Senator David McCormick, from Pennsylvania, said the investments "are of enormous consequence to Pennsylvania, but they are also crucial to the future of the nation." His comments reflect the growing sentiment in Washington that the United States must not lose ground to China in the race to develop AI. "If the United States does not lead this revolution on our own terms, we will hand control of our infrastructure, our data, our leadership, and our way of life to Communist China," McCormick wrote in a Fox News op-ed. Trump launched the "Stargate" project in January, aimed at investing up to $500 billion in US AI infrastructure -- primarily in response to growing competition with China. Japanese tech investor SoftBank, ChatGPT-maker OpenAI, and Oracle are investing $100 billion in the initial phase. Trump has also reversed many policies adopted by the previous Biden administration that imposed checks on developing powerful AI algorithms and limits on exports of advanced technology to certain allied countries. He is expected to outline his own blueprint for AI advancement later this month.

Trump to announce a $90 billion AI‑energy power play

If power is everything, President Donald Trump is about to plug America into a multibillion-dollar surge. At an energy and innovation summit in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, later on Tuesday, Trump is expected to announce one of the most sweeping infrastructure investment packages of his political career: $90 billion aimed at supercharging U.S. AI and energy systems. The rollout is set to take place at the inaugural Pennsylvania Energy & Innovation Summit, hosted at Carnegie Mellon University by Sen. Dave McCormick, a Republican who made domestic energy and AI development core issues in his Senate campaign. Trump, the keynote speaker, is likely to position the plan as both a national security imperative and an economic growth engine -- part of a broader strategy to cement U.S. dominance in AI and rebuild the country's power infrastructure to support it. "We've got commitments of more than $90 billion of investment in data centers, in energy production, in transmission, in distribution, and in investing in skilled workers," McCormick told CNBC. According to reporting from Bloomberg and Reuters, the initiative will combine federal incentives with private-sector commitments from some of the country's biggest players in tech and utilities. Google is slated to invest $25  billion in data center construction, AI cloud firm CoreWeave is expected to put $6 billion into a new campus, and electric utility FirstEnergy is planning to pour $15 billion into regional grid upgrades. Other expected participants include Meta, Microsoft, Amazon Web Services, and oil giants such as Chevron and ExxonMobil. CEOs from BlackRock, Anthropic, and Abu Dhabi investment company Mubadala are also expected to attend the energy summit. While the details of any federal funding or executive actions remain under wraps, this would be the latest in a series of moves by Trump to tie AI innovation to industrial revival. Earlier this year, he signed an executive order dismantling several Biden-era AI restrictions and unveiled an "AI Action Plan" that includes fast-tracked permitting for infrastructure and streamlined approvals for water, land, and power projects tied to AI development. Late on Monday, Nvidia announced that the Trump administration will allow the company's H20 chips back into China. With AI training models expected to consume as much as 30 times more power by 2035, the U.S. is facing a looming grid bottleneck. Big Tech is going all-in on domestic infrastructure as the AI boom strains U.S. energy and computing capacity. Meta plans to spend up to $72 billion this year, building out massive AI data centers -- including some experimental "tent" sites -- and locking in solar, geothermal, and even nuclear energy deals. In June, Amazon Web Services signed a $650 million, 10-year nuclear power deal with Talen Energy to supply its data center operations from Pennsylvania's Susquehanna plant -- part of a broader $20 billion regional investment that includes two major data campuses. Google just signed a $3 billion hydropower deal -- one of the largest clean-energy contracts ever -- to supply its U.S. data centers, and is expanding facilities in Ohio and Virginia. Microsoft has said it plans to pour money -- $80 billion -- into AI infrastructure. All together, the U.S. infrastructure expansion is a land-and-grid grab that hasn't been seen since the industrial era. But this time, the factories run on silicon and watts. For Trump, Pennsylvania makes for a symbolically rich backdrop. The state helped power the first Industrial Revolution with coal and steel; now, it's angling to become an AI and energy hub, leveraging its shale gas reserves, research universities, and swing-state status. That said, the president's $90 billion plan isn't without tension. Clean-energy advocates have warned that piecemeal executive orders can't replace long-term regulatory reform, especially if the Trump administration continues to aggressively roll back climate protections. There is also some irony related to Tuesday's announcement following Trump's recent announcement of steep tariffs on copper by August 1 -- because copper is critical for both grid expansion and data center construction. Still, the scale of Tuesday's expected commitments signals that corporate America is willing to bet big, especially when the federal government is smoothing the path. With China investing heavily in its own AI infrastructure, the U.S. seems to be doubling down on a new kind of arms race -- less about weapons and more about watts.

Trump and McCormick to announce $70 billion in AI and energy investments for Pennsylvania

The Pittsburgh region's assets will be on display for President Trump and the leaders of the country's largest energy and technology companies on Tuesday. Pennsylvania U.S. Senator Dave McCormick, organizer of the inaugural Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit, is set to announce $70 billion in new investments in the state. One project is set to target Aliquippa, which was once the steelmaking center of the Ohio Valley until it fell on hard times with the closing of the mill. But Aliquippa is looking at a rebirth, with the possible transformation of that site to power the artificial intelligence economy. "That thing's been sitting empty for close to 50 years of my life," Aliquippa Mayor Dwan Walker said. Walker remembers his steelworker father walking out of the mill for the last time and sitting on the porch crying the day it closed. Today, the mayor hopes that a technological revolution can bring his city back. "Being that we were the center of steel, now we can be the center of AI," Walker said. "I don't think, I know it can happen. I know in this day and age, 2025, Aliquippa can be a new tech hub." Artificial intelligence requires massive amounts of energy and computing capacity, and a local partnership headed by real estate developer Chuck Betters hopes to transform the 89-acre site of the old mill into a massive, multi-billion dollar data processing center, creating thousands of construction jobs, hundreds of permanent ones and generating tens of millions of dollars in tax revenue. "Large job creation, large tax base, and the comeback of Beaver County from the steel mill days," Betters said. At Tuesday's summit, the Pittsburgh region will be on display for the heads of the country's largest tech companies, showcasing both the technological innovations being developed here as well as the massive energy resources available to power them. Data centers will help spawn companies like Pittsburgh's Gecko Robotics, which recently became a unicorn -- a company worth more than $1 billion. Founder Jake Loosararian will demonstrate at the summit his AI-powered climbing robots and ask those tech leaders to invest here and help Pittsburgh take the next step. "We have the biggest leaders in the world in AI and energy coming to this city," Loosararian said. "We need to see investment from those companies into this region -- continue to do so. You'll start to see an ecosystem of companies like Gecko that begin to emerge." With energy in natural gas and nuclear, empty industrial sites ready for data center development, and a culture of innovation, leaders say the Pittsburgh region is uniquely positioned to be a world leader in AI. Walker believes that it can bring back Aliquippa's Franklin Avenue. "More businesses downtown, more strip malls, more access to revenue, that dollar flip two or three times in this community instead of leaving it," Walker said. If and when the site of the mill is developed, it will begin to merge the region's technological know-how with its vast energy resources, creating a new AI economy that leaders say will benefit everyone.

Carnegie Mellon University is perfect venue for energy and AI summit, leaders say

President Trump, several cabinet members, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, and the world's top leaders in energy and artificial intelligence will attend the Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit on Tuesday at Carnegie Mellon University, the perfect venue for these topics. "CMU has always been the place for machine learning and AI, and really this is a recognition of all the value CMU has brought to AI," said Zico Kolter, director of CMU's Machine Learning Department. Kolter, who oversees AI efforts at Carnegie Mellon, said this summit also highlights the influence western Pennsylvania has in this space. "We are going to see a lot of growth in these new sectors of the economy. We're going to see a lot of growth when it comes to energy, when it comes to things like data centers to power those new AI models that are being developed these days. Western Pennsylvania is a hub for this kind of work," Kolter said. Pennsylvania U.S. Senator Dave McCormick organized the summit and is set to unveil $70 billion for artificial intelligence and energy development across the state. It'll include building data centers, which require lots of energy to power AI. Don Smith, the president of RIDC, whose mission is to drive economic development, says the investment will bring jobs, boost the economy, and much more. "Those buildings and jobs will create taxes. So, it'll help the fiscal health of our municipalities. And really, we're talking about getting in the early stages of the biggest wave of new industrial development in a very long time. And so I think this bodes well for our ability to compete successfully in the AI economy," Smith said. Smith says western Pennsylvania is perfectly poised to lead the future of AI. "It's the combination of energy. The whole AI revolution is driven by computational power capacity, and then the talent. And we have those three things in abundance here," Smith said. Kolter said that as more companies develop in the region, it's going to encourage more investment. "It's going to just make it easier and easier for future innovators or future entrepreneurs to stay in the area to build up companies and AI and other tech areas in the region because the talent, the rest of the ecosystem needed to support the companies, is already going to be here," Kolter said. "Investments like this one, and one being discussed at the summit, and events like the summit, hopefully, can drive that further and can drive innovations in the space," he added.

Trump attending major energy and AI summit today at Pittsburgh's Carnegie Mellon University

President Trump will be in Pittsburgh Tuesday to attend a major energy and AI summit at Carnegie Mellon University. The Inaugural Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit, organized and hosted by Republican U.S. Sen. Dave McCormick, will also be attended by leaders of many of the country's largest energy and technology companies. McCormick is set to announce $70 billion in new investments into energy and innovation in the state. Among them will be the construction of data centers to help provide the enormous amounts of energy needed to power AI. The Pittsburgh region will be prominent at the summit, with a focus on technological innovations being developed here and the massive energy resources available to power them. The event comes shortly after Amazon's announcement of a $20 billion investment in data centers across Pennsylvania, the largest economic development project in the state's history, and a $14 billion partnership between Nippon Steel and U.S. Steel to boost domestic steel production and protect thousands of jobs. The White House says Mr. Trump is scheduled to depart Washington, D.C. at 12:30 p.m. and will be participating in the summit in Pittsburgh at 2:30. Several of the president's Cabinet members will join him at the summit. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, Energy Secretary Chris Wright, EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin, and White House AI and Crypto Czar David Sacks are among Trump administration officials listed as summit participants. Gov. Josh Shapiro, a Democrat, will also be there, participating in a panel about major investments in Pennsylvania that will be moderated by Penn State University President Dr. Neeli Bendapudi. Industry leaders like Alphabet President and CEO Ruth Porat, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, Blackstone President and CEO Jon Gray, Gecko Robotics Founder and CEO Jake Loosararian, EQT President and CEO Toby Rice, Amazon Web Services CEO Matt Garman are all listed as panel participants, as well. Mr. Trump's visit will not be without pushback, as evidenced on CMU's campus, where signs painted with the words "protest the summit" could be seen on The Fence. That sentiment on the CMU Fence was also posted on social media to, in the words of activists, "call on students and the Pittsburgh community to stand against fossil fuels, AI for surveillance, and authoritarianism."

Trump unveils $90 billion in energy and AI investments for Pennsylvania during summit in Pittsburgh

Michael Guise is a web producer for CBS Pittsburgh who has worked for KDKA-TV since 2019. President Trump and many leaders of the country's largest technology and energy companies announced more than $90 billion in new investments from private companies in Pennsylvania on Tuesday. Mr. Trump, who spoke for about 30 minutes during a roundtable discussion at the Inaugural Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit at Carnegie Mellon University, said 20 "leading technology and energy companies" will invest in Pennsylvania to develop a new artificial intelligence economy, capitalizing on Pennsylvania's technology and energy assets. "We're back in Pittsburgh to announce the largest package of investments in the history of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania," Mr. Trump said on Tuesday. Among the projects will be the construction of data centers to help provide the enormous amounts of energy needed to power AI, and an energy innovation center to train workers in the Pittsburgh region in energy and AI jobs. The event was hosted by Republican U.S. Sen. Dave McCormick, who said the Pittsburgh region is uniquely positioned to marry its technological know-how with its vast energy resources in natural gas and nuclear to create a new AI economy. He said the investments will bring "tens of thousands of jobs" to Pennsylvania. "Our vision for this event came from the realization about the crucial link between artificial intelligence and energy, but never before have the leaders of all those companies, as well as major investors, come together," McCormick said on Tuesday. Mr. Trump highlighted Westinghouse, saying the Pennsylvania-based company is set to build 10 nuclear reactors across the country. He also touted his involvement in consummating a $14 billion partnership between Nippon Steel and U.S. Steel, which he said will revitalize the Mon Valley. Mr. Trump said the investments announced on Tuesday will spawn the development of AI in the region. "We're building a future where American workers will forge the steel, produce the energy, build the factories and really run a country like, I believe, this country has never been run before. I think we have a true golden age for America," Mr. Trump said. "We've been showing it, and it truly is the hottest country anywhere in the world. I'm honored to be in Pennsylvania, and I'm honored to be in Pittsburgh, and you're going to see some real action here." The organizers are hoping the investment mark only a beginning, hopeful of leveraging the summit to ramp up energy production, build more data center and spawn new AI companies in the Pittbsurgh area -- making the region the center of AI in the country. "We have phenomenal technology resources inside of our universities systems," PNC Financial Services Group CEO Bill Demchak said on Tuesday. "We have an abundance of energy, we have Westinghouse in the area. We have labor availability and we have a huge need as we see the transformation that AI is causing." The event came after Amazon's announcement in June of a $20 billion investment in data centers across Pennsylvania, the largest economic development project in the state's history. Several of the president's Cabinet members joined him at the summit. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, Energy Secretary Chris Wright, EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin and White House AI and Crypto Czar David Sacks were among Trump administration officials listed as summit participants. Gov. Josh Shapiro, a Democrat, was also in attendance. He is participating in a panel about major investments in Pennsylvania, moderated by Penn State University President Dr. Neeli Bendapudi. Industry leaders like Alphabet President and CEO Ruth Porat, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, Blackstone President and CEO Jon Gray, Gecko Robotics founder and CEO Jake Loosararian, EQT President and CEO Toby Rice, and Amazon Web Services CEO Matt Garman were all listed as panel participants, as well. Mr. Trump's visit was not without pushback, as evidenced on CMU's campus, where signs painted with the words "protest the summit" were seen on The Fence. That sentiment on the CMU Fence was also posted on social media to, in the words of activists, "call on students and the Pittsburgh community to stand against fossil fuels, AI for surveillance, and authoritarianism." The advocates, who lined the streets across parts of the city, said the summit prioritizes corporate interests over sustainability and ethics. "I do believe we should be focusing more on renewable energy, green energy. Just kowtowing to oil and gas is not the way to the future," Zach Zourelias of Plum said. "I'm not saying get rid of it entirely. It is important for Pennsylvania, it is important for the country. But we need to be looking to the future, not the past."

Trump unveils investments to power AI boom

Pittsburgh (AFP) - US President Donald Trump went to Pennsylvania on Tuesday to announce $92 billion in energy and infrastructure deals intended to meet big tech's soaring demand for electricity to fuel the AI boom. Trump made the announcement at the inaugural Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit at Carnegie Mellon University, with much of the talk about beating China in the global AI race. "Today's commitments are ensuring that the future is going to be designed, built and made right here in Pennsylvania and right here in Pittsburgh, and I have to say, right here in the United States of America," Trump said at the event. The tech world has fully embraced generative AI as the next wave of technology, but fears are growing that its massive electricity needs cannot be met by current infrastructure, particularly in the United States. Generative AI requires enormous computing power, mainly to run the energy-hungry processors from Nvidia, the California-based company that has become the world's most valuable company by market capitalization. Officials expect that by 2028, tech companies will need as much as five gigawatts of power for AI -- enough electricity to power roughly five million homes. Top executives from Palantir, Anthropic, Exxon and Chevron attended the event. The funding will cover new data centers, power generation, grid infrastructure, AI training, and apprenticeship programs. Race to beat China Among investments, Google committed $25 billion to build AI-ready data centers in Pennsylvania and surrounding regions. "We support President Trump's clear and urgent direction that our nation invest in AI... so that America can continue to lead in AI," said Ruth Porat, Google's president and chief investment officer. The search engine giant also announced a partnership with Brookfield Asset Management to modernize two hydropower facilities in Pennsylvania, representing 670 MW of capacity on the regional grid. Investment group Blackstone pledged more than $25 billion to fund new data centers and energy infrastructure. US Senator David McCormick, from Pennsylvania, said the investments "are of enormous consequence to Pennsylvania, but they are also crucial to the future of the nation." His comments reflect the growing sentiment in Washington that the United States must not lose ground to China in the race to develop AI. "We are way ahead of China and the plants are starting up, the construction is starting up," Trump said. The US president launched the "Stargate" project in January, aimed at investing up to $500 billion in US AI infrastructure -- primarily in response to growing competition with China. Japanese tech investor SoftBank, ChatGPT-maker OpenAI, and Oracle are investing $100 billion in the initial phase. Trump has also reversed many policies adopted by the previous Biden administration that imposed checks on developing powerful AI algorithms and limits on exports of advanced technology to certain allied countries. He is expected to outline his own blueprint for AI advancement later this month.

Trump and Sen. Dave McCormick team up to promote energy investments in Pennsylvania

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Donald Trump and Sen. David McCormick of Pennsylvania will jointly announce roughly $70 billion of energy investments in the state Tuesday as the president travels to Pittsburgh for a conference with dozens of top executives to promote his energy and technology agenda. The Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit will be held at Carnegie Mellon University, and it comes as the state's political and business leaders are working to forge the city into a hub for robotics, artificial intelligence and energy. Trump has repeatedly pledged U.S. "energy dominance" in the global market, and Pennsylvania -- a swing state critical to his wins in 2016 and 2024 -- is at the forefront of that agenda, in large part due to its coal industry that the Republican administration has taken several steps to bolster. Neither the White House nor McCormick's office gave breakdowns of the $70 billion or what the investments entail. McCormick, a Republican first-term senator who is organizing the inaugural event, says the summit is meant to bring together top energy companies and AI leaders, global investors and labor behind Trump's energy policies and priorities. He says the investments will spur tens of thousands of jobs in Pennsylvania. "Pennsylvania is uniquely positioned because of abundant energy, of incredible skilled workers, technology," McCormick said in a Fox News interview Monday promoting the summit. "We need to win the battle for AI innovation in America, and Pennsylvania is at the center of it." The list of participating CEOs includes leaders from global behemoths like Blackstone, SoftBank, Amazon Web Services, BlackRock and ExxonMobil and local companies such as the Pittsburgh-based Gecko Robotics, which deploys AI to bolster energy capacity. Gov. Josh Shapiro, a Democrat, will also attend. Administration officials speaking at the summit include White House crypto czar David Sacks, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and Energy Secretary Chris Wright. In the Fox News interview, McCormick credited his wife, Dina Powell McCormick, with the idea for a summit. Powell McCormick served as Trump's deputy national security adviser in his first term and is a former Goldman Sachs executive who is now at BDT & MSD Partners, a merchant bank. Pittsburgh is home to Carnegie Mellon University, a prestigious engineering school, plus a growing industry of small robotics firms and a so-called " AI Avenue " that's home to offices for Google and other AI firms. It also sits in the middle of the prolific Marcellus Shale natural gas reservoir. Pennsylvania has scored several big investment wins in recent months, some of it driven by federal manufacturing policy and others by the ravenous need for electricity from the fast-growing AI business. Nippon Steel just bought U.S. Steel for almost $15 billion, getting Trump's approval after pledging to invest billions alone in U.S. Steel's Pittsburgh-area plants. Amazon will spend $20 billion on two data center complexes in Pennsylvania, with more to come, while a one-time coal-fired power plant is being turned into the nation's largest gas-fired power plant to fuel a data center campus. Meanwhile, Microsoft says it is spending $1.6 billion to reopen the lone functional nuclear reactor on Three Mile Island under a long-term power supply agreement for its data centers. Shapiro, elected in 2022, has been pushing for the state to land a big multibillion-dollar industrial project, like a semiconductor factory or an electric vehicle plant. In his first budget speech, Shapiro -- who is viewed as a potential White House contender in 2028 -- told lawmakers that Pennsylvania needs to "get in the game" and warned that it would take money. He didn't land a mega project, but he instead has worked to play up big investments by Amazon and Microsoft, as well as Nippon Steel, as he prepares to seek a second term. ___ Levy reported from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

Trump and Sen. Dave McCormick Team up to Promote Energy Investments in Pennsylvania

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Donald Trump and Sen. David McCormick of Pennsylvania will jointly announce roughly $70 billion of energy investments in the state Tuesday as the president travels to Pittsburgh for a conference with dozens of top executives to promote his energy and technology agenda. The Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit will be held at Carnegie Mellon University, and it comes as the state's political and business leaders are working to forge the city into a hub for robotics, artificial intelligence and energy. Trump has repeatedly pledged U.S. "energy dominance" in the global market, and Pennsylvania -- a swing state critical to his wins in 2016 and 2024 -- is at the forefront of that agenda, in large part due to its coal industry that the Republican administration has taken several steps to bolster. Neither the White House nor McCormick's office gave breakdowns of the $70 billion or what the investments entail. McCormick, a Republican first-term senator who is organizing the inaugural event, says the summit is meant to bring together top energy companies and AI leaders, global investors and labor behind Trump's energy policies and priorities. He says the investments will spur tens of thousands of jobs in Pennsylvania. "Pennsylvania is uniquely positioned because of abundant energy, of incredible skilled workers, technology," McCormick said in a Fox News interview Monday promoting the summit. "We need to win the battle for AI innovation in America, and Pennsylvania is at the center of it." The list of participating CEOs includes leaders from global behemoths like Blackstone, SoftBank, Amazon Web Services, BlackRock and ExxonMobil and local companies such as the Pittsburgh-based Gecko Robotics, which deploys AI to bolster energy capacity. Gov. Josh Shapiro, a Democrat, will also attend. Administration officials speaking at the summit include White House crypto czar David Sacks, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and Energy Secretary Chris Wright. In the Fox News interview, McCormick credited his wife, Dina Powell McCormick, with the idea for a summit. Powell McCormick served as Trump's deputy national security adviser in his first term and is a former Goldman Sachs executive who is now at BDT & MSD Partners, a merchant bank. Pittsburgh is home to Carnegie Mellon University, a prestigious engineering school, plus a growing industry of small robotics firms and a so-called " AI Avenue " that's home to offices for Google and other AI firms. It also sits in the middle of the prolific Marcellus Shale natural gas reservoir. Pennsylvania has scored several big investment wins in recent months, some of it driven by federal manufacturing policy and others by the ravenous need for electricity from the fast-growing AI business. Nippon Steel just bought U.S. Steel for almost $15 billion, getting Trump's approval after pledging to invest billions alone in U.S. Steel's Pittsburgh-area plants. Amazon will spend $20 billion on two data center complexes in Pennsylvania, with more to come, while a one-time coal-fired power plant is being turned into the nation's largest gas-fired power plant to fuel a data center campus. Meanwhile, Microsoft says it is spending $1.6 billion to reopen the lone functional nuclear reactor on Three Mile Island under a long-term power supply agreement for its data centers. Shapiro, elected in 2022, has been pushing for the state to land a big multibillion-dollar industrial project, like a semiconductor factory or an electric vehicle plant. In his first budget speech, Shapiro -- who is viewed as a potential White House contender in 2028 -- told lawmakers that Pennsylvania needs to "get in the game" and warned that it would take money. He didn't land a mega project, but he instead has worked to play up big investments by Amazon and Microsoft, as well as Nippon Steel, as he prepares to seek a second term. ___ Levy reported from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

Trump to unveil $90 billion in AI investments during Pennsylvania trip

US inflation rose again in June to its highest level in four months, as President Donald Trump's tariffs began driving up consumer prices. President Trump has long expressed his desire to see America dominate the global market in artificial intelligence innovation. In fact, one of the first executive orders he signed was aimed at removing barriers to American leadership in the fast-growing field. On July 15, Trump will travel to Pennsylvania to tout more than $90 billion in private sector investment in the state, including in data centers, energy, power infrastructure and personnel needed to fuel the country's AI ambitions, according to the office of Sen. Dave McCormick, a Pennsylvania Republican. It also happens to be a battleground state, which was crucial to Trump's victory in 2024. The first Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit was organized by McCormick, a former hedge fund CEO, who brought together industry titans from the finance and tech world who had made major commitments to the state. Blackstone, for instance, announced a $25 billion investment in data center and energy infrastructure development in northeastern Pennsylvania. The investment is expected to create 6,000 construction jobs along with 3,000 new permanent jobs, according to McCormick's office. First Energy will invest $15 billion to expand power distribution, strengthen grid infrastructure, and operate the enhanced grid, supporting 56 of the 67 Pennsylvania counties. "As the nation's second largest energy producer and a global nuclear power leader, Pennsylvania is uniquely positioned to deliver the abundant, affordable energy that growing AI and advanced manufacturing sectors demand," said McCormick in a statement.

Trump touts $92B in data center, energy investments

President Trump on Tuesday touted $92 billion in new private data center and energy investments as his administration seeks to boost the nation's power supply amid a push to rapidly develop energy-hungry artificial intelligence (AI). Trump unveiled investments from 20 major energy and technology companies, including Google, CoreWeave and Blackstone, at Sen. Dave McCormick's (R-Pa.) inaugural Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit in Pittsburgh. "We're back in Pittsburgh to announce the largest package of investments in the history of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania," Trump said Tuesday. "We're here today because we believe that America's destiny is to dominate every industry and be the first in every technology, and that includes being the world's number one superpower in artificial intelligence," he added. Cloud computing firm CoreWeave announced plans to invest $6 billion in building a 100 megawatt data center in Lancaster, Pa., with the ability to eventually expand to 300 megawatts. Google also unveiled a $25 billion investment in data center and AI infrastructure in states covered by a regional grid operator across the Midwest and Mid-Atlantic. The tech giant plans to invest another $3 billion in modernizing two hydropower facilities in Pennsylvania as well. Investment firm Blackstone also announced that it will invest more than $25 billion in building out data center and power infrastructure in the Keystone State. The Trump administration has increasingly focused on the need for more power to protect the electrical grid from strain as it promotes rapid AI innovation. The technology requires vast amounts of energy. While the Trump administration has been largely focused on promoting fossil fuels and nuclear, while hampering wind and solar, investments featured at the summit included a mix of power sources. Homer City Redevelopment will purchase $15 billion worth of Pennsylvania's gas for a power plant. Energy Capital Partners will put $5 billion into a data center and will also develop community solar projects. A Department of Energy report released last week warned of the growing risk of blackouts, as both AI and the push to reshore manufacturing put pressure on the grid. The report found that the likelihood of blackouts could increase 100-fold by 2030, even if the U.S. brings online more than 200 gigawatts of power by the end of the decade as planned. Data centers are expected to add anywhere from 35 to 108 gigawatts in load growth to the grid during that same period. The Trump administration's recently passed "big, beautiful bill" slashes subsidies for wind and solar, which is expected to result in less power production, though the administration has sought also to bolster other power sources including coal, gas and nuclear.

Trump joins tech and energy executives amid AI push - The Economic Times

The Energy and Innovation Summit at Carnegie Mellon University is expected to bring tech executives and officials from top energy and tech firms including Meta, Microsoft, Alphabet and Exxon Mobil to discuss how to position the US as a leader in AI.President Donald Trump will join executives from some of the largest US tech and energy companies for a summit in Pittsburgh on Tuesday as the administration prepares fresh measures to power the US expansion of artificial intelligence. Top economic rivals US and China are locked in a technological arms race over who can dominate AI as the technology takes on increasing importance everywhere from corporate boardrooms to the battlefield. The Energy and Innovation Summit at Carnegie Mellon University is expected to bring tech executives and officials from top energy and tech firms including Meta, Microsoft, Alphabet and Exxon Mobil to discuss how to position the US as a leader in AI. Trump will use the summit - put together by U.S. Senator Dave McCormick, a Republican ally from Pennsylvania - to announce some $70 billion in artificial intelligence and energy investments in the state. Big Tech is scrambling to secure vast amounts of electricity supplies to power the energy-guzzling data centers needed for its rapid expansion of artificial intelligence. The CEOs expected to attend include Khaldoon Al-Mubarak of Mubadala, Rene Hass of SoftBank, Larry Fink of BlackRock, Darren Woods of ExxonMobil, Brendan Bechtel of Bechtel and Dario Amodei of Anthropic. The White House is considering executive actions in the coming weeks to make it easier for power-generating projects to connect to the grid and also provide federal land on which to build the data centers needed to expand AI technology, Reuters previously reported. The administration is also weighing streamlining permitting for data centers by creating a nationwide Clean Water Act permit, rather than requiring companies to seek permits on a state-by-state basis. Mike Sommers, head of the influential American Petroleum Institute, said executive action is welcomed to unlock the energy needed to power the data centers, but a more durable solution is needed. "Real durable permitting reform requires an act of Congress, not just an executive order," Sommers said in an interview with Reuters. Trump ordered his administration in January to produce an AI Action Plan that would make "America the world capital in artificial intelligence" and reduce regulatory barriers to its rapid expansion. That report, which includes input from the National Security Council, is due by July 23. The White House is considering making July 23 "AI Action Day" to draw attention to the report and demonstrate its commitment to expanding the industry, Reuters has reported. US power demand is hitting record highs this year after nearly two decades of stagnation as AI and cloud computing data centers balloon in numbers and size across the country. The demand is also leading to unprecedented deals between the power industry and technology companies, including the attempted restart of the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania between Constellation Energy and Microsoft. The surge has led to concerns about power shortages that threaten to raise electricity bills and increase the risk of blackouts, while slowing Big Tech in its global race against countries like China to dominate artificial intelligence.

'We're way ahead of China...': Trump rallies big tech and energy executives for AI race

President Donald Trump joined executives from some of the largest US tech and energy companies for a summit in Pittsburgh on Tuesday (July 15), as the administration prepares new measures to power the country's expansion of artificial intelligence. Trump told an energy summit at Carnegie Mellon University that the United States would be fighting China "in a very friendly fashion." The Energy and Innovation Summit brought together leaders from companies including Meta, Microsoft, Alphabet, and Exxon Mobil to discuss positioning the U.S. as a global leader in AI. The gathering highlighted the growing intersection of technology, energy, and geopolitics as AI becomes critical in sectors ranging from corporate boardrooms to defense. Trump and the summit's host, U.S. Senator Dave McCormick of Pennsylvania, touted some $90 billion in AI and energy investments in the state. "This is a really triumphant day for the people of the Commonwealth and for the United States of America, we're doing things that nobody ever thought possible," Trump told attendees. Trump has launched a global trade war in recent years, imposing tariffs of at least 10% on many nations and even steeper duties on others, part of a broader effort to reshape global trade and outcompete China in critical sectors like AI.

Pittsburgh is poised to be at the heart of America's second...

PITTSBURGH -- It was the site of America's first industrial revolution. Now it's prepared to usher in a second one, when the country's leaders in innovation, technology, energy and artificial intelligence meet at Carnegie Mellon University on Tuesday for the Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit. President Donald Trump, in an interview with me ahead of the summit, said the event is going to "open the eyes of a lot of people of what is about to be unleashed in Pennsylvania." Senator David McCormick, the Pittsburgh Republican who assembled the July 15 event, said the energy and AI summit will feature Trump, several cabinet members, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, big Tech leaders from OpenAI and Meta as well as energy leaders from all over the country, including the natural gas powerhouse EQT's Toby Rice. "And what is about to happen here in Pennsylvania, with the technology experts from our universities, the natural resources, the ability to turn around long dormant industrial communities and our unparrelled workforce is a game changer," McCormick said. He compares the moment to 1859, when Edwin Drake became the first American to successfully drill for oil. Drake's Well, in Titusville, Pennsylvania, ushered in an energy revolution. Scottish immigrant Andrew Carnegie was an early investor in this oil boom, which he then used to build the largest steel company in the world in western Pennsylvania. Carnegie became one of the richest men in American history, and donated most of it -- including to the Pittsburgh research university that bears his name. "People will quickly see we are on the brink of America's next industrial revolution, just in the same way Pennsylvania led the first one when Drake's oil was discovered," McCormick said. "We are at that moment right now, thanks to the technology that comes from [Carnegie Mellon] and the hubs of companies that surround it, as well as our incredible work force to build these AI data power centers, and the tradesmen and women who will supply the energy needed for them," he said. Darrin Kelly, the President of the Allegheny-Fayette Labor Council, said if the investments in projects all line up, his men and women will be ready to go. "We have the best workforce in the world and no matter what it is, we'll shine when the time comes." The event comes on the heels of a boom in the labor force in Pennsylvania that kicked off last month when Trump announced the partnership and $11 billion investment from Japanese-owned Nippon Steel. That investment not only kept the American steelmaker in the U.S., but also protected more than 100,000 jobs through investments in steelmaking in Pennsylvania as well as in other plants in Indiana, Arkansas, Minnesota and Alabama. That announcement was quickly followed by Amazon pledging $20 billion in Pennsylvania for AI infrastructure. Shapiro told me that the investment will establish multiple high tech cloud computing and AI innovation campuses across the Commonwealth, "It will create thousands of new jobs that will build, operate and maintain the first two data center campuses in Luzerne and Bucks counties," he said, adding, "look for more investment soon." Western Pennsylvania sits in the sweet spot for the growth and development of the AI boom; both the University of Pittsburgh and CMU are heralded for attracting and training some of the brightest minds in the country when it comes to engineering, research and artificial intelligence. Western Pennsylvania has had its troubles. After the end of the steel boom, the area decayed, unemployment was rampant -- still-vacant coal fired power plants, steel mills and manufacturing plants stand as ghostly sentinels of an era that has long vanished. But things started to turn around about 15 years with a natural-gas boom and oil fracking technology. McCormick says between the access to massive amounts of energy, both natural gas, nuclear as well as coal that will turn things around in a way no one has seen for generations. In April, in Homer City, the stacks of a former coal fired power plant were imploded, and the site is being redeveloped into a $10 billion AI and data center. In the two years since the Homer City coal fire plant had been closed down, the tiny western Pennsylvania village had already started to show signs of depression -- but the new investment changed everything. McCormick said this isn't just about the potential tens of thousands of construction jobs to build these AI data centers. "These jobs will also include chemists, scientists, engineers, AI experts, physicists," he said. McCormick said people have asked him why Pittsburgh? His answer: "The energy production is incredible, it is the number two energy producer in the country which is the first necessary step to power the AI revolution and to really power the energy revolution. We have incredible skilled labor, with the welders, steam fitters, pipe fitters, construction workers and electricians, but we also have incredibly sophisticated technologists." "I think it's arguably CMU is the best AI university in the country. It's got incredible tradition with computer science and technologists, which is why in recent years, Google and Apple and Airbnb and everybody else, Tesla all have offices around here because they're trying to draw on that talent," he said. Trump, Shapiro and McCormick all expressed great excitement about what people learn from this summit, but also to show the turn around for the region. "Too often the stories have been about what once was, well this is a moment about how great things will be," said McCormick, adding, "We are only beginning."

Trump to unveil $90 billion investment in AI, energy at Pittsburgh...

PITTSBURGH -- President Trump is set to speak at a major innovation conference in Pennsylvania on Tuesday afternoon to unveil $90 billion in private-sector investments meant to spur the state's energy production and US artificial intelligence industry. Trump, who won the Rust Belt swing state on Nov. 5 just months after surviving an assassination attempt outside Steel City, will champion more than a dozen corporate pledges topping $1 billion that were compiled by Sen. Dave McCormick. "We're going to Pittsburgh," the president told reporters Tuesday. "We have tremendous investments being made." McCormick (R-Pa.) is former hedge fund CEO and enlisted the corporate coalition with a goal of transforming Pennsylvania into an AI hub while making it an even bigger energy producer -- moving it away from its post-industrial reputation to compete with tech-heavy regions such as northern Virginia. The Inaugural Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit is being held at Carnegie Mellon University, where investment giant Blackstone will unveil a $25 billion investment to create AI data centers and power plants specifically in Northeast Pennsylvania, according to a release from McCormick's office. Google, meanwhile, will commit $25 billion to build out artificial intelligence infrastructure and data centers across the US over two years, plus another $3 billion to refurbish two hydroelectric power plants in Pennsylvania to serve regional AI data centers. The company First Energy will pledge $15 billion to boost electrical grid power distribution and the firm Homer City Redevelopment will agree to buy $15 billion of locally pumped natural gas for a 1,000-man power plant in the rural area of western Pennsylvania. PA Data Center Partners and Powerhouse Data Centers is committing to a $15 billion three-campus data center hub near Carlisle in south-central Pennsylvania and AI cloud firm CoreWeave is putting $6 billion into a new data center in Lancaster in the southeast of the state. PPL Corporation is putting $6.8 billion toward grid capacity improvement and Capital Power is putting $3 billion toward expanding a gas facility, McCormick's office said. "Pennsylvania is uniquely positioned to deliver the abundant, affordable energy that growing AI and advanced manufacturing sectors demand," the senator said in a statement. "We have the skilled workforce to build and operate this critical infrastructure, world-class universities driving innovation, and strategic proximity to over half the country's population." "I am proud to partner with President Trump and the business leaders here today to drive a new era of industrial growth that helps make America energy dominant while creating jobs and opportunities for working families across Pennsylvania." Pennsylvania already is a major energy producer due to a boom in fracking for natural gas and has many top universities that train tech pioneers, including Carnegie Mellon in the west and the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, of which Elon Musk is an alum. McCormick's push comes as electric providers are in the process of transecting western Maryland with power lines to feed Virginia's data centers. The new package is in line with the president's push to make America the leader in AI innovation, particularly over China. Trump signed an executive order in January ordering the government to remove policies that act as barriers to further development. Amazon previously announced a $20 billion investment package into Pennsylvania data centers and a $14 billion partnership between US Steel and Nippon Steel to surge steel production in the state.

Trump and U.S. senator team up to promote energy and tech investments in Pennsylvania

PITTSBURGH -- U.S. President Donald Trump and Sen. David McCormick of Pennsylvania touted tens of billions of dollars of energy and technology investments Tuesday as the president travelled to Pittsburgh for a conference with dozens of top executives to promote his energy and technology agenda. The Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit, held at Carnegie Mellon University, comes as the state's political and business leaders are working to forge the city into a hub for robotics, artificial intelligence and energy. Trump has repeatedly pledged U.S. "energy dominance" in the global market, and Pennsylvania -- a swing state critical to his wins in 2016 and 2024 -- is at the forefront of that agenda, in large part due to its coal and gas industry that the Republican administration has taken steps to bolster. At the summit, Trump Cabinet officials spoke of the need to produce as much energy as possible -- especially from coal and natural gas -- to beat China in the artificial intelligence race for the sake of economic and national security. "The AI revolution is upon us," Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said during a panel discussion. "The Trump administration will not let us lose. We need to do clean, beautiful coal. We need to do natural gas, we need to embrace nuclear, we need to embrace it all because we have the power to do it and if we don't do it we're fools." Some of the investments on a list released by McCormick's office were not necessarily brand new, while others were. Some involve massive data center projects, while others involve building power plants, expanding natural gas pipelines, upgrading power plants or improving electricity transmission networks. Google said it would invest US$25 billion on AI and data centre infrastructure over the next two years in PJM's mid-Atlantic electricity grid, while investment firm Brookfield said it had signed contracts to provide more than $3 billion of power to Google's data centers from two hydroelectric dams on the Susquehanna River in Pennsylvania. Blackstone said it will spend $25 billion on data centers and power infrastructure in northeastern Pennsylvania, Frontier Group said it would transform the former Bruce Mansfield coal-fired power plant in western Pennsylvania into a new natural gas-fired plant and AI cloud computing firm CoreWeave said it will spend more than $6 billion to equip a data center in southcentral Pennsylvania. McCormick, a first-term Republican senator who organized the inaugural event, said the summit was meant to bring together top energy companies and AI leaders, global investors and labor behind Trump's energy policies and priorities. The list of participating CEOs includes leaders from global behemoths like Blackstone, Bridgewater, SoftBank, Amazon Web Services, BlackRock and ExxonMobil and local companies such as the Pittsburgh-based Gecko Robotics, which deploys AI to bolster energy capacity. Gov. Josh Shapiro, a Democrat, also spoke. Administration officials speaking at the summit included White House crypto czar David Sacks, Energy Secretary Chris Wright and Lutnick. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Interior Secretary Doug Burgum also attended. McCormick credited his wife, Dina Powell McCormick, with the idea for a summit. Powell McCormick served as Trump's deputy national security adviser in his first term and is a former Goldman Sachs executive who is now at BDT & MSD Partners, a merchant bank. Pittsburgh is home to Carnegie Mellon University, a prestigious engineering school, plus a growing industry of small robotics firms and a so-called " AI Avenue " that's home to offices for Google and other AI firms. It also sits in the middle of the prolific Marcellus Shale natural gas reservoir. "What's going on is a rewiring of the economy, of the world over the next 15 years and that takes trillions and trillions and tens of trillions of dollars and it starts with power," said Bruce Flatt, CEO of Brookfield, during a panel discussion. Pennsylvania has scored big investment wins in recent months, some driven by federal manufacturing policy and others by the ravenous need for electricity from the fast-growing AI business. Nippon Steel just bought U.S. Steel for almost $15 billion, getting Trump's approval after pledging to invest billions alone in U.S. Steel's Pittsburgh-area plants. Amazon will spend $20 billion on two data centre complexes in Pennsylvania, while the one-time Homer City coal-fired power plant is being turned into the nation's largest gas-fired power plant to fuel a data centre campus. Meanwhile, Microsoft says it is spending $1.6 billion to reopen the lone functional nuclear reactor on Three Mile Island under a long-term power supply agreement for its data centres.

The $90 billion AI investment Trump announced is an economic and...

Today's announcement by President Donald Trump that America's biggest companies are investing $90 billion to turn Pittsburgh into a major hub for AI tech is a grand slam. It touches all the bases of Trump's economic agenda -- manufacturing, energy, tech supremacy -- and it also addresses national security. Love it or hate it, artificial intelligence is here to stay. The capability of the technology is growing rapidly, and will eventually make its way into every corner of our lives -- if it hasn't already. Yet AI requires massive data centers with powerful computers running around the clock. These machines, and the air conditioners to cool them, have huge energy demands. By one estimate, data centers just in the United States used 167 terawatts of electricity in 2023. That's enough to power all of America for more than two weeks. And that need for energy will only grow. Data-center electricity usage is expected to double in the next five years. This isn't just a question of playing with Grok. The military and intelligence applications of AI are extraordinary, which is why China is trying to corner the market on this field. Drone warfare, threat assessment, missile defense and counter-espionage -- the future of conflict will be driven by artificial intelligence. Beijing is already building a network of nuclear-power plants meant to radically increase China's power capacity. In fact, China's electricity generation soared more than eight-fold from about 1,240 terrawatt-hours in 1999 to more than 10,000 last year. US generation has mostly stood still, at about 4,000 TWh, over that time. Which is why today's Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit at Carnegie-Mellon University is so important. Leaders from industry joined scientists and policy makers to reach common ground on the steps ahead. Google, ExxonMobil and other companies are committing tens of billions of their dollars to build data centers, energy and power infrastructure, and to expand workforce training in AI. Western Pennsylvania is an apt site for this: The first oil well was sunk there in 1859, and the coal and steel industries that built America's bridges and buildings sprung up there, too. More recently, the fracking revolution has helped the United States become energy-independent for the first time in years. Meanwhile, this new initiative will bring tens of thousands of jobs to an area hit hard by the transfer of industry overseas. And it represents the fruit of the MAGA project of reshoring manufacturing to help rebuild the American middle class. President Trump and Pennsylvania's Gov. Josh Shapiro and Sens. Dave McCormick and John Fetterman deserve shared bipartisan kudos for working together and with industry to make this tremendous project possible. Three cheers for innovation and unshackling American potential!

Trump joins tech and energy executives amid AI push

PITTSBURGH, Pennsylvania (Reuters) -President Donald Trump will join executives from some of the largest U.S. tech and energy companies for a summit in Pittsburgh on Tuesday as the administration prepares fresh measures to power the U.S. expansion of artificial intelligence. Top economic rivals U.S. and China are locked in a technological arms race over who can dominate AI as the technology takes on increasing importance everywhere from corporate boardrooms to the battlefield. The Energy and Innovation Summit at Carnegie Mellon University is expected to bring tech executives and officials from top energy and tech firms including Meta, Microsoft, Alphabet and Exxon Mobil to discuss how to position the U.S. as a leader in AI. Trump will use the summit - put together by U.S. Senator Dave McCormick, a Republican ally from Pennsylvania - to announce some $70 billion in artificial intelligence and energy investments in the state. Big Tech is scrambling to secure vast amounts of electricity supplies to power the energy-guzzling data centers needed for its rapid expansion of artificial intelligence. The CEOs expected to attend include Khaldoon Al-Mubarak of Mubadala, Rene Hass of SoftBank, Larry Fink of BlackRock, Darren Woods of ExxonMobil, Brendan Bechtel of Bechtel and Dario Amodei of Anthropic. The White House is considering executive actions in the coming weeks to make it easier for power-generating projects to connect to the grid and also provide federal land on which to build the data centers needed to expand AI technology, Reuters previously reported. The administration is also weighing streamlining permitting for data centers by creating a nationwide Clean Water Act permit, rather than requiring companies to seek permits on a state-by-state basis. Mike Sommers, head of the influential American Petroleum Institute, said executive action is welcomed to unlock the energy needed to power the data centers, but a more durable solution is needed. "Real durable permitting reform requires an act of Congress, not just an executive order," Sommers said in an interview with Reuters. Trump ordered his administration in January to produce an AI Action Plan that would make "America the world capital in artificial intelligence" and reduce regulatory barriers to its rapid expansion. That report, which includes input from the National Security Council, is due by July 23. The White House is considering making July 23 "AI Action Day" to draw attention to the report and demonstrate its commitment to expanding the industry, Reuters has reported. U.S. power demand is hitting record highs this year after nearly two decades of stagnation as AI and cloud computing data centers balloon in numbers and size across the country. The demand is also leading to unprecedented deals between the power industry and technology companies, including the attempted restart of the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania between Constellation Energy and Microsoft. The surge has led to concerns about power shortages that threaten to raise electricity bills and increase the risk of blackouts, while slowing Big Tech in its global race against countries like China to dominate artificial intelligence. (Reporting by Jarrett Renshaw; Laila Kearney contributed reporting from New York; Editing by Colleen Jenkins and Stephen Coates)