As AI demand surges, the US is facing a significant obstacle: an overstressed and underprepared power grid. In contrast, China has already built vast energy infrastructure, treating data centers as a way to absorb energy oversupply. With long-term planning, overbuilt capacity, and pragmatic investment strategies, China has turned electricity into a solved problem. At the same time, US policymakers struggle with red tape, grid instability, and short-term capital constraints, according to Forbes. Experts warn that unless the US radically changes how it builds and funds energy infrastructure, China’s dominance in AI-enabling power capacity will only grow. They write:
“Everywhere we went, people treated energy availability as a given,” Rui Ma wrote on X after returning from a recent tour of China’s AI hubs.
4/ Energy is considered a solved problem. The Chinese government’s investment in sustainable energy — from advanced hydropower to next-generation nuclear — means that, relative to many other markets, electricity supply is secure and inexpensive. Everywhere we went, people treated…
— Rui Ma (@ruima) August 11, 2025
For American AI researchers, that’s almost unimaginable. In the U.S., surging AI demand is colliding with a fragile power grid, the kind of extreme bottleneck that Goldman Sachs warns could severely choke the industry’s growth.
In China, Ma continued, it’s considered a “solved problem.” […]
Meanwhile, David Fishman, a Chinese electricity expert who has spent years tracking their energy development, told Fortune that in China, electricity isn’t even a question. […]
For Fishman, the takeaway is blunt. Without a dramatic shift in how the U.S. builds and funds its energy infrastructure, China’s lead will only widen.
“The gap in capability is only going to continue to become more obvious — and grow in the coming years,” he said.
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