THE ENERGY INTERVIEW of new load without expanding generation capacity.“ The opportunity for the technology industry,” Marc says,“ is to treat energy as a co-design challenge, not a cost to be procured.”

Accelerating the clean energy transition Some of the most compelling applications Marc describes are on the clean energy side. Geothermal development, long constrained by the difficulty and expense of identifying viable well sites, is being transformed by AI-enhanced seismic imaging.

Nuclear energy, which is undergoing a huge revival in public and commercial interest this year, is seeing digital twins used to enable autonomous reactor operations and compress permitting timelines that have historically taken years.

At CERAWeek earlier this year, Microsoft and NVIDIA announced a collaboration providing end-to-end tools to streamline nuclear permitting, accelerate plant design and optimise operations across the industry.

On solar, NVIDIA partner Maximo recently completed a 100MW robotic installation at AES’ Bellefield site using AI-driven robotics built on NVIDIA’ s accelerated computing platform.

The road ahead Ask Marc where he expects the energy and technology industries to stand in five years, and the answer is unequivocal.“ The lines between the two industries will be considerably harder to draw,” he notes.

The additional load the US grid could absorb without expanding generation capacity, if data centres flex their demand for just a few hours each year, according to a Duke University study

AI infrastructure will be integrated into grid operations, participating in demand response and frequency regulation, co-located with generation assets in configurations that today exist only as pilots.

The choices being made now, he argues, will determine the shape of that convergence – how fast, how broadly and how responsibly it unfolds.

“ The processes that today take years – permitting, interconnection studies, construction – can be compressed through AI-powered digital twins, automated engineering workflows and intelligent grid integration tools.”

For an industry accustomed to measured timescales and proven technology, that represents a genuine inflection point. Marc’ s task is to make sure the energy sector is ready for it, and that NVIDIA is the partner standing alongside it when the time comes.

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