US Has ‘No Choice’ Over Cheap Solar and Wind, Al Gore Tells Davos

Climate still came up on Davos Day 1 despite efforts by organizers to downplay the topic to guarantee US President Donald Trump’s attendance.

Today’s newsletter brings you the latest comments from Al Gore at Bloomberg House, including why he called the Trump administration’s campaign against wind power “insane.”

Meanwhile, the IEA’s Fatih Birol forecast low oil and gas prices over the short term — and left his optimistic outlook for renewables untouched. Plus, former BNEF chief content officer Nat Bullard tells us how artificial intelligence will impact future electricity demand.

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Trump’s ‘insane’ approach to wind

By Frances Schwartzkopff and Laura Millan

US President Donald Trump’s efforts to block offshore wind farms defy logic, said Al Gore, the chairman of Generation Investment Management and a former US vice president.

“Why are we ending the wind farms that are now being built on the coast of the United States?” David Rubenstein asked Gore during a conversation at Bloomberg House in Davos. Gore answered promptly: “Because Trump is insane.”

Solar and wind are the cheapest forms of electricity, Gore said. “Renewable is taking over” in powering the ongoing electrification of economies, so “we really don’t have any choice about this,” he added.

The White House has had a series of setbacks in its anti-wind campaign, after judges allowed projects in New York, Rhode Island and Virginia to resume construction. But there’s still a possibility that Trump will prevail, as the latest rulings are temporary and his administration has pledged to keep fighting, saying the projects pose undisclosed national security risks.

Other Davos speakers also weighed in on the green transition. Today’s energy landscape is neither for or against renewable power, said Andrés Gluski, chief executive officer at US renewable power company AES Corporation.

“I find a lot of the thinking is politicized — either you’re 100% renewables or you’re against renewables,” Gluski said at an energy security panel. “This makes no sense whatsoever, with today’s technology you have to combine the two.”

Fatih Birol, executive director at the International Energy Agency, reiterated the group’s forecast for global electricity demand to grow three times faster than total energy demand due to AI, air conditioners and electric cars. Renewables, natural gas and nuclear power will likely fill the gap, he said.

“Lots of supplies are coming,” Birol said. “But it won’t be forever.”

Lower oil prices won’t necessarily benefit American companies, said Meghan O’Sullivan, a professor at Harvard and a former deputy national security advisor for Iraq and Afghanistan under US President George W Bush.

“A $53 [barrel of] oil is not consistent with high American oil production, so there’s a tension there, undoubtedly,” she said. “American companies feel that acutely.”

The Trump administration approach of using foreign policy tools — including diplomacy and military force — to control and influence global energy markets will have long term implications, O’Sullivan said. “This is going to quell investment, rather than enhance it.”

Read all of Bloomberg’s Davos coverage including the full story on Gore’s comments on Bloomberg.com. For David Rubenstein’s full conversation with Gore, watch “The David Rubenstein Show: Peer to Peer Conversations” Wednesday, February 25 at 9:00 p.m. New York time on Bloomberg Television. Subscribe for unlimited access to all content.

Drill, baby, drill

Forecasting AI’s future

By Aaron Clark

Innovations that enable data centers to fluctuate their electricity demand are adding uncertainty to forecasts on one of the most important questions in the green transition: What are the future energy needs from artificial intelligence.

The insight is among observations contained in the latest edition of a closely-followed annual decarbonization presentation by Nat Bullard, an adviser and co-founder of energy information provider Halcyon. Bullard previously held roles at BloombergNEF, including as chief content officer, until 2023.

Bullard’s analysis tackles subjects from Tesla Inc.’s brand reputation, to China’s battery energy storage capacity and a decline in clean energy investments by oil majors. He spoke in an interview and highlighted two of the key themes.

Data Center Disruption

There are wide disparities between forecasts for future electricity demand for US data centers. Boston Consulting Group Inc. estimates the sector will require more than 1,000 terawatt hours a year by 2030, while the Electric Power Research Institute Inc.’s lowest-case scenario sees the total at closer to 200 terawatt hours.

That uncertainty is being exacerbated by the adoption of new technologies. For instance, software developed by startup Emerald AI can curtail energy demand by optimizing Nvidia Corp. graphics processing units in real time for individual tasks.

“It’s technologies like this that could substantially change the forward demand curve,” and put into doubt current expectations about the sector’s energy needs, Bullard said. “The question to ask is what else might come along.”

The World’s Electrostate

China’s share of electricity in its mix of final energy consumption has surged in recent years — and surpassed both North America and Europe — as the world’s No. 2 economy has steered the transportation sector and some industry segments away from the direct use of fossil fuels.

While the share of renewables deployed in China has also accelerated, the country still relies heavily on coal. Fossil fuels accounted for 59% of electricity generation in 2024, according to BNEF.

Even so, there are clear benefits as China’s emissions-intensive industries electrify, said Bullard, offering the example of a steel plant using an electric arc furnace, which draws power from the grid, rather than a traditional coal-powered blast process.

“You’re using less coal in the process, even if there is coal being used to create the power,” Bullard said. “You’re also part of a process — electricity generation — that is decarbonizing over time thanks to an increasing share of renewable energy in the mix.”

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Today’s Zero listen

For the last decade, since the Paris Agreement was signed, governments have been trying to nudge big financial players to move more money into climate solutions. The idea was to drive action through data disclosure and net-zero goals, but that hasn’t yielded the results they hoped for. Have we got our approach to climate finance wrong? Lisa Sachs, director of Columbia University’s Center on Sustainable Investment, makes the case this week on the Zero podcast.

Listen now, and subscribe on Apple, Spotify or YouTube to get new episodes of Zero every Thursday.

More from Green

Unusually cold conditions are forecast to linger across northeastern and central Europe through early February, boosting heating demand and testing volatile gas markets.

An Arctic blast is also driving temperatures sharply lower across China this week, prompting authorities to issue warnings about freezing weather.

Transition bonds, intended to finance emissions reduction in the world’s heaviest-polluting industries, are forecast to advance this year as the overall market for sustainable instruments defies a wider climate backlash.

Photo finish

Wildfires raging in central-south Chile killed at least 19 people and left neighborhoods charred and choking under thick smoke. More than 50,000 people were evacuated. Flames were fanned by strong winds and dry heat, with temperatures nearing 38C (100F) during the height of the Southern Hemisphere summer.

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