[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":153},["ShallowReactive",2],{"{\"language\":\"en\",\"resolve_relations\":[\"post.author\"]}posts\u002Fpower-not-chips-now-decides-who-wins-the-ai-race":3},{"data":4,"headers":131},{"story":5,"cv":118,"rels":119,"links":130},{"name":6,"created_at":7,"published_at":8,"updated_at":9,"id":10,"uuid":11,"content":12,"slug":110,"full_slug":111,"sort_by_date":60,"position":112,"tag_list":113,"is_startpage":24,"parent_id":114,"meta_data":60,"group_id":115,"first_published_at":116,"release_id":60,"lang":66,"path":60,"alternates":117,"default_full_slug":60,"translated_slugs":60}," Power, Not Chips, Now Decides Who Wins the AI Race","2026-09-24T17:07:44.742Z","2026-09-24T18:54:32.512Z","2026-09-24T18:54:32.524Z",223559945207128,"da21bda5-ccfa-4f93-b4a9-d4d97758e418",{"seo":13,"_uid":28,"date":29,"intro":30,"title":31,"author":32,"blocks":69,"category":104,"featured":24,"component":105,"thumbnail":106,"hero_image":108},[14],{"_uid":15,"image":16,"title":25,"component":26,"description":27},"0b2255c1-04c6-484f-9505-d1f055394cba",{"id":17,"alt":18,"name":19,"focus":19,"title":19,"source":19,"filename":20,"copyright":19,"fieldtype":21,"meta_data":22,"is_external_url":24},207968453842624,"dpd_1","","https:\u002F\u002Fa.storyblok.com\u002Ff\u002F290340181793214\u002F1261x831\u002F718e276b65\u002Fistock-1299944072.jpg","asset",{"alt":18,"size":23,"title":19,"source":19,"copyright":19},"1261x831",false,"Power, Not Chips, Now Decides Who Wins the AI Race","seo","The AI race has stopped being a story about chips. In this issue of Digital Power Digest, Keel Infrastructure SVP Chris Ruppel breaks down eight forces reshaping how AI infrastructure actually gets built, starting with power, the hardest constraint of all. Pennsylvania's resource-adequacy analysis shows the grid failing PJM's reliability criterion from 2027 through 2030, driven largely by data-center load growth, and that shortfall is pushing developers to act like power companies themselves. \"Bring your own power\" started as a workaround, but with Vertiv moving into microgrid controls and xAI building a battery-backed campus in Memphis, self-generation is becoming the standard.\n\nThat shift is colliding with a rewritten social contract. Communities that once welcomed data centers with open arms — Loudoun County, Virginia, among them — are weighing moratoria, tax-exemption rollbacks, and new cost-sharing requirements, all of which force developers to prove tangible local benefit rather than assume it. Meanwhile, the market itself is splitting in two, with gigawatt-scale training campuses on one end and smaller, factory-built inference facilities on the other. Each has different financing needs, and Wall Street is adjusting accordingly, with data centers now representing roughly 8% of new commercial-property bond issuance and lenders having to underwrite megawatts and interconnection risk alongside real estate.\n\nThe AI supply chain is industrializing past GPUs and into transformers, turbines, fiber, and skilled electrical labor, with mismatched delivery timelines creating fresh bottlenecks. Developers are responding with an \"all of the above\" power strategy by mixing renewables, batteries, gas, and nuclear based on what delivers reliable megawatts fastest, as seen in ERCOT's gas queue jumping from 65 GW to 80 GW in three months. And with sovereign-AI deployments and export-control fights entering the picture, AI infrastructure is increasingly treated as national-security infrastructure. The next AI project needs power, capital, permission, materials, and rules that don't exist yet. Power is still the hardest of those to secure, and it determines whether the other four are worth arranging.\n\n","e270c710-bcda-4642-9482-84d4501225d8","2026-09-22 00:00","Power, not chip supply, now decides where AI infrastructure gets built, as developers race to secure generation, materials, and social license first. ","Digital Power Digest- Volume 4: September 7 - September 20, 2026",{"name":33,"created_at":34,"published_at":35,"updated_at":36,"id":37,"uuid":38,"content":39,"slug":58,"full_slug":59,"sort_by_date":60,"position":61,"tag_list":62,"is_startpage":24,"parent_id":63,"meta_data":60,"group_id":64,"first_published_at":65,"release_id":60,"lang":66,"path":60,"alternates":67,"default_full_slug":60,"translated_slugs":60,"_stopResolving":68},"Christopher Ruppel","2026-03-17T16:24:01.161Z","2026-04-06T00:09:57.160Z","2026-04-06T00:09:57.172Z",155955368617120,"5ce15b6e-5eb2-4ef8-ac4a-d147b128da73",{"_uid":40,"name":33,"blocks":41,"component":51,"expertise":52,"profile_picture":53},"01c2c833-f9f0-45f9-8b9b-80f2b5fa8be9",[42],{"_uid":43,"title":44,"blocks":45,"component":50,"is_large_title":24},"c0441a69-4a21-4765-986a-e2b9023e724d","Expertise ",[46],{"_uid":47,"copy":48,"component":49},"8f5c2874-33b2-4679-b5de-c44bb00257dd","Christopher Ruppel joined Keel Infrastructure as Senior Vice President of Power. Chris brings more than two decades of experience at the intersection of advanced compute infrastructure and energy systems optimization. He has led development strategies spanning onsite generation, grid-connected assets, and gas-to-power solutions supporting high-density AI and edge-compute environments.\nChris’s experience includes originating and developing more than 4 GW of energy projects globally, structuring billions of dollars in project financings, and advising data center operators on resilient, commercially optimized energy strategies. Prior to joining Keel, he served as Head of Energy Development at MARA Holdings, where he led strategy for the company’s Digital Energy division, focusing on behind-the-meter power solutions, thermal optimization, and demand-response initiatives.","team_member_copy_block","team_member_block","team_member","Senior Vice President, Power",{"id":54,"alt":55,"name":19,"focus":19,"title":19,"source":19,"filename":56,"copyright":19,"fieldtype":21,"meta_data":57,"is_external_url":24},158128143448457,"Portrait of Christ Ruppel","https:\u002F\u002Fa.storyblok.com\u002Ff\u002F290340181793214\u002F853x1280\u002Ffb552a6926\u002Fchris-ruppel-large.jpeg",{"alt":55,"title":19,"source":19,"copyright":19},"christopher-ruppel","team-members\u002Fchristopher-ruppel",null,-170,[],146010902535401,"ccfaacf8-69a7-4d3e-8c7b-b317d370de47","2026-03-17T16:24:26.848Z","default",[],true,[70],{"_uid":71,"copy":72,"component":103},"3e0da7d4-97e5-4754-8cb7-7c7e276efe50",{"type":73,"attrs":74,"content":75},"doc",{"backgroundColor":60},[76,83,88,92],{"type":77,"attrs":78,"content":79},"paragraph",{"textAlign":60},[80],{"text":81,"type":82},"The AI race has stopped being a story about chips. In this issue of Digital Power Digest, Keel Infrastructure SVP Chris Ruppel breaks down eight forces reshaping how AI infrastructure actually gets built, starting with power, the hardest constraint of all. Pennsylvania's resource-adequacy analysis shows the grid failing PJM's reliability criterion from 2027 through 2030, driven largely by data-center load growth, and that shortfall is pushing developers to act like power companies themselves. \"Bring your own power\" started as a workaround, but with Vertiv moving into microgrid controls and xAI building a battery-backed campus in Memphis, self-generation is becoming the standard.","text",{"type":77,"attrs":84,"content":85},{"textAlign":60},[86],{"type":87},"hard_break",{"type":77,"attrs":89,"content":90},{"textAlign":60},[91],{"type":87},{"type":77,"attrs":93,"content":94},{"textAlign":60},[95],{"text":96,"type":82,"marks":97},"Read More",[98],{"type":99,"attrs":100},"link",{"href":101,"uuid":60,"anchor":60,"target":102,"linktype":21},"https:\u002F\u002Fa.storyblok.com\u002Ff\u002F290340181793214\u002Fx\u002Fdc363f2102\u002Fdpd-issue-4-1.pdf","_blank","post_copy","Digital Power Digest","post",{"id":17,"alt":18,"name":19,"focus":19,"title":19,"source":19,"filename":20,"copyright":19,"fieldtype":21,"meta_data":107,"is_external_url":24},{"alt":18,"size":23,"title":19,"source":19,"copyright":19},{"id":17,"alt":18,"name":19,"focus":19,"title":19,"source":19,"filename":20,"copyright":19,"fieldtype":21,"meta_data":109,"is_external_url":24},{"alt":18,"size":23,"title":19,"source":19,"copyright":19},"power-not-chips-now-decides-who-wins-the-ai-race","posts\u002Fpower-not-chips-now-decides-who-wins-the-ai-race",-240,[],146629530122758,"9ebbd309-facd-4bd7-a626-b50a88cae463","2026-09-24T17:11:48.232Z",[],1790276073,[120],{"name":33,"created_at":34,"published_at":35,"updated_at":36,"id":37,"uuid":38,"content":121,"slug":58,"full_slug":59,"sort_by_date":60,"position":61,"tag_list":128,"is_startpage":24,"parent_id":63,"meta_data":60,"group_id":64,"first_published_at":65,"release_id":60,"lang":66,"path":60,"alternates":129,"default_full_slug":60,"translated_slugs":60},{"_uid":40,"name":33,"blocks":122,"component":51,"expertise":52,"profile_picture":126},[123],{"_uid":43,"title":44,"blocks":124,"component":50,"is_large_title":24},[125],{"_uid":47,"copy":48,"component":49},{"id":54,"alt":55,"name":19,"focus":19,"title":19,"source":19,"filename":56,"copyright":19,"fieldtype":21,"meta_data":127,"is_external_url":24},{"alt":55,"title":19,"source":19,"copyright":19},[],[],[],{"cache-control":132,"connection":133,"content-encoding":134,"content-type":135,"date":136,"etag":137,"referrer-policy":138,"sb-be-version":139,"server":140,"transfer-encoding":141,"vary":142,"via":143,"x-amz-cf-id":144,"x-amz-cf-pop":145,"x-cache":146,"x-content-type-options":147,"x-frame-options":148,"x-permitted-cross-domain-policies":149,"x-request-id":150,"x-runtime":151,"x-xss-protection":152},"max-age=0, public, s-maxage=604800, stale-if-error=3600","keep-alive","gzip","application\u002Fjson; charset=utf-8","Thu, 24 Sep 2026 18:55:28 GMT","W\u002F\"9101990884000a8f0859795877e95ea3\"","strict-origin-when-cross-origin","5.972.0","nginx\u002F1.29.1","chunked","Origin,Accept-Encoding","1.1 ee011275acb236653ac4d031eb9a7092.cloudfront.net (CloudFront)","JlQPxMDsKVtRShWJFCZeXyz0hT9c4UnSAozbJnGNjrgss69Y1ZTuxQ==","IAD55-P6","Miss from cloudfront","nosniff","SAMEORIGIN","none","8991c517-ad20-4a6d-879b-bf28cf00faad","0.034264","0",1790276128104]