The businessmen Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk defended on Tuesday the need to build new artificial intelligence data centers and expand the electrical energy infrastructure to power them, during a meeting of G20 Technology ministers in the United States. Both participated remotely from the meeting organized by the White House.
The event was dedicated to discussing the disruptions and opportunities brought by AI, with the objective of keeping this technological revolution largely free from government regulations and oversight. The conversations took place amid growing criticism about the construction of AI data centers in the United States.
The topic became especially relevant during the campaign for the US midterm elections, at the end of the year. According to Zuckerberg, the construction of AI infrastructure would require "hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, of jobs" in specialized functions.
