ALBERTVILLE — Former Alabama Senate Majority Leader Clay Scofield is confident Alabama can play a key role in helping President Donald Trump achieve his goals of being dominant in energy production and in artificial intelligence technology.
Now the president and CEO of the Energy Institute of Alabama (EIA), Scofield explained during a rotary meeting in Albertville on Tuesday what the state is doing to ensure its energy supply keeps up with the demands of AI and other growing industries.
“The Trump administration is wanting energy dominance for the United States of America," Scofield emphasized. "He wants us to win the AI race against China. We’ve got to win the AI race against China. I would think everyone would agree with that. There’s severe national security implications on the line with that. And being energy independent, by itself, is national security. We have more resources in the country — and yes, fossil resources — to be energy independent.”
Scofield anticipates a “rebirth” of nuclear energy across the country, but for now, he said, “nothing comes close to being as cheap and reliable as gas.”
“Because you've seen the demands of AI, of high-intensity industry, moving forward, they're going to require a lot of power," he continued. "And what we can't have happen is all of those entities want to come into the state of Alabama, and what happens is your rates go up because we're having to serve all those.”
Scofield said he hopes to repeat the success of the state's broadband program — a key issue during his time in the state legislature — by using the Alabama Energy Infrastructure Bank to help reduce capital costs of AI projects and infrastructure, along with receiving federal grants.
“If we have the Energy Infrastructure Bank setup like we did with Broadband, hopefully with those federal dollars raining down from the eye out of DC, just like we were with broadband, the state of Alabama is going to be ahead of the game and being able to take advantage of lots of federal funding that comes that we can then use to beef up our energy supply and distribution," he said.
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