福克斯新闻报道称，参议院候选人正面临着选民日益增长的愤怒情绪——这些选民对高昂的电费、水资源消耗问题，以及与人工智能相关的发展项目感到不满。最近的一项盖洛普调查显示，70%的美国人反对在他们的社区内建设新的人工智能数据中心。
Fox News reported that Senate candidates are confronting growing voter anger over the electricity costs, water consumption, and sprawling developments associated with artificial intelligence. One recent Gallup survey found that 70 percent of Americans oppose the construction of new AI data centers in their own communities.
政界人士已经开始关注这一问题：一些人呼吁暂停相关项目的建设；另一些人则提议提供税收优惠，或者要求这些项目自行解决能源供应问题。这种政治上的诱惑显而易见：当选民担心公用事业费用上涨和社区环境迅速发生变化时，指责大型科技公司往往比解释复杂的能源与基础设施问题要容易得多。
Politicians are paying attention. Some are calling for moratoriums. Others are targeting tax incentives or demanding that projects generate their own power. The political temptation is obvious: When voters are worried about higher utility bills and rapid changes in their communities, blaming large technology companies is easier than explaining a complicated energy and infrastructure problem.
随着这一选举议题的日益突出，人们的焦虑情绪也在加剧；然而共和党却认为华盛顿（联邦政府）并不是解决问题的关键。这些担忧是真实存在的，既不能被企业忽视，也不能被当选官员漠视。任何家庭都不应该被迫为那些由世界上最富有的公司推动的电网升级项目买单。社区有权获得关于水资源使用、噪音污染、土地开发、电力需求、税收优惠措施，以及新基础设施建设费用应由谁承担的透明、诚实的答案。
ANXIETY GROWS OVER EMERGING ELECTION ISSUE, BUT GOP SAYS WASHINGTON ISN'T THE ANSWER The concerns are real. They should not be dismissed by industry, and they cannot be ignored by elected officials. No family should be forced to subsidize the grid upgrades required by one of the world’s wealthiest companies. Communities deserve honest answers about water use, noise, land, electricity demand, tax incentives, and who will pay for new infrastructure. But, legitimate concerns are quickly hardening into something far more dangerous: a political campaign against the physical infrastructure of American artificial intelligence.
然而，这些合理的担忧很快可能演变成更加危险的事情——一场针对美国人工智能基础设施的政治运动。如果这种情况真的发生，我们将重蹈现代美国历史上最具有破坏性的覆辙之一：过去几十年里，美国曾将许多工厂、关键供应链、矿产资源及工业生产能力拱手让给了外国竞争对手；结果导致大量工作岗位流失，国家安全也受到了威胁；最终，华盛顿不得不花费巨额资金来重建那些本不应被放弃的产业。
If that happens, we will repeat one of the most damaging patterns in modern American history. For decades, the United States surrendered factories, critical supply chains, mineral production, and industrial capacity to foreign competitors. Communities lost jobs, our national security became dependent on adversaries, and Washington eventually spent billions trying to rebuild industries that should never have left. THE AI REVOLUTION COULD BECOME A NATIONAL SECURITY DISASTER IF WE AREN'T CAREFUL We cannot make the same mistake with AI.
如果我们不加以重视，人工智能革命可能会成为一场严重的国家安全灾难。我们绝不能在人工智能领域重蹈同样的错误。
Artificial intelligence does not exist somewhere in the cloud. It requires chips, servers, power plants, transmission lines, cooling systems, construction workers, electricians, pipefitters, engineers, and data centers. These facilities are not incidental to the AI economy. They are the factories of the next industrial age.
人工智能并不存在于云端某处。它需要芯片、服务器、发电厂、输电线路、冷却系统、建筑工人、电工、管道工、工程师以及数据中心。这些设施并非人工智能经济的附属品，而是下一个工业时代的工厂。
AMERICA RUNS ON DATA. IF WE DON’T BUILD THE INFRASTRUCTURE, CHINA WILL China understands this. Beijing is not debating whether it should possess the energy and computing infrastructure necessary to dominate artificial intelligence. It is building. The International Energy Agency projects that data-center electricity consumption will increase substantially in both China and the United States through 2030. If America decides that data centers are too politically difficult to construct, the demand for AI will not disappear. The investment, jobs, technical expertise, and strategic advantage will simply move elsewhere.
美国靠数据运转。如果我们不建设基础设施，中国就会建设。中国对此心知肚明。北京并未就是否应拥有主导人工智能所需的能源和计算基础设施进行辩论，而是在积极建设。国际能源署预测，到2030年，中国和美国的数据中心用电量都将大幅增长。如果美国认为数据中心在政治上难以建设，对人工智能的需求并不会消失。投资、就业、技术专长和战略优势只会转移到其他地方。那将是美国竞争力的一次深刻失败。
AMERICA RUNS ON DATA. IF WE DON’T BUILD THE INFRASTRUCTURE, CHINA WILL China understands this. Beijing is not debating whether it should possess the energy and computing infrastructure necessary to dominate artificial intelligence. It is building. The International Energy Agency projects that data-center electricity consumption will increase substantially in both China and the United States through 2030. If America decides that data centers are too politically difficult to construct, the demand for AI will not disappear. The investment, jobs, technical expertise, and strategic advantage will simply move elsewhere. That would be a profound failure of American competitiveness.
这也将为民主党制造严重的政治问题。数据中心建设已成为建筑行业的重要就业来源。美联社最近报道，哥伦布-中俄亥俄州建筑与建筑工会理事会成员至少40%的工作时间用于数据中心项目，而华盛顿大都会区国际电工兄弟会第26分会至少有50%的工作时间用于此类项目。
It would also create a serious political problem for Democrats. Data-center construction has become an important source of work for the building trades. The Associated Press recently reported that data centers account for at least 40 percent of the work hours performed by members of the Columbus-Central Ohio Building and Construction Trades Council and at least 50 percent for the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 26 in the Washington metropolitan area.
焊工出身的立法者视其为“就业的核弹”——并看到了帮助蓝领美国人的机会。这些并非多年后承诺的空头支票，而是当下电工、劳工、操作工程师、管道工及其他熟练工人的真实工作。民主党不能一边声称代表有组织劳工，一边却任由进步派活动人士阻止那些雇佣工会成员的项目。
WELDER TURNED LAWMAKER SEES A ‘NUCLEAR BOMB FOR WORK’ — AND A CHANCE TO HELP BLUE COLLAR AMERICANS Those are not theoretical jobs promised years from now. They are jobs for electricians, laborers, operating engineers, pipefitters, and other skilled workers today. Democrats cannot claim to represent organized labor while allowing progressive activists to shut down the projects employing union members.
共和党人应当抵制类似的诱惑。多年来，保守派一直主张推动产业回流、确立能源主导地位、改革审批制度、重振美国制造业，并在与中国的竞争中胜出。但如果当地对下一个美国产业项目的建设产生争议，这些承诺就毫无意义。
Republicans should resist a similar temptation. Conservatives have spent years arguing for reshoring, energy dominance, permitting reform, American manufacturing, and competition with China. Those commitments mean very little if they disappear when building the next American industry becomes locally controversial.
答案并不是毫无条件地放行每一个项目，而是要负责任地建设，并坦诚地沟通。
The answer is not to wave every project through without conditions. It is to build responsibly and communicate honestly.
应当要求数据中心开发商说明他们将建设什么、需要多少电力和水、如何保护居民用电客户的利益，以及周边社区将获得什么回报。公用事业公司和监管机构应确保，大型客户承担其需求所带来的成本。项目应采用闭环式冷却、现场发电、长期购电协议以及其他减轻当地系统压力的方案。
Data-center developers should be expected to explain what they are building, how much electricity and water it will require, how they will protect residential ratepayers, and what the surrounding community will receive in return. Utilities and regulators should ensure that large customers pay the costs created by their demand. Projects should pursue closed-loop cooling, on-site generation, long-term power agreements, and other options that reduce pressure on local systems.
要在人工智能领域击败中国，美国必须与社区合作，而不是绕开社区。最重要的是，美国需要更多能源。
TO BEAT CHINA IN AI, AMERICA MUST WORK WITH COMMUNITIES — NOT AROUND THEM Most importantly, America needs more energy.
数据中心正在暴露一个早在人工智能热潮之前就已存在的问题。过去十年，数据中心的用电需求增长了两倍，到2028年可能再增加一倍，甚至增至三倍。在发电量多年停滞、发电厂过早退役、输电系统拥堵以及审批程序使大型基础设施几乎无法按时建设的情况下，电力需求仍在上升。叫停数据中心建设不会实现电网现代化。建设更多可靠的发电设施、加快输电建设、保留现有核电机组、扩大天然气基础设施以及部署先进核能，才会实现这一目标。
Data centers are exposing a problem that existed before the AI boom. Electricity demand from data centers has tripled over the past decade and could double or triple again by 2028. Electricity demand is rising after years of stagnant generation, premature plant retirements, congested transmission systems, and permitting processes that make major infrastructure nearly impossible to build on time. Stopping data centers will not modernize the grid. Building more reliable generation, accelerating transmission, preserving existing nuclear capacity, expanding natural gas infrastructure, and deploying advanced nuclear power will.
业界还必须认识到，沉默已不再是应对策略。参议员乔恩·赫斯特德在接受福克斯新闻采访时表示，数据中心公司没有充分说明为何应获准在这些社区开发。他说得没错。
Industry also needs to recognize that silence is no longer a strategy. As Sen. Jon Husted told Fox News, data-center companies have not done a good enough job explaining why they should be allowed to develop in communities. He is right.
美国人听到的是巨大的电力消耗、水资源使用以及税收优惠。他们需要以通俗易懂的语言了解数据中心使哪些事物成为可能、创造了哪些就业岗位、如何支持国家安全，以及在与中国的竞争中，国内算力为何至关重要。这种教育必须在项目公布之前进行，而不是在反对意见已经形成之后。
Americans hear about enormous power consumption, water use, and tax incentives. They need to hear, in plain language, what data centers make possible, which jobs they create, how they support national security, and why domestic computing capacity matters in the competition with China. That education must happen before a project is announced, not after opposition has already formed.
政治领导力意味着认真对待选民的关切，同时不让恐惧决定美国的经济未来。我们可以保护电费缴纳者，要求透明度，赋予社区有意义的发言权，同时仍然建设参与竞争所需的基础设施。
Political leadership means taking voters’ concerns seriously without allowing fear to determine America’s economic future. We can protect ratepayers, demand transparency, give communities a meaningful voice, and still build the infrastructure required to compete.
美国已经让出了太多产业。在大多数美国人意识到竞争已经开始之前，我们不能将下一个产业拱手让人。
America has already surrendered too many industries. We cannot cede the next one before most Americans realize the race has begun.