"I Build AI Data Centers: What I Know Will SHOCK you"

[00:00:00] Trevor Nielsen: There's been a lot of secrecy around these projects for example government officials have been asked to sign non-disclosure agreements. AI data [00:00:09] Speaker 2: centers are coming and they're gonna transform everything but for the better or for the worse? AOC says they're gonna poison our communities. These plants [00:00:19] Trevor Nielsen: produce that ash and they have to do something. All they're trying to do is dump it places. Where do they dump it in places? Zool areas, poor areas, disenfranchised areas, [00:00:31] Speaker 2: blacks, brown areas. Trump says that they could eliminate your property taxes. The revenue from [00:00:36] Speaker 3: Google's data center construction is allowing them to eliminate property taxes entirely and that's what you call using it to your advantage. The numbers are so incredible. Nobody's [00:00:47] Speaker 2: ever seen. So will AI destroy our jobs or is it gonna hand every person on this planet a shot at unprecedented wealth and abundance? What will life be like? The most likely outcome is an age of amazing abundance. And even more concerning is it China that's pushing the darkest narratives to scare America into surrendering the AI race? Trevor Nielsen is an entrepreneur, an investor and president of Prometheus Hyperscale which is building some of the most powerful data centers in the world with backing from the CIA's investment fund IQT. And he's going to be separating real risks from manufactured fear and revealing the real life-changing opportunities AI could hand you over the next decade. So guys, if you're liking the show, please consider liking, subscribing and dropping us a comment with your feedback because we really appreciate it and it helps us out a ton. Let's jump in. Keeping it real with Jillian Michaels. Trevor Nielsen, how are you? [00:01:49] Trevor Nielsen: I'm good. Thanks for having me on. [00:01:51] Speaker 2: I got some tough questions for you. I want to start out right off the bat with the fact that half of the country thinks this is going to end life as we know it. I've heard some terrifying things from the radiation from data centers is going to poison us all. That was AOC. I'm sure you saw that one. To everybody's going to lose their job. To your electric bill is going to skyrocket. It's going to eat up farmland. It's a scar on the earth from space. And then on the other hand, I've heard this is a panacea to all of our problems. Everybody's going to have wealth and abundance. And then you've got the China narrative. So let's just take it from the top. Let's go concern by concern. What are the concerns? Is everybody getting cancer from this? Let's start there. Are there health risks? [00:02:47] Trevor Nielsen: Well, I think it's worth stepping back and maybe dividing this into two categories. So one category would be data centers themselves and then the other category would be AI itself. We're building hyperscale data centers. So very large data centers for AI companies. And I think when you look at a data center, it's important to understand what they do and then what powers them in order to do what they do, which is massive amounts of electricity. So if you look at what a data center is, it's basically a combination of thousands of computers that is running immensely complicated calculations 24 hours a day, seven days a week. And so these things are very large energy projects. An immense amount of electricity is required in order to power the chips that are inside these data centers, GPUs or TPUs, you've heard them called. And so the first thing I would say is these things shouldn't be near neighborhoods. I mean, I'm a simple guy, I guess. I think that building a power plant that enables this level of power at this scale, and you've seen the pictures of these data centers, right? They're massive in scale because of what they're trying to do. They should be in rural areas. They shouldn't be near schools. They shouldn't be near neighborhoods. They are going, because they're a power plant, they're going to produce pollution. That pollution needs to be managed. And so right out of the gate, I would just say that some of the concerns about what they do environmentally are legitimate. And they're ones that should be dealt with. And we could get into more detail about how you deal with them. Some of the things that have been said about data centers just aren't true in the current environment. And so a really good example is the topic of water use. Old data centers, 10 years ago, 20 years ago, we've been using data centers for a long time, consume vast amounts of water. And that's a huge problem. Current data centers, that old technology was called evaporative cooling. It's like a huge air conditioner, like the biggest air conditioner you could ever imagine. The current technology associated with newer data centers is closed loop liquid cooling. It's a bit like a radiator. And the way to think about it is an old data center could use millions and millions of gallons of water. A new data center does not. The coolant is recirculated. There's a need to recharge the coolant from time to time. I think overall though, Jillian, the problem is that the industry has done a terrible job of explaining itself. And as a result, there's a level of distrust. That distrust is also distrust that people have in technology companies overall. And people are really scared. And I think it's up to those of us in the industry to answer those concerns and to do it in an authentic, thoughtful way not to just act like those concerns don't matter. [00:05:54] Speaker 2: Can we circle back to you saying that these should not be in neighborhoods? I did not expect you were going to say that. I thought you were going to tell me that it's just AOC bloviating. It's perfectly fine. What kinds of concerns arise if these things are next to a school? What kind of pollution do they [00:06:18] Trevor Nielsen: actually produce? Well, I would point out that it's possible for AOC to be bloviating and also for this to be a problem. Fair point. These are very large industrial projects, right? You have a power plant next to the project. You have transformers. You have electrical lines. You have engines burning natural gas in order to create the project if these are what's called behind the meter, which we should talk about because that also relates to the concern about electricity prices. Our view at Prometheus is that these things belong in areas where there are very few or no neighbors. You know, our projects in Wyoming have no neighbors within miles of the projects. And as a result, the neighbors are more focused on the impact on the tax base, the enormous amounts of revenue it's going to create for the counties that are involved. They're more focused on the job creation, which is quite important in a lot of these rural areas. These things produce pollution, just like any form of energy produces pollution. And, you know, I've got a little boy. I don't want him at a school next door to one of these, and I don't think anybody else should want that either. [00:07:37] Speaker 2: Okay. So that's a very valid concern then. And I appreciate it because it is coming to people's towns and they are alarmed. And on one hand, you're hearing, you know, don't be an alarmist. This isn't true. And we have to be China. And on the other, it's like, oh, it's dangerous to your health. And I think you're just simply saying that's not the best way to go about it. If it does come to your neighborhood, you should definitely push back. But the benefits are tremendous when they exist in your [00:08:09] Trevor Nielsen: state. So I'm getting that right. That's right. I mean, I travel to these places, right? I meet with community residents. I meet with county commissioners. I have found the China and national security argument, which is a very important one, to not be particularly compelling to somebody that's just concerned about things that they have either heard from AOC or Bernie Sanders, or by the way, that they've heard from people on the extreme right. This is one of the funny issues that's out there that brings together the extreme right and the extreme left. Some of the fiercest opposition to data centers in Wyoming, in fact, all of it really comes from the extreme right, from a group called the Freedom Caucus that basically is just anti-business, kind of anti-everything, if you will. There are not many left-wing groups in Wyoming. In fact, I'm not sure I've ever come across one. And so the primary opposition here comes from the right. Also, I would say, you're never going to convince everybody that any large-scale industrial project is a good thing, right? So it's just a matter of going through the appropriate permitting process, making sure that the democratic process is followed, taking a vote, you know, the county commissioners take a vote, and then either they plan it or, excuse me, they approve it or they don't. One of the other issues has been there's been a lot of secrecy around these projects, you know. And for example, government officials have been asked to sign non-disclosure agreements. We think that that's outrageous. We think that that should never occur. If you are not being open with the community about what you're doing, you're not a good neighbor. And our core theory at Prometheus is that we want to be a good neighbor. Doesn't mean everybody's going to like it necessarily, you know, but it means that at least we'll be open and honest. And the kind of the backroom deals and NDAs that have occurred in the space, I think, are a big part of the reason that people are distrustful about them because they've heard about this and it just feels wrong. [00:10:22] Speaker 2: Trevor, what are they trying to hide? Why are they having people sign an NDA? I don't get it. [00:10:27] Trevor Nielsen: Well, in some of the cases, they were intending to pass along costs to the consumers. So, for example, in the Northeast, you've heard about areas of Virginia. We don't have to go in too much into like the regulatory environment and the electricity markets. But I think there was a thought on the part of some developers that consumers should actually absorb increased electricity rates. That's outrageous. We're at a time when people are really struggling. Affordability is a huge issue for people. And no consumer ever should pay for an increase to electricity prices that is coming because of AI companies. President Trump, by the way, has done a really good job on this topic. He asked the large AI companies to sign a ratepayers Protection Act, which most, if not all, of them have signed. Microsoft was actually the first. From our perspective, this is just a no-brainer. This is just logical that this shouldn't be passed along to the consumer. But I think a lot of that secrecy early on was tied to deals that people were trying to cut that just were not in the interest of the public. [00:11:41] Speaker 2: Well, that was actually my next question, is people are hearing that these things are going to drive up their energy bills? And conversely, you've got the president saying, "No, we're even using this stuff to generate so much income. We're going to be able to eliminate your property taxes in Georgia." And I'm going, well, what is it? Is it going to cost money or is it going to make you money or save you money? So what is the distinction there then? If there were NDAs previously that were put in place so local residents didn't know that their electricity and utility bills were being driven up by data centers, now is it different? Is it only different with your company? Like, is this a company by company, data center by data center, neighborhood by neighborhood? How do you know if your bill is going sky high or if you're the one getting your frickin' property tax cut? [00:12:37] Trevor Nielsen: I think thanks to the president's leadership on this, moving forward, people aren't going to be able to get away with that. But there's also another huge distinction. So some data centers are on the grid and are drawing power from the grid, and others are what's called behind the meter, which is the case for our data centers at Prometheus, whereby we are coming in and we are building our own power supply. In our case, primarily using natural gas. That is completely disconnected from the grid, so it has no impact of any kind on ratepayers. In the places where data centers are connected to the grid, what the president has asked them to do is to sign this pledge saying that they will basically pay an additional amount to make sure that it doesn't drive up consumers' prices. So the problem primarily exists in the deals that were done a year ago or two years ago, especially in the Northeast, this is a major problem. I think that moving forward, that should be less of a problem because there's just no ability for people to play games around it anymore. And by the way, Jillian, I should say, I don't blame people for being distrustful of big companies. You know, you know, big companies have not treated normal people particularly well. And I think one of the things about being here in Wyoming, it's such a small state, you know, we call it a small town with long roads here in Wyoming, is that we need to be good neighbors to people. And being good neighbors means that you, you know, you do the right thing. And I think that that needs to be the spirit of data center developers moving forward. [00:14:23] Speaker 2: Well, it needs to be, but it doesn't necessarily mean that it is. How would you recommend somebody getting information on a data center coming to their state or coming to their town? Because it seems very clear to me that companies like yours are not created equal. Some function with transparency, some have signed on to what the president is asking, some are behind the meters, some are on the grid. How do you know which type of data center is coming to your town? [00:14:53] Trevor Nielsen: Well, there's one really important thing to look for. We were, I believe, the first data center developer in the country to announce that we would enter into what are called community benefit agreements. So a community benefit agreement is a formal document that outlines the positive things and the negative things, basically, that a community can expect when a developer comes to town. The community benefit agreement then also is reviewed by the county officials or city officials or whatever the case may be. Some of the stuff that would live within a community benefit agreement would be prioritizing local hiring. So for our Wyoming projects, if you have a Wyoming driver's license, you are going to be prioritized in the hiring process, period. Another would be, how are we mitigating traffic? You know, in these small towns, people see a relatively small increase in traffic as a huge increase because they live in a rural area that doesn't see a lot of traffic. Well, how is the developer dealing with that traffic? That would belong in a community benefit agreement. Another is noise. You know, some old data centers were kind of loud or they emitted a certain humming noise that if you live in a near it, you don't want to hear, you know. And so a community benefit agreement should address acoustic levels. It should require the developer to deal with acoustic levels in a way that is particularly, you know, relevant for that project. And again, if you're next to a neighborhood, you're going to need to deal with acoustic levels in a different way than if you're in a really rural area where there's nobody besides, you know, maybe some sagebrush and, you know, the occasional deer to hear the humming noise, right? So I would say, to answer a very good question, I would say, ask if there's a community benefit agreement in place. Ask if the job creation is going to be to prioritize local people so that it's not just people from out of town. Ask what the plans are to mitigate air pollution if there's, you know, if there's gas generation involved. Things like that go a long way. But you can see why a policy of transparency and openness is essential to the entire thing. You can't just, you know, fool people into supporting something and then expect there not to be horrible backlash later. I will say, though, about AOC and Bernie Sanders and also some of these folks on the extreme right here in Wyoming, a moratorium or stopping data center development is not the answer. The answer is to do data center development better, to do it well, to make it a win-win for the communities where these facilities are going to exist. You know, I think a lot of people don't understand how much of our lives are now dependent upon these data centers and what is in them. Every show you watch on Netflix, every Google search, every time you pull up Apple Maps, if you like the recommendations that Amazon makes you, you know, when you buy this sweater, you might like this sweater, whatever the case may be. It's a data center doing all of that, right? And I think that the industry has done a terrible job of explaining the benefits of these services. You know, one funny thing that we've seen is that people are using AI tools to create campaigns to attack data centers and attack AI. People have incorporated this stuff in their lives and yet they don't like it, right? And I just think it's a part of human nature to, you know, to, to maybe benefit from something, but not really understand where that something comes from. You know, I think a lot of us don't really understand the logistics involved in these things that are in our, our lives. [00:19:06] Speaker 2: I want to get to all those benefits in just a second, but I'm a little confused about data centers in so much that do they need to be in every state? Like can a data center in Wyoming work? I know this is a dumb question, Trevor, but just bear with me work for the person in California, or do you need, I don't understand. Is it all a cloud? Is none of this? Could it be in Greenland and it could be a data center for the person in San Francisco? How does this work? So it's a, it's an excellent question. It's probably [00:19:37] Trevor Nielsen: even a better question than you realize. So these data centers are connected to fiber and unlike the, you know, spectrum cable cord that comes into your house, it's a special type of fiber that passes vast amounts of information in two directions at once. This is basically, you know, these are effectively light signals and there are certain fiber routes throughout the country that make areas attractive for data centers. And if you're not on one of those, they're called long-haul fiber routes. If you're not on one of those routes, it's harder to build a data center there because you would need to get a company like Lumen, which is a partner of ours or others to create a brand new route. The issue is, is called latency and AI models. They all function a little bit differently depending upon the company that you're talking about, but they require very low latency. They require pretty much instantaneous transfer of information because of the way that AI works. This is very different, right, than cloud computing, where basically you ask the cloud for an answer and it gives you the answer. That's how a Google search works, right? But when you're asking ChatGPT or Claude or Gemini or one of the other models a question, there is an exponential number of mathematical calculations that AI model is doing that makes it far more complicated. And that's the reason for the really high amounts of electricity that are used. And that's why your question about location is so important because if there's too much latency, what's going to happen is that your Claude, you know, your Claude query is going to get really slow or you're opening up, you know, your ChatGPT query is going to be very slow. It's just way more [00:21:41] Speaker 2: complicated than a Google search or a Bing search. Running a business means that you're always reachable until you're not. And we all know that exact second when you miss the call or the text or the follow-up, and I promise you that your competitor is waiting right there in the wings to pick up that call and answer that text. And that's why today's episode is brought to you by Quo and it's spelled Q-U-O. This is the business phone system built so you never miss an opportunity. All your calls, your texts, your voicemails in one single place. And that means anyone on your team can jump into a conversation, see the full history and respond fast. You can set it up in minutes on any device. And they've got a built-in AI agent that handles your after-hours calls, answers questions and will even book appointments. So when your team is offline, you're still capturing the leads and it also integrates seamlessly with the tools that you might be using like HubSpot or Zapier or Claude. Money's on the line, always say hello with Quo and you can try Quo for free plus get 20% off your first six months when you go to Quo.com/jillion. That's Q-U-O.com/jillion. So now I've gone over a lot of the catastrophizing, but let's talk about some of the benefits that data centers bring. You mentioned jobs for one, but I've also heard things like, you know, they'll generate so much revenue. We can drop your property taxes. And if I could just add one little thing to that, I had interviewed Chad Bianco, who was, you know, both of us are California refugees, who's running for governor. And he was saying, listen, you know, if I win, I'm going to bring you back to California. And I just said, you know, Chad, even if you can clean up the crime and the homelessness crisis and this and that and the other, I'm never paying these taxes. And he goes, I'm going to eliminate the taxes. I said, how? We're getting back into logging. We're mining for minerals. We'll bring data centers to the middle of the state. And it, you know, it definitely took up a little space in the back of my brain. And then unfortunately he did not make it. And I kind of let it all go. But then Trump just said it again. So what kind of benefits could a community see from having a data center in their state? [00:24:00] Trevor Nielsen: Well, let me give you a really specific example. Okay. Um, and so bear with me because, but this answers the question in a really specific way. So Casper, Wyoming, which is a great town kind of in north central Wyoming, um, oil and gas town, um, has, you know, has provided oil and gas and also mining and other things to this country for centuries. You know, coal, uh, is big there. The county there is called Natrona County. And Natrona County has about a hundred million dollar annual, um, revenue, annual budget, right? That they collect from taxes. If we build the data center there that we're proposing, it will generate an additional $70 million in tax revenue for that county. 70 million. So a 70% increase in the budget that that county has that county can then decide to spend it on law enforcement or emergency medical services or parks and recreation or roads or mental health services, whatever they want to decide to spend it on. The county commissioners could also decide to give, uh, people that live in that county a tax break if they wanted to. And that has happened in other counties. So it's really up to elected officials how they want to spend this, but it would, it would be a historic, um, infusion of resources into a community. And the same is true at our project on the other side of the state in Evanston, Wyoming, um, near, near, uh, down by Park City, Utah, kind of by, by Salt Lake. So massive, massive tax revenue increase that can then be passed along to taxpayers in the form of property tax reductions, or depending upon the needs of a community, it can be invested in, you know, um, whatever the community needs. Um, a lot of these communities, especially in rural areas are actually having a hard time right now, you know, a lot of these places, especially that were dependent upon fossil fuel industries go through a kind of boom and bust cycle that relates to the price of oil or the price of natural gas. And, you know, a lot of these communities really struggle. So number one would be the, the tax revenue impact. And the president is right that if a county, um, or city, but again, we're saying that these shouldn't really be in cities. Um, if, if, if it has that infusion of resources, then the county commissioners can decide, you know, what to do with it. Jobs. It is really important to be honest about the job story associated with data centers. And the job story is pretty simple during the construction of a data center, which can take five or 10 years. There are thousands of jobs created thousands. You have electricians, plumbers, pipe fitters, construction workers, drivers, landscapers. I mean, you know, thousands of jobs, those thousands of jobs, by the way, then create other jobs, because now you're going to need a hotel to service these people, you're going to need, you know, more tellers at the bank, you're going to sell more, you know, lattes in the morning, the bar down the street is going to need to have three more staff because of everybody coming off of their shifts, etc. So there's kind of a catalytic effect of these jobs. On an ongoing basis, after the buildings have been constructed, it's a few hundred jobs, which might not sound like a lot, you know, if you're in a big city, but in a rural area, a couple of hundred jobs is a huge impact on that community. And they're high paying jobs. You know, these are jobs that compared to some of the other jobs in the community would be really sought after. Part of what we're doing is vocational training programs with community colleges and technical colleges in the communities where we're working, because we're really committed to that local hiring that I mentioned. That initiative is called Build Wyoming. It's part philanthropic, part vocational training. You know, in Casper, you've got Casper College, which is an incredible community college and a technical college. And so, you know, that's really key too, because if you can't give people the skills they need to access these jobs, then people will come from elsewhere to take them. So that's a big part of the equation. So, you know, to answer your question, I would say massive tax revenue impact, massive job creation, but it's important to recognize, you know, the nature of the sort of temporary jobs, even though temporary can be five years or even seven years. And then the permanent jobs, which are fewer because once a data center is built, it's a couple hundred people that will likely work there versus the many thousands in the case of the construction period. [00:29:04] Speaker 2: So let's talk about China. We keep hearing, we've got to do this because China, we've got to do this because China. So to me, I'm thinking, well, I mean, what do you mean? We're like, who cares? It's a matter of months. It's a, you know, what a year, like how far behind do you fall? So what? Like, you know, what's wrong with being a fast follower. So for anybody watching in business, I usually will take a backseat, watch a person run a headlong into a brick wall with an idea, analyze where they went wrong, correct those mistakes in my own business, and then re-approach as the fast follower more intelligently. But I'm hearing with AI that is just, you know, a devastating way to approach this. What's the real threat here with China? [00:29:53] Trevor Nielsen: Yeah, I think it's on a number of different levels. You know, one, I think that there's a belief, and I share this belief, that Chinese AI models are not conducive with free societies around the world. You know, you're dealing with intelligence. For the first time in the history of the world, intelligence is truly democratized. Anyone can be as smart as anyone else. And I think that that does not align well with the Chinese model of, you know, of frankly, anti-democratic repression. So freedom is the first answer to that question. And that's very broad, but I think it's really important. Secondly, increasingly AI is used as a weapon of war. You know, we see this in a lot of different areas. One would be in the management of drones. You know, on one day recently in the Russia-Ukraine War, there were 12,000 drones in the air in one specific area. And AI models are controlling that autonomous warfare, the drone versus drone warfare, the drone versus, you know, tank warfare. It's AI versus AI in that case. And if the Chinese are leading, and if there is a large-scale conflict with them or one of their, you know, their surrogates, you could take it to Taiwan, for example, or you could apply it anywhere. Well, that's a real problem. If they have superior models, it means that they're going to be superior on the battlefield. The autonomous weapon issue is not just related to drones. I mean, so we now have autonomous targeting, right, where AI is making the decision based on a very fast series of facts how to target a military target or how to respond. You know, an example would be, and this has been, in my view, problematic, where a AI model will see that a rocket has been launched, let's just say, from a apartment building in Gaza. And the AI model will immediately order a counter-strike on the apartment building. Well, a rocket may have been fired from the apartment building, but a human might make a decision that it's not worth, you know, hundreds if not thousands of women and children and civilians that are in that apartment building simply to counter-strike against a rocket launch, right? So whenever you put these sorts of life and death decisions in the hands of technology, and you may recall a big issue between Anthropic and the Department of War on this topic, because Anthropic was saying, we don't feel comfortable that our technology is good enough yet to be used in that way. And Secretary Hicks has, you know, took them on and tried to make a big example of them and caused quite a, you know, quite a furor over that topic. So that would be another one. A third one, third problem with the Chinese kind of leading in AI would be economic issues, trade issues and the way that AI can be used to harm American companies or American business interests. By the way, it's been pretty well documented that the Chinese technology companies, Chinese AI companies seem to have, let's just say borrowed, another word would be stolen, technology from American AI companies in order to get to the place that they're at. That's a huge problem. I understand that there actually is an upcoming meeting between the US government and the Chinese government on this topic. But I'm in the camp that says we must have America lead. The world is a safer place when America leads on these issues. We're not perfect. We make tons of mistakes. But we do err on the side of freedom in a way that other countries do not. And it's a very scary thing to me that we might lose this race. If we lose it, by the way, it's not going to be because of our software developers and our engineers. They're the most brilliant minds in the world. It's going to be because of a lack of data center capacity, a lack of compute. So this AI race is really a compute race. It's about do we have the electrons necessary, the land necessary, the chips necessary to power data centers. And so that's part of why we take this work really seriously. I think it's also a part of why the arm of the intelligence industry in the US, the IQT, CIA, NSA, etc. That's their investment fund invested in Prometheus. And they actually have a seat on our board of directors as well. You know, you sent that information to me [00:35:04] Speaker 2: when I was writing your bio and I was like, Oh, God, I'm going to put that this is, you know, this fund for the CIA backs the company and nobody's going to trust this episode. He's going to think it's propaganda. And we've all just become so blackpilled, Trevor, that we don't trust anything anymore. It's like, nah, you know, Charlie's mic exploded and Israel did 9/11. And nobody, it's like, we're just nobody knows what's true anymore. Nobody knows how to ground themselves and how to disseminate it. And, you know, I really appreciate how you're playing both sides of this conversation. I think that's so, so important of the pros and the cons. Having said that, the same, the same, [00:35:58] Trevor Nielsen: the same freedom that allows people to get online and say whatever they want about whoever they want, the same freedom that allows Reddit conspiracy theories or X conspiracy theories, the same freedom that allows high quality inquiry as to what the actual facts are of a certain situation, that same freedom is why we need America to lead in AI. Because I can assure you, if China leads on AI, that the same freedom that drives us crazy sometimes, because it, you know, it some of these conspiracy theories are so wild, so over the top. The same thing that unfortunately has fed a lot of distrust and a lot of animosity, that comes from freedom. And there is no First Amendment in China. There is no Jillian Michaels podcast in China. You know, and so we may not like everything that our intelligence, you know, agencies have done or the role they've played historically in different things. But the vast majority of the people at those places are really fighting to protect the American way of life and the freedoms that we benefit from. And they're patriots. You know, there are people that go into this line of work because they believe that America, while imperfect, is better than everything else. You know, and I think that that's important to keep in mind in this conversation as well. [00:37:40] Speaker 2: You know, I was just talking to Nick Freitas and he was saying almost exactly what you were saying, but he's like, you know, you get disenfranchised with a group of people and all the intelligence agencies massage the president's daily brief. He's like, if that happened, that was a handful of agents, not the CIA, not the FBI. You're disillusioned with certain politicians. That's not your party. That's for politicians who are blocking voter ID. And we tend to create these generalizations and just sign off to all of it. Oh, it all sucks. It's all bad. And we make no distinctions, which is so incredibly dangerous. Hence, honestly, bringing it back to that conversation about nuance. But you had said something to me once before that freaked me out and can be a bit conspiratorial. And I want to know how deep you think this may go. You suggested it's possible that these narratives against that are vehemently against data centers could possibly be Chinese narratives. [00:38:55] Trevor Nielsen: I don't think it's I don't think there's any question, you know, opening. I published data recently showing that it was Chinese accounts being used to generate anti data center content. They're working on that. You know, if you step back and you ask yourself, who would have the biggest interest in slowing down the compute necessary to have America win the AI race? Well, you really just end up with China, you know, maybe Russia perhaps, but they don't have the same capabilities in a certain way that the Chinese do technologically. And so if people are interested in that, they should look at the report that OpenAI issued. I think that you'll find that there's more of that as well. However, I think it's quite important to not try to throw all of the critics of data centers into that category. You know, it is perfectly fair and in fact, it is fundamentally American to say, I don't want something to happen in my community. It's also then fundamentally American for whoever you're criticizing to make the case that actually it is good for the community. And that's called democracy. So I think that it's quite important not to try to throw all of the critics of AI or data centers into some conspiracy theory. That's not the vast majority of people are just don't want it in their backyard. You know, we've all heard of NIMBY, right? Not in my backyard, you know, and I think that that's a common phenomenon. And, and I get it, you know, sometimes you just don't want something and it is your right as an American to say that. And it's your right, by the way, and people have to stand up at a county commission meeting and say, we don't think that Trevor and Prometheus should do what they want to do in our community. We accept that as a normal, good part of the process. And I just think that more people need to embrace that, that just kind of open, non adversarial approach to these things. We've said actually, it's interesting, Jillian and Casper, we actually said publicly, hey, if the community decides that it doesn't want this, no problem, we will accept that. And we'll just go do it somewhere else. Because there are a lot of communities that they want these things. And so I just think we need to bring that spirit to a lot of issues, not just to data centers. I know. You're absolutely right. I don't disagree with you. [00:41:30] Speaker 2: Let's talk for a second about AI. So on one hand, you've got the Elon Musk saying, and you mentioned it yourself, like it's sort of the great equalizer. We're all going to have equal access to computing power and information. I don't know. I do question how true that is. But this is me putting on my tinfoil hat of, all right, who's really going to control the flow of information? Are they really going to let us have access to these things? Are there going to be certain things we're locked out of? But if in fact, that is the case, I can see ways of people creating businesses and writing books and making movies. You've got all of this talent right at the tip of your fingers here. But then on the other hand, you're hearing everything from it's going to wipe out millions of jobs. And who saw Terminator? Remember Skynet? Like it's going to eliminate us. What is your, I mean, Trevor, you are uniquely qualified to kind of weigh in here. I'm sure it's a nuanced answer, but what does your gut tell you about what the next 10 years with AI is going to hold for human beings? [00:42:47] Trevor Nielsen: I, you know, I think that Elon's ability to sell a vision is unrivaled. I mean, he is a remarkable visionary and a, and a very good salesman. And those two things go hand in hand and he has accomplished such things that nobody else in history has accomplished and, and we were all better off for it. I think that the nuanced view of this is that their life will be a lot better and a lot easier for some people. And it might not be better and easier for a lot of people. And thus, like pretty much any large event in human history, there are winners and there are losers. You know, I think it's safe to say that this is one of the biggest, probably the top five biggest inventions in human history. I mean, agriculture was a human invention, which of course led to, you know, the growth of civilization in a fundamentally important way. You know, in the, I guess, 17 or 1800s, you had the steam engine. It changed absolutely everything in the world. All of a sudden, there was a mechanized way of, of transportation. You know, you had electricity. You know, speaking of Tesla, you know, one of the inventors of electricity, which, you know, changed the whole world. You would put the internet probably on that list, but pretty much everyone agrees that AI will be more powerful than the internet. And I think what it means is a lot of productivity for a lot of people and a lot of suffering for a lot of people. You know, so one thing that's happening even faster than everybody imagined is that a lot of jobs are just being replaced right away. You know, you've heard a lot from Sam Altman and from Dario Ananthropic about this. It's a concern that AI leaders have pointed to. There have been some studies that actually show that job loss is not as extreme as some people have predicted because new jobs are created. But the key is making sure that people are trained in those new jobs so that there is a pathway forward for people. I mean, you wouldn't want to be a paralegal right now. You know, you would not want to be a creative director at an advertising agency right now or a copywriter, a person that used to be paid because their prose was so elegant because any one of these models can generate a journalist. I mean, you know, people can beat up on the media, but it's not the easiest time to be a print journalist these days because AI can write every story a lot faster and probably a lot better. So, you know, I think that we have to, as a society, think about people that are most vulnerable, look at job retraining, look at ways to make this a story of opportunity and abundance for everybody, not just the most wealthy. You know, I spend a lot of time in rural communities here in Wyoming and I care a lot about them because I think that they're sort of the best of America in a lot of ways. These are really patriotic people who love their country and their community. And I've been focused on, you know, what would programs through the Build Wyoming initiative, but also just personally looking at what programs could we create in these small towns to let people benefit from this revolution. And one of the things I've come up with is what you need actually is childcare. You need daycare coupled with training so that moms can participate in this, right? If you're a, let's say you're a stay at home mom and you think, man, I want to start a business. And I keep hearing about how chat GPT or Claude makes it so much easier to start a business. And by the way, it does, but I don't have any time away from my two kids who are driving me crazy. Well, why couldn't we, speak for yourself, Trevor. Why couldn't we create a place where moms could come and get childcare and be trained on how to use Claude or chat GPT to create a new business? This is just one tiny example, you know, of the sort of things that we need to be thinking about to make sure that everybody is a part of this revolution. [00:47:20] Speaker 2: Okay. Who's got a pooch? That's a picky eater. It's annoying, right? You've tried all different brands and you've mixed in toppers and yet the process brown pellets just sit there. Well, maybe it's because your dog is smart and knows the difference between junk and real food. Sundays for dogs is exactly that real food founded by a veterinarian. Sunday starts with over 80% all natural meats and they blend these meats with super foods like kale and ginger and blueberries. And there's no fillers and no synthetic chemicals, just complete nutrition. And it's gently air dried instead of blasted with high heat. So it looks and smells like premium human grade jerky. And best of all, you don't have to put it in the fridge. You don't have to prep anything. There's zero mass. So it's the quality of a home cooked meal for your best buddy with the ease of a scoop. Plus Sundays has just launched a brand new fish recipe made with 80% fish, including eco-friendly invasive carp. And it offers a rich flavor that's packed with omega threes for a healthy skin and shiny coats. It's the ultimate upgrade that your dog deserves. So make the switch to Sundays go right now to sundays for dogs.com forward slash Jillian and get 50% off your first order or you can use the code Jillian at checkout. That's 50% off your first order at sundays for dogs.com forward slash Jillian sundays for dogs.com forward slash Jillian or you can just use the code for dogs.com forward slash Jillian at checkout. You know, it's interesting because so many of our young kids are they're being radicalized. I'm sorry, the DSA is octogenarians and 18 year olds. And what I, you know, Trevor, and the reality is, I recently did a deep dive on Mao's China and I knew about it broadly from interviews with Bill O'Reilly on confronting evil, but I didn't really understand the depth of it, uh, until very recently. And he radicalized these young kids, brought them into the red guard and then went after, you know, the teachers, the doctors, the lawyers. Anyway, where I'm going with this is I get why kids are disenfranchised. I can't buy a house. You know, everything's more expensive. All the opportunities you had, I don't have. And therefore the whole thing must crumble to the ground. I think there's a fine line between validating the fact that it is a different path forward. I get that. And if you're trying to take the exact same path, it's going to be exponentially harder, but why can't we teach these kids to think differently like you're mentioning and whether you love him or whether you hate him? I had Grant Cardone on a podcast a little while ago and we were talking about home ownership and he's like, Jillian, you're blowing money on a house. You've got repairs, you've got interest, you've got, you know, property tax, this, that, the other, buy an income property, let it make money for you, buy another, buy another. And then by the time you have it, all this money is making money on your behalf, you can go indulge in the luxury of home ownership, but you can rent cheaply, invest that money intelligently and become a billionaire. Quite literally, the sky's the limit. And this is a guy that's thinking outside of the box. What you're talking about is thinking outside of the box. So instead of my generation that virtue signals of like, I get it. It's so unfair. I'm so sorry. Don't eat me because you're angry. Is there a way to say to these kids exactly what you're saying? Like, listen, yes, I it's, it's not going to be as easy to take this path forward, but you're going to have all of these opportunities that we didn't have. So buck up buttercup and let's get you in the job training or down the road. Like, how are you, how do you message this to these kids that are freaking pissed? And you have two, two kids. I think that just both are just out of college. What are they thinking? [00:51:20] Trevor Nielsen: Yeah. Well, they're, yeah, they're still in college, but the, the step back and look at this for a second. So this is the first look at what's happening here. Energy, which in our case comes from natural gas, which has been in the ground for, you know, 50 to 500 million years is creating electrons. The electrons are powering chips. And for the first time in the history of the world, thanks to these imaginative, brilliant software engineers, that produces intelligence for the masses. So you have, you literally have, you know, dinosaur bones and algae from 50 million years ago, turning into gas, turning into intelligence, which is pretty amazing if you think about it. And that intelligence is accessible to everyone. And I think that the, well, people are focused on how scary that is, is a moment. And I understand, you know, their point of view. Entrepreneurial people will say, well, this means that no longer is a Ivy league institution, the holder of all knowledge and the pinnacle of all academic success. You know, no, no longer is a four year degree that's going to be really even necessary. If your goal is to start a business, certainly. Good luck being an MBA moving forward, because every single aspect of being an MBA is right in front of you with a $20 a month, you know, clod subscription. And so if you know, if I could wave a magic wand, I would try to help people realize the incredible moment that we are in, in their real lives. Right? I think it requires a revisiting of traditional education models. I think it requires some intervention from the government to make sure that people aren't left behind. Because I don't think that just purely leaving this up to the market will protect vulnerable people in this. The other thing I'd say, Jillian, is we're in the first inning of this thing. I mean, so if people think that the changes that have, that they've seen so far, just by playing around with ChatGPT or whatever, or where this is headed, they're wrong. I mean, we have barely begun to see the impacts of what people call physical AI, robotics, you know, the way that this is going to enter medicine and health. And, you know, we already have examples of AI creating scientific breakthroughs that were never imaginable. I mean, there's a very famous Google example, an entity called DeepMind within Google that went out and discovered millions of proteins that had never been discovered before. The basis of a lot of science is proteins, as you know better than anybody. And you're going to see diseases cured by AI. You're going to see breakthroughs in energy, you know, found through AI. Hopefully, with nuclear in particular, AI will help accelerate the discovery of new nuclear pathways that will make energy a lot less dirty, a lot more affordable, and can help address some of the environmental impacts of the current energy system. I think it's going to take a few years for people to really tune in to those benefits. And we just have to make sure that people understand them while also weighing the negatives. That brings up the role of government. You know, the Congress has not passed a single AI law. I would argue the Congress is not qualified to pass a single AI law. So what you have is the president in the White House passing executive orders, which have been, in my view, very sound, smart, driven by David Sachs, and brilliant people, actually, within the administration working on AI. But ultimately, you would think that Congress would have something to say about these matters. It would require there being people in Congress that have the intellectual ability to understand these matters, right? And so there's a lot of big questions that are out there. But I hope that people can bring some level of optimism to this without going so far into the it's going to fix everything for everybody. You know, mindset. [00:56:01] Speaker 2: You know, we talk about the government. And on the right, you often hear less government, less government, nothing good came from more government in my line of work. I would really like to see them regulate the food companies, the pharma companies, the insurance companies. And I know that you know that these industries are spending hundreds of billions of dollars to make the government work on their behalf. And then here we are going, No, no, no, I don't want the government to work on my behalf. Don't regulate anything like no, no, no, no, they need to work for you. There's a level of involvement that they should have here to protect you from poison in your food that does not belong there. Like this is not about telling you whether or not you should be eating French fries. This is about ensuring that your food is not soaked in a pesticide we know causes cancer, things like that. And it's it's the exact same game in your industry. Do you think that these companies, though, the Anthropics and the Chad GPTs and perplexity and all of that stuff that they're just going to become another monster sized lobby and there'll be zero regulation to protect people? Well, that will be their inclination [00:57:19] Trevor Nielsen: because they don't have faith that there is a government process that will be intelligent enough to regulate. You know, you know, actually, the best scenario for them is some level of regulation that and maybe you follow this and it's a rabbit hole we probably don't want to go go into, which is the question of open models within AI where some portion of the technology is actually shared and so people can build on it. By the government? Well, the government in theory would help facilitate an agreement among the companies either to provide some aspects of their technology for what's called open source, you know, programming, or that the government will somehow monitor the power of the models to be used by malicious actors in things like cyber. So, you know, you probably saw, well, both open and also an anthropic have come out at different times saying, okay, hold on here. This most recent model was able to exploit cyber security vulnerabilities, you know, on the part of the U.S. government, for example, or to have, you know, corporate data. And to the credit of these companies, they had been the ones flagging this. It's not the government finding this. You know, now, in some cases, it's a competitor flagging a problem with one of their competitors. Got it. Yeah, I see. But I think ultimately to your question, it's in the interest of the industry and it's in the interest of innovation to have some sort of standards out there that kind of, you know, when you're playing football, the football field needs to be a certain size. It has to have certain rules. Yep. There has to be a referee in order to have a good football game, right? I mean, if anything that is just completely devoid of any regulation, I think is a harder market for a company to succeed in, especially when these become big public companies, which they're going to become very soon. [00:59:35] Speaker 2: Trevor, if I'm a person watching this and you've presented me with all of this brilliant nuance, it's good when it's like this. It's not so good when it's like that. We got to watch out for this. You want to make sure that you're ahead of that. Keep your eye on that. How can you, let's say, impact the future of this? Is there something that we should be asking our representatives for to educate themselves on legislation? We want to see them pass because I always try to empower the audience to take an action. What is an action that you might take on a personal level and then overcoming for everybody as a culture and a society and a country? [01:00:21] Trevor Nielsen: Well, I'll tell you what I tell the people that I love, right? I tell the people that I love, use the technology. I don't care how old you are. You're not too old to use ChatGPT or to use Claude. Use it because it benefits you in your life. And I've told so many people that, and there's so many people, especially people that, you know, maybe you're in their fifties or sixties or whatever, that just say, oh, I'm too old for that. And it's too crazy. And, and a lot of people conflate it like with social media, you know, they'll say, well, no, of course I'm not on TikTok. So why would I be on ChatGPT? Well, of course, there's a huge difference between the two. So just encourage people- You sound like me talking to my mom. Yeah. Right. Well, and I've told my parents- Oh my God. Yeah. And I've told my, my college age daughters, become an expert in it. Become an absolute expert in this because it is going to be definitive for your career or whatever career you choose. So use the technology would be one. And by the way, pay for the slightly more expensive, you know, premium version, not just the free version. You know, it's 20 bucks a month. You can, you can, you can figure it out. That'd be number one. Number two on the, in the case of data centers and this, you know, that topic, I would just encourage people to get involved at the local level. You know, it's always shocking to me when I go to these county commission meetings in particular, how many people just aren't tuned in. And you tend to get the really radical people at these meetings. You tend to not have just normal normal people, you know, just good, normal folks that are going to work every day and raising their kids. And, you know, probably they're just busy, right? But very often in these public forums where issues are being discussed, you just don't have the voice of the broader community there. You end up having really radical, sometimes pretty crazy voices at these meetings. And anybody that's ever been to a school board meeting or a county commission meeting or city council meeting, you know, has experienced that. So get involved at the local level. I do not have an answer at the federal level, except that we have got to start electing people that are people of character. And I don't care what party they're from. I don't think the Democrats have the solution. I don't think the Republicans have the solution. And as you and I have talked about, I think the solution lives somewhere in the center. And I think that the more people of character that we elect, which requires pulling out of partisan tribal craziness, the more likely we are to have people that can solve these issues for us. Because if you just elect people that are bomb throwers and are focused on attack ads, and all of the craziness of politics, it's not likely that they're going to be serious about addressing really difficult questions, you know. And by the way, the smartest people out there who we want in public service are not the people that are drawn to it right now because they don't want to be a part of the craziness, right? So the good news is there are very good people. I named a few of them in the Trump administration. I think David Sachs in particular, who I guess has now left the administration, but I think is still very active in terms of helping them shape AI policy. He is brilliant. He has spent time and a lot of time in technology and as an investor, and is trying to do the right thing for the country, right? And the more people you have like that, in his case, you know, leaving the private sector and coming into the government, which is quite important in the case of AI, because you need people that have actually worked on these issues. You know, that's a really good sign. And I think that the more we have of that, the more likely we are to have people that are capable of addressing these problems. [01:04:16] Speaker 2: You've inspired me on a regular basis and you did again today. So I am grateful and I am hopeful and I am thinking different and I am better off for always listening to you. So how can the audience do that? I know you have a fantastic book. I want you to tell everybody about that isn't actually about AI and where they can follow you for more information on this topic in particular as well. [01:04:39] Trevor Nielsen: Yeah, well, I'm on X and that's probably a good place. The Prometheus website is prometheushyperscale.com and the book is called The Forgotten Center, although it's not really about AI. It's more about this belief that there's a need for us to set aside this kind of tribal insanity and work together to find solutions. In fact, there are a lot of examples from Wyoming, elected officials here who have done that over the years. And so a lot of the book is about that. So The Forgotten Center is on that topic. Look at the Prometheus website for topics, you know, for that topic and then follow me on X. [01:05:18] Speaker 2: Thank you. And it's Trevor Nielsen on X, @Trevor Nielsen. [01:05:22] Trevor Nielsen: It's Trevor underscore Nielsen. Yeah, yeah. [01:05:26] Speaker 2: You threw me for it. Ah, you got me. Dammit. [01:05:28] Trevor Nielsen: There aren't too many Trevor's out there. Trevor underscore Nielsen. [01:05:35] Speaker 2: Thank you so much. I really appreciate it. [01:05:37] Trevor Nielsen: All right, Jill. We'll see you soon. Thank you. [01:05:41] Speaker 2: Thank you so much for watching. If you enjoyed the podcast, please like, comment, subscribe, and share. And make sure to let me know what guests you want to see on in the future.