The False Narrative Is Driven By An Obsolete Computing Model
The false narrative that America needs trillions of dollars in new data centers, consuming electric power that does not exist is driven by legacy forces.
1980s technology vendors, with 40-year-old technology stacks, indeed need massive data centers to operate.
American A.I. dominance should not be dictated by the constraints of legacy software vendors.
In A.I., demand for building new data centers is often driven by the need to train new Large Language Models (LLMs).
Placing an application, AI agent or critical data into an LLM, in a cloud data center and bringing all one’s data directly into any LLM or cloud is expensive and inefficient – and there is an alternative.
Leading innovative firms like Power Analytics have proven LLMs can be bypassed through intelligently abstracting to databases outside the LLMs – delivering A.I. systems at 1/16th the cost of conventional technology.
Data center requirements are eliminated, delivering cost savings of 10 to 1.
Adopting a 1980s compute model for A.I. imperils U.S. security.
It is dangerous for America to commit blindly to building data centers as the default path for future A.I. dominance.
A typical data center can consume over 400,000 gallons of water a day and use the electric power equivalent to a town of 25,000.
Data centers do not produce significant numbers of jobs, and they destroy rural farmland.
Even if the massive data center model were optimal, there is not the electric power available to support its needs.
It is estimated that data centers today use about 2%-3% of available electric power.
Current forecasts – if America were to blindly default to the conventional wisdom that data centers are needed for A.I. – would consume up to 7% or more of electric power.
In January 2025, DeepSeek showed the need for massive data centers for A.I. is a fallacy.
Fractal and its customers have taken that argument to the next level – showing there is no need, for any government or commercial application, or for A.I. applications, for a data center at all.
Currently billion-dollar corporations use Fractal technology to move energy-consuming applications out of data centers to tiny computers residing with the data.
In a recent demonstration project, the Fractal team took the Federal Election Commission database – 680,000,000 records, which requires a massive U.S. Government data center, plus a cloud, scores of employees, a 4 to 5 figure-a-month electric bill and moved the entire database to a computer 4-inches by 4-inches in size.
The Fractal equivalent of the FEC database did not require a 5-figure monthly electric bill – it ran on less power than a kitchen microwave oven.
No data center needed – just a computer one can hold in one’s hand.
No expensive staff – the system is managed by one engineer, a few hours a month.
America is at an inflection point.
The false narrative that energy-hungry data centers are needed for A.I. dominance has proven to be false.
Now is the time to commit to projects demonstrating any application can be built or migrated without a data center or cloud.
Sustainable computing is here – proven today.
America has it. America’s adversaries do not.
This is a generational opportunity to embrace sustainable computing and the advantages it brings to A.I. development.
