Artificial intelligence is redefining what’s possible in finance, healthcare, logistics, and virtually every sector of the economy. But while your clients may be hearing about new applications and breakthrough models, what they don’t see is what powers it all, literally.
Every AI model, training loop, and query consumes electricity at a scale that traditional computing never demanded. As a result, the energy grid, not chip speed, is becoming the limiting factor in how fast and far AI can scale.
That’s why energy infrastructure deserves a place in your AI strategy. If you’re building exposure to AI’s long-term potential, you need to be thinking beyond software and semiconductors. You need to be thinking about power.
AI’s Energy Appetite Is Exploding
We’re no longer dealing with gradual increases in electricity consumption. Instead, demand forecasts have shifted toward exponential growth. Why? Because training and deploying AI models, particularly large language models, requires immense computing power, which in turn requires enormous energy input.
A single AI query can consume 10 to 90 times more energy than a standard Google search. Multiply that across millions of users and billions of queries, and you begin to see the challenge. Reliability, scalability, and energy availability have become the first real constraints in AI’s trajectory. And the companies helping solve those constraints are poised to benefit.
Utilities Are Becoming Growth Engines
Historically seen as defensive, regulated utilities are now entering a new phase driven by massive infrastructure upgrades in key data center corridors.
Take Evergy, for example. The utility is expanding its transmission and power delivery capacity to support hyperscale data center buildouts in and around Kansas City. These aren’t one-off projects. They are multi-year investments to modernize the grid and deliver consistent, scalable power to meet the demands of AI workloads.
Utilities are generally regulated businesses that aim to provide consistent service and long-term capital investment, which can contribute to more stable cash flow patterns over time. That can help create an ideal combination of income stability and exposure to one of the fastest-growing areas of infrastructure development.
Advanced Generation Is Stepping Up
While renewables are an important component of the energy ecosystem, AI’s needs go far beyond intermittent sources. You need baseload stability and responsive load balancing to ensure 24/7 availability for power-hungry computing environments.
GE Vernova, for instance, is deploying advanced gas turbines to help smooth load spikes and support dynamic power needs from data center clusters. Meanwhile, nuclear energy, long viewed with caution, is re-emerging as a serious candidate for AI-related power solutions. Global uranium demand is on the rise as investors and governments revisit nuclear’s potential for clean, uninterrupted energy.
Renewables can have a role, but they require robust transmission infrastructure to be viable at scale. That means the entire energy marketplace, from generation to grid, is entering a capital-intensive phase.
Investors Can’t Afford to Ignore This Foundation
When advisors consider AI exposure, their focus tends to gravitate toward obvious growth stories, such as chipmakers, software providers, and large tech platforms. But the physical systems supporting those innovations often go underappreciated in portfolios.
Energy infrastructure companies are positioned to capture sustained capital flows as AI demand reshapes electricity usage patterns. That creates an opportunity not only for return enhancement but also for risk management, given the relatively lower correlation these sectors have with broader equity benchmarks.
Tortoise Capital Helps Provide Access to the Lifeblood of Scalable AI
Our investment management team at Tortoise Capital is positioned to offer advisors carefully selected exposure to the energy enablers powering the next wave of AI development. This includes:
- Regulated utilities operating in high-demand regions
- Companies involved in transmission modernization and expansion
- Manufacturers of next-generation gas turbines
- Nuclear infrastructure and uranium suppliers essential to baseload continuity
Energy is central to AI’s scalability. To better understand how power and infrastructure are evolving, explore our guide The AI Revolution: Why Infrastructure is Critical to Ongoing Innovation.
For investors interested in strategies focused on this theme, Tortoise offers the AI Infrastructure ETF (TCAI). Explore the fund here.
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Click here for TCAI’s full holdings.
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