China’s energy dominance underpinning its successful charge into the global artificial intelligence (AI) race for supremacy is so overwhelming it causes sleepless nights for Interior Secretary Doug Burgum.

Burgum made his revelation during an interview on the All-In podcast with David Friedberg.

He warned China is combining opportunity with a keen sense of direction based on strong baseload electrical power and that energy dominance should be ignored at the west’s peril.

China prioritises — as it always has — economic growth over environmental righteousness and American must follow suit, Burgum said:

If you were to ask me what’s the thing that keeps me awake at night, this is the issue. It’s so thrilling and refreshing that you understand the scale, the magnitude, and the importance of this AI arms race, which is really driven by access to electricity.

China last year brought on 94 and a half gigawatts of coal-powered electricity. One gigawatt is Denver, so they brought on 94 Denvers just last year. That’s more than all we have today for all of California and all of New York, which is less than 94. They added a New York and a California worth of electricity last year, just from coal. They’re still getting 60% of their base load from coal.

People may stop listening when they hear the word ‘coal,’ but coal, from an electricity standpoint—thermal coal—is fantastic base load. It has all the characteristics to allow you to maintain amperage and voltage to keep a system going.

Burgum maintains, “you simply can’t run an electrical grid with just intermittent power. You cannot run with something that is based on intermittent, which is the definition of solar or wind, because the sun doesn’t shine at night, and the wind doesn’t blow every day.”

Coal-fired energy is the way to go for America, Bergman counsels, and the time has come to turn away from former President Joe Biden’s eager embrace of any “green” power supplies that weren’t from traditional sources.