“We're entering a period  where demand is arriving faster than infrastructure can be built. AI is adding to that challenge, increasing the need for power today while much of its economic value will emerge over time. That places a premium on long-term thinking. Investors are looking beyond individual assets and asking whether the broader system can support growth reliably and at scale. The opportunity is significant, but capturing it will depend on coordinated investment across generation, networks, storage and digital infrastructure.” Ken Moelis Founder and Executive Chairman, Moelis & Company Leaders are very clear when asked about the near-term energy demands of AI. Seventy-four percent expect that greater adoption of AI will increase the total amount of energy their country consumes by 2030. Six percent expect a decrease. The IEA puts global data-center electricity demand at roughly 950 TWh by 20304 (IEA). The longer view is less settled, and potentially more interesting. By 2050, 64% still expect AI to raise total energy use — but 24% now expect it to lower it, roughly four times the number who say so for 2030. The data suggests that the efficiency case is both established and that the industry believes in it. Asked where AI will most affect the energy transition, 57% name optimizing complex systems — power flow, dispatch, balancing — well ahead of automating processes at 39% and unlocking scientific discoveries at 32%.The expected payoff is therefore, in the near term at least, not a new technology, it is a better-run system. This potentially presents a challenge when allocating capital: demand rises first, and the intelligence that moderates it pays back later. Twenty-four percent name sovereign wealth and state-directed investment and 23% private equity and venture capital as the most influential sources of capital by 2030, with institutional investors at 14%. By 2050 venture capital falls to 17% and institutional money rises to 18%, while sovereign and state-directed capital barely moves, from 24% to 23% — the only source expected to matter as much in twenty-five years as in five. Most leaders expect AI adoption to increase national energy use by 2030. The investment task is to build capacity and intelligence together — coordinating generation, networks and digital infrastructure while pursuing efficiency gains. The scale of corporate commitment is rising alongside it. BCG’s cross- industry AI Radar report cites executives in energy and utilities projecting AI investment climbing from 0.6% to 1.9% of revenue5. But the binding constraint is downstream of any model. The IEA puts annual investment in electricity grids at roughly $400 billion — well under half of what flows into generation6 (IEA). Capacity is being built faster than the network that has to carry it. That constraint extends upstream of the power plant. Expanding gas supply and LNG capacity does not by itself create reliable power. Gas must be processed, transported, stored and delivered to generators, while networks must carry electricity to concentrated demand. Because these assets operate on different investment cycles and are unevenly distributed, an underdeveloped link can become the bottleneck. Supply, transportation, storage, generation and grids should therefore be financed as a connected system. Our data points at the same gap. Asked for the single most important policy action to support sustainable AI and energy growth, leaders name grid investment first at 24%, with AI and energy regulation level at 24% and incentives for clean energy at 17%.Two options were new this year — energy system integration, and cross-border coordination frameworks — and together they took 29%. From the findings you can make the case that both the money and policy are being drawn toward the same place: not technology, but the system it runs on. 4 CAPITAL AND POLICY ARE BEING DRAWN TOWARDS THE GRID 4 Key Questions on Energy and AI, World Energy Outlook Special Report, IEA, April 2026 5 BCG AI Radar 2026: As AI Investments Surge, CEOs Take the Lead, Boston Consulting Group, January 2026 6 World Energy Investment 2025, IEA, June 2025 22