Energy Department’s AI R&D work gets a boost in bipartisan House bill

The Department of Energy would receive updated guidance for artificial intelligence-related research and development activities under new legislation from a bipartisan pair of House lawmakers.

The Department of Energy Artificial Intelligence Act of 2024 from Reps. Brandon Williams, R-N.Y., and Suzanne Bonamici, D-Ore., would amend a DOE-specific portion of the National Artificial Intelligence Initiative Act of 2020 and codify several items regarding the agency’s R&D efforts on the emerging technology.

“This is the kind of technology that will define the coming eras of human history,” Williams said in a statement. “To ensure prosperity at home and maintain America’s scientific advantage abroad, we must innovate. We must utilize every resource available to develop newer, stronger, safer tech which, in turn, will spur advances in national security, energy-efficiency, manufacturing, and more.”

The first of those modified items from the National AI Initiative Act is the authorization of activities laid out in the Frontiers in Artificial Intelligence for Science, Security, and Technology initiative, a program with the agency’s national labs to accelerate the creation of AI systems and leverage its advanced supercomputing and research infrastructure capabilities. The FASST initiative has been a top priority for DOE in recent months, with the agency releasing a roadmap for the program in July and Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm saying at the time that it would “enable technological breakthroughs for decades to come.”

The bill from Williams and Bonamici would also require the DOE to partner with nonprofits and private-sector firms in collaborative efforts aimed at “scientific discovery and technological innovation in the field of AI,” per the press release announcing the legislation. Other measures include support for the development of high-powered computing systems and AI platforms via Energy Department-managed facilities and infrastructure data, and the authorization of at least one data center testbed for the purposes of study into hardware and algorithms used for energy-efficient AI training.

“Artificial intelligence is evolving rapidly and the government must be equipped to respond to new developments and stay on the cutting edge,” Bonamici said in a statement. “I’m introducing the bipartisan DOE AI Act with Rep. Williams to position the Department of Energy to develop high-performance platforms, responsibly cultivate training data, and improve energy efficiency to support safe AI innovation.”

The legislation from Williams and Bonamici bears some resemblance to a bipartisan bill introduced in the upper chamber in July. The Department of Energy AI Act from Sens. Joe Manchin, I-W.Va., and Lisa Murkowksi, R-Alaska, would authorize the FASST initiative and also push the Energy secretary to create an R&D program focused on the aggregation and training of AI datasets and the deployment of advanced computing platforms and infrastructure.