Bruin AI Current Events
AI’s Power Struggle | Coal, Courts, and Competing Visions
Good afternoon!
Welcome back to the Current Events Newsletter. We are glad you are tuning in this week.
Thanks to everyone who came out to Bruin AI’s first-ever Responsible AI Hackathon kickoff event! We have stimulating workshops lined up this week that we are excited for you to participate in. If you are interested in learning about how AI is being used in key industries (such as sustainability, healthcare, and creativity), add these workshops to your calendar here!
Additionally, we are about <1 week away from SoCal AI Responsibility Summit (SAIRS) 2025, with speakers and sponsors from Google, NVIDIA, IBM, Meta, Microsoft, and more!
📣 Announcements
💸 Economy
🧭 Ethics
- Karen
The Responsible AI Hackathon has begun
This week-long hackathon aims to tackle key challenges in Tech, Healthcare, and Infrastructure, with no coding experience required!
Why join?
🔹 $1,000+ in prizes
🔹 Workshops & personalized mentorship from industry experts
🔹 Hands-on AI experience in key sectors
🔹 FREE pass to SAIRS 2025, a top AI conference
EXTENDED Deadline to Register: Wednesday, April 16th at 11:59 PM
More details can be found in our hacker packet.
Happy building!
The SoCal AI Responsibility Summit is 5 days away
The theme this year is AI in art, gaming, consulting, and quant finance: the future of creativity and decision-making.
Get a chance to hear panels from industry experts, network with Fortune 100 companies, and submit your research for a prize!
📍 UCLA Ackerman Grand Ballroom
🗓️ April 19th, 2025
Trump Turns to Coal
Industry experts recognize that the surge in electricity demand that is coming in the next few years needs to be addressed. Some industry leaders such as the International Energy Agency predict that electricity demand from AI-driven data centers will quadruple by 2030, and that will account for “half of the growth in electricity demand between now and 2030.”
While experts largely disagree over the path forward, the Trump Administration has indicated that coal will be its choice as the energy of the future.
Over the past decades, coal’s contribution to US energy consumption fell from “about 37% in 1950 to 9% in 2023,” and has largely been replaced by other sources such as liquified natural gas and renewables which are widely considered cheaper. In fact, many utility companies have already closed hundreds of aging coal plants and are on track to “close half of their coal-fired generation capacity by 2026.” While the surge in AI-driven power demand did push some of these closings back, the trend is clear: coal has been on its way out for decades.
Trump’s executive orders to boost the coal industry direct agencies to lift barriers to coal mining including an Obama-era moratorium that paused coal leasing on federal land, cancel policies encouraging a transition away from coal production, and provide coal-fired plants a “two-year exemption from federal requirements to reduce emissions of toxic chemicals.” His aims extend to the state level as Attorney General Pam Bondi was instructed to take measures to stop the enforcement of state laws that limit coal production.
For those worried about climate change, this move from the Trump administration in conjunction with AI’s surging power demand may threaten American progress on the matter. AI’s addition to data center demand was previously projected to drive new natural gas consumption “equivalent to roughly 10-30 percent of current U.S. demand for gas-fired power generation.” While private companies have been gravitating toward alternatives such as nuclear power, the Trump administration's coal expansion efforts could work to undermine the attractiveness of renewable options in the marketplace.
While the administration has not provided any details, it seeks to stop future administrations from reversing its actions by providing “guarantees that government cannot close [coal plants] down.”
Yet, past precedent implies a level of uncertainty as to the extent to which coal can actually come back. Trump pledged to revive coal in 2016 as well, but he largely failed. Quite simply, “coal plants are older and getting more expensive to run,” making them less competitive in the free market. Depending on the outcome of this tension between market economics and policy intervention, America’s future energy landscape will be set for decades.
-Tobin
OpenAI Countersues
In the latest escalation of one of Silicon Valley’s most high profile feuds, OpenAI filed a countersuit against Elon Musk on Wednesday. OpenAI asked a federal court to block Musk from engaging in what it called an “unlawful campaign of harassment.”
The countersuit responds to Musk’s 2023 lawsuit which accused OpenAI and its founders, Sam Altman and Greg Brockman, of abandoning the company’s original nonprofit mission in favor of commercial gain. In its filing, OpenAI argues that not only is Musk misrepresenting OpenAI’s move away from a nonprofit structure, but his suit is based on a personal motivation to sabotage the company. OpenAI's filing seeks to clarify that the company intends to become a public benefit corporation rather than a traditional for-profit entity. This structure would allow OpenAI to generate profits while maintaining its core mission of developing artificial intelligence that benefits humanity.
The 66 page court document draws a detailed history of OpenAI’s history, particularly as it regards Musk’s involvement, and it describes what it considers a coordinated campaign to discredit OpenAI. OpenAI argues that, “Musk could not tolerate seeing such success for an enterprise he had abandoned and declared doomed. He made it his project to take down OpenAI, and to build a direct competitor that would seize the technological lead—not for humanity but for Elon Musk.”
Musk’s use of X to discredit AI provides a key argument for the case. In November of 2023, OpenAI saw significant turmoil and and Altman was briefly removed and reinstated as OpenAI’s CEO. The day he was reinstated, Musk posted on X a link to a letter which purported to come from disgruntled OpenAI employees. The letter accused Altman and Brockman of manipulation and deceit, but the letter was deemed largely a hoax according to OpenAI’s filing. Recently, Musk’s bid to buy OpenAI during the process of changing its status from a non-profit to public benefit corporation represents a continuation of this behavior.
OpenAI argues that this letter was a sham; “Among other things, the letter included no evidence of financing to pay the nearly $100 billion purchase price, which the letter described as based on OpenAI’s ‘historical financial results’ and ‘projections.’” Although OpenAI recognized the unserious nature of the bid, it argues that it had to take on significant legal and financial costs responding to the letter and interacting with media.
How the Oakland Court overseeing this case rules is yet unknown, but OpenAI’s case is clear: “Elon continues to use bad-faith tactics in an attempt to slow down OpenAI for his personal benefit. These efforts are anti-competitive and go against our mission.”
As both sides of this lawsuit dig in farther, it is clear that this battle is just as much about ego and who gets to shape the future of AI as it is a legal one.
-Tobin
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All the best,
Tobin Wilson, Editorial Intern
Karen Harrison, Newsletter Manager
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“When we help ourselves, we find moments of happiness. When we help others, we find lasting fulfillment.” - Simon Sinek