California's legislature has approved a first-of-its-kind state law setting rules for how lawyers are permitted to use generative artificial intelligence in their work. https://t.co/1qywd2MA3F
New York City Public Schools is banning more than half a million students and teachers from using artificial intelligence for the 2026-2027 academic year, the school district confirmed to ABC News.
Read more: https://t.co/UzU67VXb2Z
In Australia, under proposed national standards, new data centres must bring their own 100% renewable energy supply, firmed by batteries or gas. Crucially, this means new, additional renewable generation, not simply claiming certificates against generation already on the grid.
And the scale is enormous. AEMO is already tracking 225 data centres in development, with data-centre electricity demand forecast to rise from around 3% of NEM consumption today to 13% by 2036, potentially around 34 TWh a year.
Climate Change & Energy Minister Chris Bowen puts the challenge bluntly: “Data centres are huge consumers of electricity. They are whales.” In 2024, US data centres consumed as much electricity as the entire country of Sweden. Australia wants to get ahead of this.
Australia isn't alone. Similar policy moves are underway in China, Germany and Ireland, but Australia's proposed framework is among the most aggressive: 100% renewable energy, tied to new additional generation and backed by firming, with the new rules intended to begin from 2027.
Instead of allowing this enormous new load to compete with households and businesses for existing generation, Australia wants it to help finance the new supply needed to meet it.
AI growth → electricity demand → renewable PPAs → new solar & wind → more batteries & transmission → stronger grid.
This has always been part of my thesis: AI will become a major new demand engine for Australia's solar, wind and battery buildout, rather than a brake on the energy transition, potentially creating a blueprint the rest of the world can replicate.
AI and renewables don't have to compete. Done right, each can accelerate the other. #SWB #Bettrification
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Deloitte has agreed to pay nearly $21.5 million to settle allegations that it defrauded the federal government by continuing to consider diversity when making hiring, promotion and staffing decisions. https://t.co/g6YAalu6Av
BREAKING: The Supreme Court has cleared the way for President Trump's executive order restricting mail-in voting ahead of midterms. https://t.co/FDJnPdmoBw
BREAKING: The U.S. is preparing to rescind up to 200,000 business and tourism visas in the largest mass visa revocation ever, officials say. https://t.co/TZzszWyv4z
A lot of talk about Japanese politics with speculation growing about the demise of Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi's administration. And I always wonder about whether there can ever be a viable opposition in Japan, or a two-party system. It's a bit of a stereotype, but Japanese society is conformist, liking to do things by consensus, or alleged consensus, so that people feel like they are all working as one. It's a system that has worked relatively well, despite the giant mistakes of the past like colonization leading up to World War II. After its defeat, Japan has never had total political autonomy, anyway, given the defense alliance. Defense is so key in setting political policy, and in so many areas. Going against that alliance and what it stands for is basically unthinkable in Japan today. So both these factors mean Japan's brand of "democracy" is not what you might expect in the West.