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Missing the next boom? With deal-cutting pols a thing of the past, the Bay State is losing out on hundreds of billions in federal and corporate AI-related projects, labor leader warns
Whatever barroom in the sky Ted Kennedy now holds court in, he’s surely rolling his eyes and calling for another drink as hundreds of billions in pork barrel spending flows right past New England to other regions and states.
Fluent in progressive platitudes, Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey have struggled to understand the language of old fashioned political deal making.
The state’s two Democratic senators, after years of begging, have managed to line up $1.7 billion to replace the two bridges over the Cape Cod Canal.
An aide to Warren calls it the “largest single bridge funding grant in American history.”
Which would be great - until you realize that the project’s total tab tops $4.5 billion.
Kennedy, who helped haul in more than $7 billion in federal buckeroos for the Big Dig, would surely be unimpressed.
Now, with the federal government and big tech pumping hundreds of billions into AI related infrastructure and projects, could we wind up missing that gravy train as well?
Mike Monahan, a top electricians’ union official and one-time board member of Boston’s powerful development authority, is certainly worried.
Monahan, an IBEW international vice president, is seeing double-digit membership growth in states like Ohio and Arizona where massive new semiconductor plants are under construction in the wake of the Biden administration’s $280 billion CHIPS and Science Act, passed by Congress in 2022.
But when it comes to New England, Monahan and other IBEW leaders are scrambling just to keep membership numbers up as an aging workforce hits retirement age.
There are no big semiconductor plants slated for New England.
“The industry is growing across the country in those areas, but in New England we are staying with the same numbers we have,” Monahan tells Contrarian Boston. “We have a lot of members installing solar panels, but it’s a one and done thing.”
And we also appear to be missing out on Big Tech’s spending on massive new data centers designed to power the AI revolution as well, with the exception of a Connecticut data center being planned next to the Millstone nuclear plant.
Despite being home to research powerhouses like MIT and Harvard, Massachusetts is nowhere to be found on the top 15 markets across the country for data centers.
Why? After pretty much running nuclear power out of town in Massachusetts and other New England states, we lack the electric grid and power plant capacity needed to support AI data centers.
AI data centers require far more power than the typical data center - by some estimates, ten times as much.
Beyond capacity, there’s also electric rates, with Massachusetts stuck with some of the highest in the country - a major deterrent to tech companies looking to build data centers.
By contrast, rates in Ohio and Arizona, two states where semiconductor plants are taking shape, are roughly 50 percent lower.
“We don’t have the electricity and it’s too expensive,” Monahan said.
And data centers matter - or should matter - to our senators and our all-Democratic congressional delegation, which, the last time we checked, claims to best represent the interests of working men and women.
During construction, this new breed of data centers - often with price-tags north of $1 billion - generate lots of well-paid work for electricians and other construction workers, while also requiring considerable ongoing maintenance after they are up and running, according to Monahan.
Monahan’s pretty sure that Ted Kennedy would have understood this, but he’s not so sure of the late senator’s successors.
When Contrarian Boston asked Warren’s office for specific examples of AI boom projects the senator has secured for Massachusetts, an aide cited $19.7 million for Northeast Microelectronics Coalition Hub.
Nice, but it would be far more impressive if we were talking $19.7 billion, not million. Markey’s office also cited the funding for the microelectronics group.
“Senators Warren and Markey couldn’t hold a candle to Ted Kennedy on his worst day,” Monahan said.
NIMBY nuttiness: Wellesley neighbors put the kibosh on plans to build dozens of badly needed new condos
Um, downsized might not be the best description of what’s happened to what was a promising condo project in Wellesley Hills, where the median home price is an oh-so-affordable $2.9 million.
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