Powering the Digital Transformation

This book connects the dots between artificial intelligence, energy systems, and computing infrastructure, offering a fresh and systems-based perspective on one of the most important challenges of our time: sustainability in the age of AI. Rather than viewing AI as simply a new consumer of electricity, this book reframes it as a meta-technology —one that can drive system-wide optimization across energy, materials, logistics, and infrastructure. Using a clear systems analysis approach, this book explores how these technologies interact, how data centers are evolving into active components of energy infrastructure, and how public policy, governance, and human decision-making shape outcomes. It goes beyond the usual focus on energy efficiency or technological hype, offering readers a deeper understanding of the causal relationships and strategic implications at play. Essential reading for anyone involved in strategy, innovation, digital transformation, or sustainability, this book provides the tools to make sense of accelerating change and to act responsibly within it. It challenges assumptions, provides a practical framework for future thinking, and makes the case for deliberate, system-wide approaches to digital and ecological futures.