The Yotta Podcast

Power is quickly becoming the defining constraint of the AI era. As data center demand accelerates and generative AI drives a hockey-stick curve in electricity consumption, the question isn’t just how we generate more power — it’s how we use it more intelligently. In this session from Yotta 2025, DatacenterDynamics’ Alex Dickins sits down with David Chernis, Director of Flexible Compute Platforms at CPower, to explore how flexible demand, AI workloads, and grid participation could reshape the energy landscape for digital infrastructure. From spiky inference loads to demand response markets and the concept of being a “good grid citizen,” this conversation looks at how the data center industry can unlock new capacity while supporting the grid.

As demand for digital infrastructure accelerates, the pressure to deliver complex data center projects on time, on budget and at scale has never been higher. Avicado, a leading digital project management consultancy, empowers owners and developers with the tools, processes and insights needed to streamline project delivery across the data center lifecycle. In this podcast, Avicado will demonstrate how integrating program management platforms and data-driven workflows can reduce risk, improve collaboration and accelerate time to market.

Join DPR Construction for an in-depth analysis on data centers and mass timber, led by BrightWorks Sustainability Principal Josh Hatch. Joined by Erik Kneer, SE, LEED AP, Strategic Initiatives Leader at GPLA and Scott Brown, National Mass Timber Specialist at DPR Construction, they’ll unpack the unprecedented pace and scale of data center development, the overlooked carbon story of how construction materials can have as much of a sustainable impact as operations, and how mass timber is a real-world application for the next generation of digital infrastructure.

Discover how the next wave of digital infrastructure is being built on water. In this podcast spotlight, Kat Sullivan of DatacenterDynamics speaks with Gabe Andrews, VP of Operations at Nautilus, and Agustin Roca, VP of Product, about their pioneering waterborne data center platform and its potential to transform the environmental impact of traditional facilities. From zero-water-consumption cooling to dramatically improved energy efficiency, this is a must-listen for anyone tracking the future of sustainable compute.

Senior Content Director Sarah Zilonis sat down with Natalie Johns, Alternative Energy Director at Dudley Land Company, for a conversation on renewables, land policy, mineral rights, regulatory changes, and successfully aligning projects with communities through meaningful engagement and education.

Founder George Rockett sat down with Tony Grayson, President & General Manager of Northstar Enterprise and Defense, for a conversation on modular data center design and how these innovative structures are revolutionizing the tech industry by providing scalable and efficient solutions. They also discuss Tony's experience as a Navy Commanding Officer on a deployed nuclear submarine in a not-to-miss conversation bridging mission-critical experience with digital infrastructure resilience.

This week on the Yotta Podcast, Founder George Rockett sits down with friend of the pod Dan Golding of Appleby Strategy Group, to discuss his latest blog post, "Why The End of Hyperscale is Good News." They touch on the rise of new market entrants, the complexities of AI Infrastructure, and the challenges of delivering projects on spec in the current economic environment. They also take a deep dive into the communication gaps that exist between data center providers and hyperscalers, and even touch on current events, like the recent challenge faced in Ashburn, VA, due to extreme heat and energy demands this past week in the United States.

This week on the Yotta Podcast, Founder George Rockett sits down with David Quirk P.E., President & CEO of DLB Associates Consulting Engineers, to unpack the evolution AI is having on data centers. From data center design to the one megawatt rack, collaboration across industry is becoming more essential for overcoming challenges and driving progress. David shares his insights on software applications, new cooling technologies, operational efficiency, and keeping up with the rapid pace of technological advancement.

Senior Content Director Sarah Zilonis sits down with Miranda Gardiner, Executive Director of the iMasons Climate Accord, to discuss why a sustainable industry is closer than we think. They explore Miranda's unique perspectives and how the Climate Accord approaches bringing various companies together to work through challenges. They also dive into how energy demand for AI creates an exciting and more innovative problem-solving environment across the industry, where leaders and decision-makers have a unique opportunity to tackle the energy crisis head-on.

George Rockett is joined by Mark P. Mills—energy futurist, author, and Executive Director at the National Center for Energy Analytics—for a wide-ranging conversation on the future of power, compute, and regulation in the AI age. From the counterintuitive reality that efficiency fuels energy demand, to the evolving role of gas generation and the regulatory sprint to keep up, Mills offers his characteristically sharp take on where we’re headed.

George Rockett sits down with Dan Golding, CTO at Appleby Strategy Group, for a deep dive into the AI-driven evolution of data centers. From the shifting tides of digital infrastructure to the high-stakes economics of AI-specific builds, they unpack the challenges, opportunities, and game-changing dynamics shaping the future of networks.

George Rockett sits down with Kemal Hawa, Partner at Greenberg Taurig one the world's pre-eminent law forms for digital infrastructure transactions. Involved in many of the largest transactions the industry has seen, Kemal shares the view from his front row seat as deal sizes get much bigger. Gigawatt big.

George Rockett talks to Peder Naerboe, Founder and Executive Chair of Bulk Infrastructure, a progressive and highly sustainability-focused Norwegian data center operator, and then some. Peder personifies the Yotta idea of connecting the silos and, in this conversation, goes back to the beginning of his journey into the digital world. It's taken him from the logistics industry to massive data center zoning projects, and into the subsea world as he looks to unleash stranded power capacity in ex-industrial regions of the cold North.

George Rockett talks to data center industry 'rockstar' Christian Belady about a long and illustrious career that has taken him from thermal engineer to infrastructure lead at Microsoft and what life's like on the 'other side' advising DigitalBridge and other exciting businesses. They talk about post-PUE, nature-positive, and how the industry must adapt to the massive scale of infrastructure in this next wave of development.

Joe Reele is vice president of solution architects at Schneider Electric, and has a birds-eye view on the company’s journey to true net-zero by 2050. In this talk, he explores how Schneider and the rest of the industry are making meaningful progress towards sustainability goals in the face of changes brought on by AI through a variety of innovative technologies.

In our latest Yotta podcast, George Rockett sits down with Steffen Hellmold, director at Cerabyte, to talk about data storage technology. Cerabyte is pioneering a novel approach to long-term data retention using nano-scale ceramic "punch cards" inspired by ancient clay tablets. Hellmold, whose personal journey has taken him from tape drives to DNA storage, believes that Cerabyte has the X factor.

George Rockett talks to Yotta Advisory Board Member Chris Sharp, CTO of global colocation giant Digital Realty, about how the infrastructure that supports Gen AI will evolve from its infancy into a more mature—and hopefully efficient—deployment model. They discuss many of the issues that the Yotta conference program will explore, including future-proofing data center design, energy constraints, and how networks will evolve to cope with the massive data growth that comes with inferencing.

George Rockett talks to a friend and industry veteran, Bill Angle, Co-founder of leading New York IT consultancy, CS Technology, about his journey through the world of digital infrastructure, as he likes to put it, "looking backward can often help us with how to deal with the future." The discussion looks at the 'whys' and 'hows' of the first concurrently maintainable data center he built for the United Parcel Service in 1994, which laid the blueprints for Tier IV data centers and the world's first low-latency trading platform for the NYSE. Who knew that the biblical tale of Babel's Tower has so much to do with the objectives of Yotta!

In this episode, George Rockett is joined by Jeff Wittich, chief product officer at Ampere Computing, a semiconductor company with an innovative approach to CPU design focused on high-performance, energy-efficient and sustainable cloud computing. Ampere signed on as an early Yotta supporter, in part because of Jeff's belief in the need to break down the silos that currently plague the digital infrastructure industry. In this episode, you'll learn about the inception of Ampere, Jeff's take on industry dynamics and why Ampere is urging the industry to "Get Over GPUs," calling them, "overpriced, overpowered and overkill."

Oklo's Caroline Cochran, COO, and founder, and Head of Business Development Brian Gitt dive into Oklo's journey from its inception at Y Combinator to its pioneering role in nuclear energy innovation, its approach to micro-nuclear reactors, safety features, and the strategic partnership with Sam Altman's AltC for public listing.  

Peter De Bock and Rakesh Radhakrishnan from the U.S. Department of Energy's ARPA-E discuss technological breakthroughs that will fundamentally change the way we use, generate, and store energy. Take a deep dive into their recent investment of $42 million in the Cooler Chips program, which targets a 90% reduction in cooling energy use. 

Mark P. Mills, author of "The Cloud Revolution", shares his insights on the cloud revolution and its relation to power and digital infrastructure demands. Explore the intersection of technology and energy production to learn how advancements will revolutionize our approach to energy consumption.

Chris Stott, the chairman and CEO of Lonestar Data Holdings, discusses the intricacies of building humanity's first-ever data center on the moon. Dive into the intersection of space technology, information management, and new solutions for data security and storage.