Rep. Josh Christy N.D. Legislative Assembly photo

North Dakota has potential to become a technology and data hub with the right policies and investments, according to a Fargo legislator who is drafting bills to advance the idea.

Rep. Josh Christy, R-Fargo, who has worked in the technology industry for the past 25 years, is suggesting North Dakota support artificial intelligence (AI) and computing initiatives that attract talent to the state and also leverage the state’s natural gas resources to attract energy-hungry data and computing centers.

He plans to request $5 million for a research and development fund and another $5 million to support what are known as compute credits.

“The R&D fund would basically be for high-tech, advanced computing technologies, and that would be a grant-based program,” Christy said.

An early-stage startup company probably wouldn’t qualify for existing state assistance programs, so this fund would be a way to attract high-tech companies to the state, with grants possibly in the $25,0000-$50,000 range, he said.

Compute credits involve purchasing a portion of a computer platform, known as cloud computing, to conduct computing operations. Christy noted the difficulty startup companies have in obtaining compute credits within the existing technology marketplace and proposed the state create a cooperative purchasing model in collaboration with data centers.

“What I wanted to do was to create a program that allowed the AI startups and the AI needs within the state the ability to apply for a grant that gives them computing power for their applications,” Christy said. “The hope is, again, that we would attract more professorships to the research institutes that are interested in the space, so that they can do their research. We can attract more students that are interested in the space.”

In exchange for placing some employees in North Dakota, the state could grant compute credits to companies to help get software off the ground and into testing, he said.

Christy would like to see a ND Advanced Computing Alliance, overseen by a public/private sector board, offer a unified state strategy for artificial intelligence that would encompass workforce development, education, research and AI safety.

“This is more of a future vision. I’ve been working with a lot of different agencies,” he said, citing, in particular, the N.D. University System, Department of Public Instruction and North Dakota Information Technology.

“The thing that I wanted to try to head off as we move into the AI future is everyone trying to silo themselves and do it all – everyone trying to do their own thing. What I wanted to try to lay the groundwork for was the ability to take the State Mill, the State Bank model and create kind of a co-op,” he said. “Can we bring in resources into one pool that everyone is able to tap into?”

Natural gas is another resource he proposes to utilize on behalf of the technology industry.

“In my research, I found that North Dakota flares 24% of all the natural gas in the U.S., which is a huge amount. If we can capture that and reclaim that to power data centers at a lower cost to compute, that allows us to create economic development, workforce development. There’s just a lot of opportunities there,” Christy said.

Where the data centers would be located is up to local jurisdictions, but there is opportunity for western North Dakota to benefit from the economic development given the natural gas activity there, he said.

North Dakota also has a positive power utilization rating, which is an industry ranking indicating locations where it makes sense to place data centers, Christy said.

North Dakota’s cooler climate means less power needs to be generated to cool equipment. Data center equipment also is tax-exempt in the state, he said.

“And then we have a very good regulatory environment,” he said. “We also have access to good baseload energy. So, I feel like we are positioned very well for this.”

In addition, Christy plans to introduce two policy bills.

“Technology can always be used for good and bad, and I see a lot of the good with what we’re trying to do, but there’s also kind of the negative side to it,” he said.

One concern brought to his attention by the Attorney General’s Office and Bureau of Criminal Investigations relates to the creation of child pornography using AI-generated images. Law enforcement has no prosecution authority, which Christy wants to create through legislation.

A second bill would address instances in which a person’s likeness is used without permission to generate AI images. Under legislation Christy is drafting, distribution of those images would enable a person harmed by the images to pursue damages in court.