Opinion by: Merav Ozair, PhD, blockchain and AI senior advisor.
Elon Musk and Peter Diamandis help the concept that “every little thing will probably be free.” They purport to consider that AI abundance will finish poverty and supply a common excessive earnings.
Others within the mega tech ecosystem point out the approaching abundance. Demis Hassabis, for instance, says AI may spark a “renaissance” of “radical abundance.”
Politicians on the World Financial Discussion board 2026 in Davos favored Musk’s imaginative and prescient. They had been thrilled that their financial issues would quickly be “let out.” This story is sort of interesting. Who doesn’t prefer to get issues without cost?
What does it actually imply? Would all financial actions haven’t any value? Would all firms turn out to be altruistic and search no revenue?
Allow us to unpack the narrative.
The price of manufacturing might be low cost, however by no means zero
Let’s put issues in perspective. Within the age of AI abundance, services is not going to arrive out of “skinny air.” They’d nonetheless want labor, supplies, power and infrastructure.
The advances in AI and different rising applied sciences might result in very low cost power and extremely automated manufacturing. This evolution will consequence within the marginal value of most digital and even bodily items approaching zero.
This is because of three predominant components. First is the automation of labor, the place machines and AI deal with nearly all manufacturing, logistics and lots of companies. The second is superior manufacturing and AI distribution, like 3D printing, robotics and AI logistics methods that drastically scale back waste and stock, making “sufficient for everybody” technically possible. Lastly, considerable power — fusion or extremely‑low cost photo voltaic makes power so reasonably priced that it stops being the bottleneck.
As a result of power underlies every little thing bodily, all different prices fall.
Plans are already in place. Elon Musk is now prioritizing lunar manufacturing and AI, with a purpose of over 1,000 gigawatts of solar energy. Utilizing photo voltaic power as an alternative of nuclear energy will scale back power value to nearly zero. The catch: the preliminary value to determine the infrastructure on the moon could be very excessive, and it could want to beat main challenges.
Associated: Energym AI dystopia goes viral as crypto tasks tout user-owned AI brokers
Below these situations, it’s believable that schooling sources turn out to be considerably free to the consumer as a result of they’re AI‑generated and infinitely replicable as soon as the system is constructed. A big fraction of healthcare turns into extraordinarily low cost, as soon as the suitable AI and robotic infrastructure exists.
On the degree of physics and engineering, if the true bottlenecks — power and automation — are considerable, prices collapse, however they don’t fully disappear.
Infrastructure is the lacking layer that nobody talks about
Robotics and power must run at scale and velocity to create an “abundance” of every little thing for everybody. For this, it wants infrastructure.
Automation and robotics run on what Jensen Haung calls “AI factories.” That is AI infrastructure, representing a shift in the direction of treating AI growth as an industrial course of, enabling organizations to repeatedly practice and refine AI fashions for higher security and effectivity.
They’re specialised, high-performance computing knowledge facilities designed to “manufacture” intelligence by changing uncooked knowledge into educated AI fashions and tokens, slightly than merely storing knowledge. Utilizing superior GPUs and big interconnected infrastructure, they’re the engines of AI functions similar to autonomous autos, robotics and generative AI.
AI factories are costly. They want some huge cash to construct and run. Firms which have already arrange the infrastructure will continue to grow and bettering. For instance, Nvidia is 5 instances extra worthwhile than IBM was within the Nineteen Eighties, with solely a tenth of the workers. Productiveness and income will enhance, as a result of AI tremendously boosts effectivity. Investments will go to those that personal AI fashions, platforms and particularly the infrastructure.
This may result in the largest focus of wealth in historical past.
Main gamers embody tech giants like Nvidia, AWS and SpaceX. They’ll proceed to dominate the market, making it powerful for newcomers to compete.
Governments are additionally concerned. China is utilizing its big photo voltaic power capability to spice up the energy-heavy AI increase. This creates a singular “AI and power” ecosystem. Right here, synthetic intelligence optimises renewable power era, whereas solar energy helps knowledge centres. China is seen as a frontrunner in renewable power use.
Low-cost power shouldn’t be low cost
Power is the gasoline that runs AI factories, that are the engine of all robotics, automation and AI functions that can generate abundance. Power fuels the infrastructure, and infrastructure runs the AI functions. Subsequently, power is the true bottleneck. With out low cost power, this “free” principle fails.
At the moment, electrical energy is the first type of power used to run the infrastructure. China is aggressively integrating renewable power into its infrastructure and different areas are increasing renewable-powered power into knowledge facilities as properly. Electrical energy era and grid capability for AI-scale infrastructure could be very expensive and never scalable. To achieve abundance at scale, power have to be very low cost and scalable.
What are the choices?
Fission power is a kind of or nuclear power. It’s absolutely mature, offering secure energy, however produces radioactive waste. It carries the danger of nuclear proliferation, and security considerations relating to meltdowns. It’s cheaper than present fossil-based electrical energy sources however nonetheless has a tangible value, and, like the opposite electrical energy sources it’s restricted, and never scalable.
Fusion power includes merging mild atoms to create power, mimicking the solar, whereas conventional nuclear power splits heavy atoms. Fusion presents practically limitless, cleaner power with out long-lived high-level waste.
Fusion is inherently safer with no threat of a runaway chain response.
The caveat, nevertheless, is that fission is what’s presently getting used. Creating nuclear fusion for power is awfully costly and requires upfront investments of a whole bunch of billions of {dollars}, and it’s nonetheless experimental and sure a long time away from large-scale industrial use.
Not like nuclear fission, nuclear fusion is scalable. It’s low cost however not doesn’t value zero. Somebody has to pay the upfront prices to construct the infrastructure, to create it after which preserve it.
Elon Musk goes to the moon
Lunar solar energy gives ample power with out atmospheric points. But, it has excessive prices for launching, constructing and sustaining in a vacuum. Musk’s plan is to maneuver all manufacturing, together with the AI manufacturing unit, to the moon.
The moon has low gravity and loads of sources, making it the most cost effective place for AI infrastructure.
Robots will terraform and construct infrastructure. People will come to supervise and broaden, whereas AI knowledge centres will gasoline the area economic system.
With Starlink, SpaceX, Optimus robots and xAI, Musk is in a robust place to make this occur.
Nonetheless, machines for making superior AI chips want to achieve the moon. These bus-sized machines require very exact situations.
The answer is a brand new technique referred to as Atomically Exact Manufacturing (APM). This builds atom by atom and aligns with Musk’s “first precept” considering.
If profitable, this might unlock limitless photo voltaic power and uncooked supplies from the moon and asteroids. There could be no thermal limits or atmospheric interference.
This might result in boundless AI at a low value. Consultants say that if lunar fabrication works, it may create a trillion-dollar, and even a whole bunch of trillions, alternative.
Who will profit most from this hundred-trillion-dollar probability? Will or not it’s shared pretty?
The tender jail of “free”
When you could have centralized infrastructures and methods, whoever owns the infrastructure units the phrases of engagement. Strongly centralized methods can present intensive “free” companies, however in alternate, they usually demand excessive management over speech, motion, knowledge and financial decisions. Non‑authoritarian welfare states might commerce some particular person autonomy for safety and assured companies. Many “free” digital companies right now are funded by surveillance, profiling and behavioral manipulation — your knowledge and a spotlight are the true worth.
In a world of AI abundance, the infrastructure could also be authorities owned. It might be owned by firms. It could possibly be owned by means of a public-private partnership. Both approach, the infrastructure is centralized and the centralized energy will dictate the distribution phrases — how AI abundance is distributed, who will get what, below what situations. In the event that they want to, they will abruptly “shut the valve” and nothing is distributed both to a person or a bunch. Your dependency on their companies turns into a “tender jail” stripped of your autonomy and self-sovereignty.
It is perhaps a hundred-trillion-dollar alternative, however the proprietor of the centralized infrastructure will get the lion’s share and can dictate what is going to trickle right down to the plenty.
They are saying if one thing is “free”, you’re the product. This stays true in a world of sheer abundance. In that world, the product is your self-sovereignty.
Opinion by: Merav Ozair, PhD, blockchain and AI senior advisor.
This opinion article presents the creator’s skilled view, and it could not mirror the views of Cointelegraph.com. This content material has undergone editorial evaluation to make sure readability and relevance. Cointelegraph stays dedicated to clear reporting and upholding the best requirements of journalism. Readers are inspired to conduct their very own analysis earlier than taking any actions associated to the corporate.