Shoulder to Shoulder

In this episode of Shoulder to Shoulder, hosts Vin Caruso and Amanda Winter Cassidy sit down with Brian Chen, VP of Energy and Infrastructure Sales at Stewart Title, to talk about what's really driving — and slowing down — America's data center boom. Brian compares today's data center land rush to renewable energy development a decade ago, but with far deeper capital behind it and a faster path to community backlash. Drawing on his military background leading counterinsurgency and community engagement work in Afghanistan, Brian argues the biggest obstacle facing data center developers isn't land, power, or money — it's trust, and the industry's habit of operating in secrecy is making that problem worse. The conversation covers transmission bottlenecks, the misinformation swirling around tax abatements, why AI has become a national security race, and what developers can learn from renewable energy's own community-engagement growing pains.

🎧 Episode Highlights

[00:02:00] Why data center development looks like early-stage renewables — same land-and-power scramble, but now with heavy community opposition.

[00:12:00] Transmission infrastructure as the real bottleneck: the coming choice between multi-trillion-dollar grid buildout and a shift toward regional microgrids.

[00:19:48] Brian's counterinsurgency background in Afghanistan, and why the same community-first playbook applies to data center developers today.

[00:24:00] Why data centers have quietly existed for decades — and why the public only started noticing in the last few years.

[00:31:28] The real AI jobs threat: it's not AI that replaces you, it's the person who knows how to use it.

[00:38:30] The farmer's dilemma: why rural landowners see developers as their retirement plan — and their neighbors don't.

[00:43:17] Debunking the "Texas lost $350 million to data centers" myth — how tax abatement misinformation spreads and what it actually means.

[00:50:00] What renewable energy's advocacy groups (AWEA, SEIA) got right that data centers still haven't figured out.

🔑 Key Takeaways:

•Takeaway 1: The biggest obstacle to data center development isn't land, power, or capital, it's trust. Communities that feel decisions are being made behind closed doors push back hard, regardless of the actual economic benefit.

•Takeaway 2: Much of the public opposition to data centers is built on misinformation that goes unanswered — like the false claim that Texas "lost" $350 million to tax abatements, when abatements are a discount on taxes owed, not a credit or a loss. The industry's competitive secrecy is part of why that narrative goes uncorrected.

•Takeaway 3: AI likely won't replace most people's jobs directly — but someone who's more efficient because they know how to use AI probably will. The skills gap, not the technology itself, is the real risk for most workers.

👤 Guest Spotlight:

Brian Chen, VP of Energy and Infrastructure Sales, Stewart Title

Brian Chen leads energy and infrastructure sales at Stewart Title, working at the intersection of land, title, and some of the largest data center and renewable energy projects in the country. Before his career in title and energy infrastructure, Brian served in the U.S. Army in Afghanistan, where his work centered on provincial reconstruction and counterinsurgency — building trust and buy-in with local communities, an experience that directly informs how he advises data center and renewable developers today. Outside of his day job, Brian mentors veterans transitioning out of the military, helping them see the range of civilian career paths available beyond their military occupational specialty. In this episode, he brings a rare combination of battlefield community-engagement experience and on-the-ground land expertise to one of the most contested conversations in American infrastructure.

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