Millions of viewers in the U.K. turned on kettles at halftime during the UEFA EURO 2020 round of 16 match between England and Germany, creating a sudden surge in electricity demand. National Grid saw a demand spike of about 1 gigawatt in a matter of minutes, highlighting how quickly grid operators must respond to keep the system stable as large new electricity users come online.
Emerald AI, working with NVIDIA, EPRI, National Grid and Nebius, presented a model for “power-flexible” Artificial Intelligence factories that can automatically reduce power use during periods of grid stress. Following proof-of-concept trials at Artificial Intelligence factories in Arizona, Virginia and Illinois, the group brought the Emerald AI Conductor Platform to Nebius’ new Artificial Intelligence factory in London. The team ran production-grade Artificial Intelligence workloads on a cluster of 96 NVIDIA Blackwell Ultra GPUs connected through the NVIDIA Quantum-X800 InfiniBand platform, while NVIDIA System Management Interface provided seconds-level GPU power telemetry.
EPRI and National Grid simulated grid stress events ranging from lightning strikes to extended periods of low wind power, then instructed the facility to temporarily cut consumption. One test recreated the football match “TV pickup” event. As millions of simulated kettles were about to switch on, the Artificial Intelligence cluster reduced its power use and absorbed the abrupt demand swing without disrupting the highest-priority workloads. In the Nebius demonstration, higher-priority tasks maintained peak throughput while more flexible jobs were slowed temporarily.
Emerald AI recorded 100% alignment with over 200 power targets that EPRI and National Grid instructed the Artificial Intelligence cluster to follow for this experiment. The companies said the result shows that flexible computing loads can help grids use existing capacity more efficiently, reducing the need to overbuild infrastructure for worst-case peaks and helping keep consumer electricity costs manageable.
National Grid said the tests extended beyond earlier U.S. work by covering not only GPUs, but also CPUs and the total power consumption of the surrounding IT equipment. The approach is positioned as a way to help London connect large new customers despite infrastructure constraints, while supporting broader economic growth tied to computing investment in the U.K. After four demonstrations, Emerald AI and NVIDIA are preparing for real-world deployment at the Aurora AI Factory in Virginia, set to open this year.
