Powering South Carolina’s Future: Energy, Innovation, and Opportunity

by Susie Shannon, President & CEO of the South Carolina Council on Competitiveness

South Carolina stands at a pivotal moment to secure its position as the location of choice for the technology, cloud computing and advanced manufacturing jobs shaping our future. Reliable and affordable energy is a make-or-break issue for businesses of all types in South Carolina and for energy-intensive industries the availability of low-cost, reliable power has been a significant factor in companies’ consideration of South Carolina as the place to grow or expand. Much of the recent debate around energy demand in South Carolina has been centered on rates and the amount of electricity data centers and advanced manufacturing require to operate. While this is an important issue, what is becoming increasingly clear is that one of our other biggest issues – and one in which South Carolina is competitively positioned to excel – is the issue of skilled manpower.

Recently, I participated in a roundtable in Columbia with Congresswoman Sheri Biggs and other industry, academic, and government leaders to discuss the opportunities and challenges we face with respect to energy and technology as South Carolina’s data center infrastructure increasingly powers small businesses and manufacturers across the state. Nearly every sector of the South Carolina economy, including the aerospace, defense, logistics, manufacturing, and technology sectors, require that our children have the advanced skills to compete in a technology-driven economy. Typically, that has meant a focus on post-secondary STEM programs. While these are critical, the speed at which technology is advancing has made it clear that we must start reaching our children much sooner if we want to properly prepare them for the new and exciting career opportunities to come.

Historically, the foundation of South Carolina’s economy was built around the agricultural and textile industries. After WWII, we embarked on a deliberate strategy to diversify our economy and pursue a successful industry cluster approach that focuses on fostering collaboration among businesses, educational institutions, and government to enhance competitiveness in targeted sectors like aerospace, automotive, logistics, advanced manufacturing, and technology. This focused approach has continued to pay enormous dividends. South Carolina’s recent cluster strategy has yielded more than $10 billion in capital investment and tens of thousands of jobs, with hundreds of companies either being created or moving here.  Our state’s critical assets, like the SC Ports and its connectivity to the global marketplace and support of both job growth and local businesses, along with our two-year technical and community college system, are key drivers of South Carolina’s growth.

To sustain this momentum and continue to grow our reputation as a global leader in technology and industry, South Carolina’s newest cluster focused on Artificial Intelligence (AI) is working to reshape the state’s major supply chains and educate and train our children earlier with a focus on both middle and high schools. SC Competes’ dedicated public-private-academic AI initiatives, like the Palmetto AI Corridor, SC Tech, Palmetto Applied Research Council, and SC Fraunhofer Alliance and which are hyper-focused on critical technologies like AI, are helping to drive innovation by connecting businesses, researchers, and educators to harness new and emerging technologies and tools. These initiatives are also helping local industries—from manufacturing to agriculture—leverage new tools to boost efficiency and competitiveness. The AI cluster will also bring hands-on robotics and technology education to ten schools across South Carolina (grades 6-9), along with developing out an “AI Marketplace – SC-AIM” – within the next year. South Carolina is already demonstrating it is AI-ready and AI-forward.  A dedicated AI curriculum is rolling out in select high schools this fall.  Our state’s two- and four-year colleges and universities are deploying advanced research enabled by AI technologies, while also educating the future talent in these high-paying careers.  On top of that, our SC Legislature is leading the way in enabling and ensuring South Carolina is globally-competitive in effective and responsible use of AI in providing useful citizen services, educating our people, and enhancing economic growth for our industries.  This effort has been strongly championed by Representative Jeff Bradley, Chairman of the House Committee on Regulations and Administrative Procedures, Artificial Intelligence, and Cybersecurity. Under his leadership, the Committee has been instrumental in driving the responsible adoption of AI across state and local government, fostering its use in K-12 and higher education, and helping businesses leverage AI to become more competitive. Chairman Bradley’s vision has centered on using AI not only as a tool for efficiency and innovation, but also as a foundation for building a modern workforce and ensuring South Carolina remains a national leader in both economic development and technological readiness.

The stakes are high. Global competition demands that we continue to grow our economy and embrace cutting-edge technologies like AI to retain and grow jobs in South Carolina. Thanks to our state’s success in working together across our public, private, and academic areas and in prioritizing energy innovation and preparing our students for the jobs of the future, we can secure a prosperous future for all South Carolinians.

Susie Shannon serves as the President & CEO of the South Carolina Council on Competitiveness (“SC Competes”), a business-led, nonprofit organization that drives South Carolina’s long-term economic growth through managing select industry clusters and providing the research, network, and resources that clusters require to thrive.