The Vertical Stack Technology Coalition For Near-Zero Emissions PBC ("VTCNZE") today announced a proposed national "Speed-to-Power" framework designed to deploy approximately 600 GWh of distributed grid storage within 48 months by adapting the CHIPS-era public equity model to energy infrastructure. The proposal follows the federal government's recent use of minority, non-controlling equity stakes in strategic technology companies under the CHIPS and Science Act.
VTCNZE believes this taxpayer-aligned model should apply to the physical power infrastructure required to support frontier artificial intelligence, quantum computing, advanced manufacturing, defense readiness, and data center growth. "The CHIPS model changed the conversation from one-way subsidy to taxpayer upside," said Max Davis, Founding Architect of VTCNZE. "If public authority can accelerate quantum and semiconductor infrastructure while preserving value for the taxpayer, the same principle should apply to the energy infrastructure needed to power frontier AI. Chips do not matter if America cannot turn them on."
VTCNZE's framework calls for a coordinated public-private deployment model built around high-density, load-adjacent, non-lithium energy storage assets positioned near major computing and industrial load centers. Instead of sprawling horizontal battery farms or years-long utility interconnection queues, the framework prioritizes compact, modular, vertically integrated storage structures deployable on urban industrial parcels, brownfields, underutilized public land, and infrastructure-adjacent sites.
The company argues that the national AI power challenge is an industrial strategy issue, a national security issue, a ratepayer protection issue, and a community wealth issue. Across the United States, data center growth is colliding with constrained substations, multi-year interconnection backlogs, transformer shortages, and rising concerns that infrastructure costs may be shifted onto residential ratepayers.
Under the proposed model, federal, state, and municipal entities could participate in qualified infrastructure projects through minority, non-controlling equity positions or comparable economic participation rights. The federal government could contribute national priority designation, financing access, and permitting coordination. State governments could contribute clean-grid authority and infrastructure bank liquidity. Municipal governments could contribute brownfield access and permitting acceleration. Private investors would contribute project capital and engineering execution. "No taxpayer acceleration without taxpayer upside," the framework states.
The deployment model centers on high-density vertical energy storage structures, or "Vertical Stacks," designed to compress large-scale storage capacity into smaller urban footprints. VTCNZE's working target is 600 GWh across major U.S. data center corridors within 48 months, subject to engineering validation and site-specific approvals. "Scaling 600 GWh is not about building one mega-project," Davis said. "It is about validating a repeatable infrastructure unit and deploying it across corridors where power constraints are already threatening American technological leadership."
A central component is the "WIMBY Factor" — Welcome In My Backyard. Communities would be protected from avoidable cost-shifting and included in the upside through mechanisms like municipal equity participation and local revenue sharing. "If a neighborhood is being asked to host the infrastructure of the AI age, that neighborhood should not be treated as an afterthought," Davis said.
VTCNZE calls for immediate cooperation among public-sector authorities, utilities, data center operators, and communities to evaluate pilot deployment pathways. Priority sites include urban industrial brownfields, underutilized municipal land, and grid-constrained industrial zones. For more information, visit https://verticalstack.energy.
