Good morning. PJM came up 7 GW short, data centers could add 125 GW of demand by 2030, and utilities are throwing out the old forecasting playbook.
Top Stories
PJM AUCTION FALLS 7 GW SHORT OF ITS RELIABILITY TARGET
Utility Dive
FERC Chair Laura Swett said the grid operator's latest capacity auction drew only about 500 MW of new supply, compounding alarm bells ahead of a July 23 governance conference.
DATA CENTERS COULD OUTRUN U.S. POWER SUPPLY BY 2030
Utility Dive
Bank of America sees more than 230 GW of new generation need against just 93 GW of planned accredited utility supply, pushing developers toward on-site gas engines and batteries.
AI HAS TURNED SILICON VALLEY INTO HEAVY INDUSTRY
The Atlantic
Five tech giants may spend as much on data centers this year as they spent from ChatGPT's launch through 2025, trading software's asset-light economics for steel, gas turbines and debt.
CHINA CONTROLS 90% OF AMERICA'S GRID-BATTERY MARKET
The Wall Street Journal
Battery storage is becoming essential to wind- and solar-heavy grids, but Chinese suppliers' dominance of the U.S. market has turned deployment into a geopolitical risk.
GRID CONGESTION COST PJM $1 BILLION IN A SINGLE MONTH
Reuters
An aging transmission network is forcing grid operators to call on costlier local plants, with PJM congestion charges hitting a record in May and another $777.8 million in June.
Power & Grid
MASSACHUSETTS UTILITIES CONTRACT 4.5 GWH OF STORAGE
Utility Dive
State utilities signed contracts for 4.5 GWh of energy storage, one of the largest single procurements in the Northeast as New England leans on batteries to cover winter peaks and offshore wind gaps.
DATA CENTERS BREAK THE OLD UTILITY FORECASTING MODEL
Environment+Energy Leader
Twenty-three utilities revised long-term plans in early 2026 as large-load uncertainty drove planned gas additions up 9.4 GW, cut renewable additions by 17.3 GW and pushed planned batteries to 79 GW.
32-CENT POWER TURNS CONNECTICUT'S GOVERNOR RACE ELECTRIC
CT Insider
Residential rates averaged 32.24 cents per kWh in April as Eversource seeks $727 million that would raise average bills 18%, or 11% excluding storm costs.
HOLTEC PLANS IPO TO MASS-PRODUCE SMALL NUCLEAR PLANTS
The Philadelphia Inquirer
The nuclear-services company reported $567 million in 2025 sales and wants public capital to commercialize factory-built SMR-300 reactors and its liquid energy-storage system.
MICROREACTOR STARTUP JOINS VIRGINIA'S NUCLEAR PUSH
Interesting Engineering
NANO Nuclear joined the Virginia Nuclear Energy Consortium, putting its KRONOS and ZEUS designs closer to the world's largest concentration of data centers.
Data Centers
OHIO'S DATA-CENTER FIGHT SPLINTERS INTO TWO DOZEN LOCAL BALLOTS
cleveland.com
After a statewide amendment stalled, organizers are pursuing local bans on facilities above 25 MW, along with referendums, moratoriums and recalls across more than two dozen communities.
ANTI-DATA-CENTER PROTESTS GO NATIONAL
Business Insider
Humans First staged more than 100 demonstrations in a single day, including 18 in Texas and a rally against a $1.8 billion New Jersey project whose opposition petition topped 12,000 signatures.
VIRGINIA DATA CENTERS WANT THEIR OWN GAS TURBINES
Virginia Mercury
Grid delays are pushing developers toward behind-the-meter generation, raising a new question: whether private gas plants can sidestep the state's renewable-energy requirements.
THE DATA-CENTER BOOM BRINGS EMINENT DOMAIN TO THE FARM GATE
PBS NewsHour
Transmission lines needed for large new loads increasingly cross private property, widening the backlash from data-center sites to the infrastructure built around them.
FEDERAL SHORTCUT PUTS A DATA CENTER ON PUBLIC LAND
The Spokesman-Review
BLM reused a solar project's environmental review to approve a Nevada data center without a new public process; Boulder City is appealing the decision.
Stat of the Day
125 GW
Potential new U.S. data-center electric load through 2030
Bank of America says overall demand could outrun planned accredited utility supply by more than 100 GW.
Utility Dive ↗