THE DAILY MINE ⛏️

LIGHTS OUT: CUBA'S GRID COLLAPSES FOR THIRD TIME IN FOUR MONTHS
CBS News / AP

US oil blockade cut Venezuelan shipments, but decades of underinvestment made this inevitable — grid fragility is physics, not geography.

MISO 5 GW SHORT... FEDS FORCE COAL PLANTS OFF THE DEATHBED TO KEEP LIGHTS ON
Kilowatt Logic / DOE

Emergency federal orders pushed coal generation up 61% in February — the grid gap is widening faster than new capacity can connect.

ORACLE GUTS 30,000 JOBS... FEEDS $50B INTO AI DATA CENTER MACHINE
Business Insider

Potentially the largest tech layoff of 2026 — cloud revenue up 44% but free cash flow is negative, so humans get swapped for server racks.

JENSEN DROPS VERA RUBIN... CALLS IT START OF 'GREATEST INFRASTRUCTURE BUILDOUT IN HISTORY'
NVIDIA / VentureBeat

Seven new chips, 10x inference throughput per watt over Blackwell — every major cloud provider will carry it, and every watt will come from somewhere.

$64 BILLION IN DATA CENTERS... KILLED OR FROZEN BY LOCAL REVOLT
RealClearEnergy / Data Center Knowledge

188 activist groups across 40 states — cancellations quadrupled in one year, and the backlash is now systemic risk for the entire buildout pipeline.

DOE LAUNCHES 'UPRISE'... WANTS 5 GW MORE FROM REACTORS ALREADY RUNNING
World Nuclear News / DOE

Uprates, life extensions, plant restarts — the cheapest new gigawatts are the ones already built, and MISO needs every one of them.

MISO FAST-TRACKS 8 GW... GAS GRABS 73% BECAUSE IT CAN ACTUALLY GET BUILT
Kilowatt Logic / RTO Insider

Third expedited cycle: 6.4 GW gas, 2.2 GW batteries — 27 GW total now on the fast track across all three rounds.

2.5 GWH BATTERY MEGADEAL... BUILT SPECIFICALLY TO KEEP DATA CENTERS LIT
PR Newswire

Canadian Solar's e-STORAGE ships 500 MW of battery containers to a major US utility starting March 2027 — batteries-for-data-centers is now its own market.

BAKER HUGHES DITCHES OIL FOR AI... DOUBLES DATA CENTER POWER BET TO $3B
Bloomberg Law

Behind-the-meter gas turbines for data centers in Georgia and Texas — the oilfield-to-AI pipeline is now a literal business model.

AMERICA NEEDS $1 TRILLION IN NEW PIPELINES... 37,000 MILES OF GAS TRANSMISSION ALONE
Forbes / INGAA Foundation

$40-48B/year for 26 years, plus 103,000 miles of gathering lines — the AI buildout doesn't just need power plants, it needs the pipes to feed them.

ILLINOIS DROPS THE 'POWER ACT'... STATEWIDE DATA CENTER CRACKDOWN ON ENERGY, WATER, TAX BREAKS
Northern Public Radio / Inside Climate News

Clean energy mandates, water reporting, community engagement — plus Pritzker wants a two-year freeze on DC tax credits.

MICROSOFT TAKES OVER FOXCONN'S GHOST TOWN... 15 NEW DATA CENTERS, $13B TAXABLE
W.Media

Mount Pleasant unanimously approved 9 million square feet and three new substations — total Wisconsin bet now exceeds $20B.

DATA CENTER REVOLT GOES NATIONAL... 188 GROUPS, 40 STATES, POLITICIANS LOSING SEATS
S&P Global

Up from 142 groups in 24 states just months ago — bipartisan, organized, and ousting local officials who voted yes.

MISSOURI POLL: VOTERS SAY NO TO DATA CENTERS... SUBURBS MOST HOSTILE
Springfield News-Leader / SLU-YouGov

900 likely voters — only 30% support, 49% oppose locally — first statewide poll to put hard numbers on the backlash.

ILLINOIS ZONING WARS: FARMLAND BANNED, PEKIN SAYS NO, AURORA DEMANDS RENEWABLES
WGLT / WCBU

McLean County locks DCs out of farmland, Pekin's mayor kills a proposal cold, Aurora ends its moratorium with on-site renewables mandates — the Midwest is writing the zoning playbook.