THE DAILY MINE ⛏️

AMD AND META SIGN $100B CHIP DEAL
Data Center Knowledge

Six gigawatts is roughly the output of six large nuclear plants — and that's just one deal, between two companies, on one day.

HYPERSCALER CAPEX HITS $700B AND CLIMBING
Data Center Knowledge

Every dollar of that capex eventually needs a wire to the wall — and the grid has no idea what's coming.

CONGRESS GRILLS NERC CHIEF ON GRID FAILURES
RTO Insider

NERC CEO Jim Robb said the system "survived" January's storm, which is a low bar — surviving isn't the same as being ready for what's next.

DATA CENTERS LEAVING THE GRID, RATEPAYERS PAY
Utility Dive

Behind-the-meter gas plants let hyperscalers skip the interconnection queue, but someone still pays for the grid they're no longer using.

NERC: AMERICA'S GRID PAST THE POINT OF RETURN
Power Magazine

The argument is that we've been boiling slowly for 20 years and are now past the point where patching works — a full rethink is required.

FEDS KEEP CENTRALIA COAL PLANT ALIVE AGAIN
RTO Insider

Washington state's last coal plant was supposed to close in December — emergency federal orders keep reviving it because nothing else is ready to replace it.

FERC APPROVES SPP INTERCONNECTION OVERHAUL
Utility Dive

SPP merges its interconnection queue with transmission planning in one process — if it works, it's the template every other RTO needs to copy.

DOE DROPS $1.9B ON AGED TRANSMISSION LINES
Utility Dive

The SPARK program targets existing lines, not new ones — same towers, better wire, more capacity, faster than building from scratch.

NEW JERSEY LOCKS IN 355 MW OF BATTERIES
Utility Dive

A billion-watt storage build in one of the densest data center corridors in the country — New Jersey knows what's coming and is actually doing something about it.

NERC: OPERATORS IGNORED DATA CENTER LOAD WARNINGS
RTO Insider

NERC issued a Level 2 alert on large-load interconnection last year — most entities haven't acted on it, which is exactly the kind of thing that shows up in the next winter storm.

12 STATES MOVING TO BAN DATA CENTERS
Southwest Ledger

Oklahoma, Georgia, Michigan, New York, Virginia, and seven others have active moratorium bills — Lawton, OK didn't wait for the legislature and imposed limits already.

OHIO VOTERS COULD BAN DATA CENTERS IN NOVEMBER
Cleveland.com

Activists need 413,000 signatures by July to put a 25 MW ban on the November ballot — and the senator who built Ohio's data center incentive program may pay the price.

NORTH CAROLINA FIRST: DATA CENTER PLANS TO FRACK
BPR

Lee County residents say the proposed data center may pursue fracking to fuel its own power — a combination nobody has had to fight before.

NEXTERA BUYING 1,000+ KANSAS ACRES, AQUIFER AT RISK
KCUR

NextEra and Monarch Energy have been signing land option agreements for months while Sedgwick County's moratorium is still active — the aquifer sits directly beneath the target parcels.

NERC FLAGS AI POWER DEMAND AS 'HIGH IMPACT' RISK
E&E News / Politico Pro

"High likelihood, high impact" is NERC's most serious risk category — the same language used for severe weather events, now formally applied to AI data center load growth.