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June 3, 2026: Most people use a data center dozens of times a day and have no idea what it is. Today I'm changing that. I break down exactly what data centers are, what "compute" actually means, why every new AI model needs exponentially more of it, and how short we currently are as a country — using real numbers from Goldman Sachs, FERC, RAND, and others. Then I take on the five biggest myths driving the backlash: that new data centers waste water, that they're an energy disaster, that they kill jobs, that taxpayers are funding Big Tech, and that they destroy communities. I debunk every single one with sourced data — because the misinformation around data centers is doing real damage to America's AI future. These buildings currently account for 80% of US economic growth according to S&P Global, they're funding the nuclear renaissance, and they're the front line in a race with China that we cannot afford to lose. This is the episode I'd send to anyone who thinks data centers are the enemy.
In this episode of Construction Corner, host Dillon breaks down the massive infrastructure transformation sweeping America — and what it means for the construction industry.Dillon covers:The power grid under pressure — Why the surge in data centers and reshoring of manufacturing is driving unprecedented investment in utility infrastructure, and how FERC regulates rate increases tied to capital spending.Data center geography — Which states are winning the data center race (Northern Virginia, Texas, Eastern Oregon, Nevada, Arizona) and why California keeps losing out to regulation and permitting challenges.The $700 billion AI buildout — How the four hyperscalers (Microsoft, Google, Amazon, Meta) are committing historic CapEx, what a gigawatt-scale facility actually costs, and why supply chain — not concrete — is the real bottleneck.Behind-the-meter power — Why major data center operators aren't waiting on utilities and are standing up their own generation (gas turbines, solar, and even small modular nuclear reactors) to turn on racks faster.Battery energy storage at scale — How megawatt-hour battery systems are being deployed at data centers to smooth load swings, support the grid, and reduce utility dependency — and why this is very different from a home Powerwall.The AI compute race — Why demand for GPUs shows no signs of slowing, how Anthropic's revenue explosion illustrates real consumption, and why this infrastructure build likely runs for at least five more years.Construction is hyper-local — A reminder that no matter how big the macro trends are, your personal economy in construction is defined by the geography and relationships where you operate.Whether you're in the trades, engineering, or just trying to understand where the industry is headed, this episode gives you a ground-level view of the biggest construction wave in a generation.
Today, POLITICO Energy host Josh Siegel sits down for an extended interview with David LaCerte, a Republican commissioner at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. They discuss FERC's highly anticipated proposal on connecting AI data centers to the power grid, the turmoil surrounding America's largest power grid operator PJM Interconnection, rising electricity costs, permitting reform, whether FERC is coordinating with the White House and more. Josh Siegel is the host of POLITICO Energy and a congressional energy reporter for POLITICO. Nirmal Mulaikal is the co-host and executive producer of POLITICO Energy. KJ Cline is the video producer for POLITICO Energy. Matt Daily is the energy editor for POLITICO. Cyril Zaneski is executive editor of POLITICO's E&E News. Debra Kahn is the editorial director for energy and environmental coverage at POLITICO. Veronica Tejera is the deputy head of Audio/Video at POLITICO. Our theme music is by Pran Bandi. Follow the show on Apple, Spotify, Youtube and Instagram. Follow POLITICO here: ➤ X: https://x.com/politico/ ➤ Instagram: / politico ➤ Facebook: / politico For more reporting on energy and the environment, subscribe to Power Switch, our free evening newsletter: https://www.politico.com/power-switch And for even deeper coverage and analysis, read our Morning Energy newsletter by subscribing to POLITICO Pro: https://subscriber.politicopro.com/newsletter-archive/morning-energy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Story of the Week (DR):Trump is bringing Tim Cook, Elon Musk, and a dozen other CEOs to Beijing for his Xi summitTechnology & AIElon Musk – CEO, Tesla and SpaceXTim Cook – CEO, AppleJensen Huang – CEO, Nvidia (joined as a last-minute addition after a personal call from the President)Cristiano Amon – CEO, QualcommSanjay Mehrotra – CEO, Micron TechnologyDina Powell McCormick – President, MetaJim Anderson – CEO, CoherentFinance & InvestmentLarry Fink – CEO, BlackRockStephen Schwarzman – CEO, BlackstoneDavid Solomon – CEO, Goldman SachsJane Fraser – CEO, CitigroupAerospace & ManufacturingKelly Ortberg – CEO, Boeing (reportedly finalizing a massive 500-jet deal during the trip)Larry Culp – CEO, GE AerospacePayments & ServicesMichael Miebach – CEO, MastercardRyan McInerney – CEO, VisaAgriculture & BiotechBrian Sikes – CEO, CargillJacob Thaysen – CEO, IlluminaPaypal agrees to $30 million settlement with Trump's Justice Department over 'illegal DEI'The company launched a $530M Economic Opportunity Fund in 2020 for Black and underrepresented minority businessesDid not fight this in court, just surrenderedTo make the DOJ happy, PayPal had to ditch its race-based criteria; instead, it now funnels that financial support to veteran-owned businesses and companies in farming, manufacturing, or technology. A direct “black” to “white” transferAny company that launched a race-specific grant or loan program after 2020 is now officially in the DOJ's crosshairs, and "social justice" is being litigated as "civil rights fraud."PayPal board:“Independent” chair David W. Dorman (2015-; 17%)member of the Dell Technologies BoardMichael Dell and Donald Trump are BFFs: Dell pledged $6.25B to Trump AccountsJonathan Christodoro (2015-; 13%): a disciple of billionaire Carl Icahn (former Managing Director at Icahn Capital), one of Trump's oldest and most vocal alliesFounder PayPal Mafia Trump BFFs: Musk (DOGE), David Sacks (AI and Crypto Czar), Peter Thiel (JD Vance creator)Frank Yeary (2015-; 12%): Intel director since 2009 and chair since 2023It Was One of DOGE's Most Absurd Abuses. A Court Finally Exposed ItThis whole saga centers on a major legal showdown between the Trump administration's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) and the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH). The case is a consolidated lawsuit (often called the NEH-DOGE lawsuit) filed in May 2025 by groups including the Authors Guild, the American Historical Association, and the Modern Language Association. On May 7, 2026, U.S. District Judge Colleen McMahon issued a massive 143-page ruling. She essentially nuked DOGE's attempt to defund hundreds of humanities projects, calling their process a "textbook example of unconstitutional viewpoint discrimination."The AI Purge: Instead of a professional review, DOGE staffers (described in court as young "technologists" with no background in humanities) ran thousands of grant descriptions through ChatGPT.DOGE staffers—mostly described as 20-somethings with "zero experience in the humanities"—attempted to dodge government transparency laws by conducting official business on Signal with auto-delete enabled. The court found this was a blatant violation of the Federal Records Act, proving that "efficiency" is often just code for "avoiding a paper trail."The Woke Filter: They told the AI to flag anything related to "DEI." This backfired spectacularly when the AI flagged projects on Holocaust survivors, Appalachian history, and Italian-American archives simply because they used words like "identity," "culture," or "women."DOGE didn't actually read the grants they cut. Instead, they used ChatGPT and basic keyword searches to flag any program containing "incriminating" words like "history," "culture," "identity," or "BIPOC." If the AI thought it sounded "woke," the funding was axed—a move Judge Colleen McMahon called a "textbook example of unconstitutional viewpoint discrimination."In perhaps the most "mask-off" moment of the proceedings, it was revealed that DOGE staffers flagged and canceled a documentary about Jewish women's slave labor during the Holocaust. The reason? Their AI-driven filter decided that focusing on "Jewish cultures" and "female voices" made it an illegal DEI program. Apparently, documenting Nazi atrocities is now "radical identity politics."The ruling highlighted a minor detail the administration seemed to forget: DOGE isn't a real government agency. The judge noted that DOGE had absolutely no lawful authority to terminate congressionally appropriated funds. They were essentially a group of private-sector bros playing President with the NEH checkbookThe Redirect: The court found that the $100 million "saved" wasn't actually returned to the Treasury. Instead, it was being funneled into the administration's own projects, like the "National Garden of American Heroes."Why Two Big Companies Just Cut Paid Family Leave MMFor the last decade, a tight labor market forced companies to compete for talent with generous perks. Now, with the job market cooling and employees having less leverage to quit, companies like Deloitte and Zoom are quietly rolling back benefits.Zoom, the company that became the face of remote work, has slashed its paid parental leave. Birthing parents saw their leave drop from up to 24 weeks to 18 weeks, while non-birthing parents were cut from 16 weeks down to 10.Deloitte is making deep cuts, but not for everyone. The reductions specifically target “Center” employees—the administrative, IT, and finance support staff who generally earn less—rather than the high-earning consultants. Their leave was halved from 16 weeks to just eight.Beyond just time off, Deloitte is axing its $50,000 reimbursement program for adoption, surrogacy, and IVF for these support roles.I Hate Working 5 Days': Zoom CEO Eric Yuan Says AI Could Shrink Workweeks To 3 Days In A Major Future ShiftGoodliest of the Week (MM/DR):DR: Chipotle CEO [Scott Boatwright] tells customers to ‘just ask' if they want bigger portions after downsizing accusations: “You should ask for a little more ... We serve big, beautiful bowls and burritos. Full stop, no questions asked. If you want more, just ask the team member. I promise you there's never a team member on that line that's going to say no.” 886 to 1MM: Oil shortages DR MMBeer demand stumbles as gas prices surge, data showsI mean, isn't this the double best? Less idiots driving drunk AND less idiots DRIVING!Oil shortages are even hitting colored snack bagsUgly snacks, maybe less eating!Assholiest TRIGGERIEST of the Week (MM):Brett BlundyVictoria's Secret unveils allegations against activist investor, loses board directorBlundy, Australian billionaire who launched Bras N Things, a classy establishment sold to Hanes, and currently chairs Lovisa, a fast fashion jewelry business, bought 13% of VS and thinks he can run it betterHe's disappointed with VS acquisition of Adore Me (online retailer) and the drop in earningsMeanwhile, Lovisa's 1Y market returns: -22% vs. ASX +4% TRIGGERED:Blundy, a fucking Australian billionaire blowhard, chairs LovisaLovisa board: Blundy, Mark McInnes (“deputy chair”), John Cheston (CEO), Bruce Carter, Tracey Blundy (wife), John Charlton, Sei Jin Alt (woman, Asian)Brett and Tracey own 40%+ of sharesZero merit directorsExec team: John, Mark, Victor, Chris - zero womenBlundy is targeting VS, whose board is…Donna James, Hillary Super (CEO), Irene Britt, Sarah Davis, Jacqueline Hernandez, Rod Little, David McCreight, Mariam Naficy, Lauren Peters, Anne SheehanExec team: 4 women, 1 manThis is the ultimate mansplain - some chest thumping billionaire walks into a room full of women, pushes them out, takes over… and this from the filing:“On November 13, 2025, members of the Board held a videoconference call with Mr. Blundy to inform him that the Board had determined, in accordance with its fiduciary duties, that appointing Mr. Blundy to the Board would not be in the best interests of VS&Co or its stockholders. In an effort to reach amutually agreeable resolution, the Board proposed collaborating with BBRC and Mr. Blundy on (i) adding one mutually-agreed new independent directornot affiliated with BBRC to the Board, (ii) Mr. Blundy's participation in a review with the Board of the Company's capital allocation, (iii) entering into alonger-term information sharing agreement and, in the context of a negotiated resolution with BBRC and Mr. Blundy, an agreement on customary standstill restrictions, and (iv) taking down the Rights Plan. After this call, the Board delivered to Mr. Blundy the following letter explaining its rationale for rejecting his candidacy and proposing a new framework for a mutually agreeable resolution:“The potential for significant reputational and legal risk to Victoria's Secret arising from (1) your pattern of hiring executives with a history of serious allegations of sexual harassment or other misconduct, and (2) the reported and alleged instances of harassment and highly inappropriate employee policies that occurred under your oversight at companies you controlled or effectively controlled.The proxy should just say, “Australian white male billionaire who is cool sexually harassing women while selling them underwear wants to take over massive underwear store run by women”Elon Musk and Sam AltmanMusk first…Sam Altman Accuses Elon Musk of Laughing at Memes During Important OpenAI MeetingsMusk's China trip during OpenAI trial prompts apology from his lawyer for CEO's absenceTRIGGERED: This is the man child trillionaire we're supposed to take seriously - does his mom fold his socks for him? Does he eat Cheerios out of a frisbee for breakfast? These are our male adult role models?Musk apparently was too busy for the trial, but during talks of absorbing OpenAI into Tesla, he wasn't too busy to spend a long time forcing everyone to look at his fucking dopey idiot manboy memes that made him laughReminder time: Musk is in charge of who gets internet in military conflict (Starlink), gutted the government (DOGE), is trying to implant chips in brains (Neurolink), and used everyone else to get his billions (Tesla was bought, subsidized, SpaceX subsidies, Boring Company steals municipal money to dig holes…)Altman next…Sam Altman faces awkward grilling over 'toxic culture of lying'ChatGPT Told a 19-Year-Old How to Mix Drugs — His Mother Found Him Dead the Next MorningWHEN YOU PUT A SOCIOPATH AND MANCHILD IN CHARGE OF A WORLD DESTROYING DEVICE, IT TURNS OUT IT'S BADWarren Buffett DRPut the folksy “I'm just a guy eating a werther's original candy making money” schtick aside, where he says they pick great management and let them do their thing - this is “their thing”:TRIGGERED: Electric Company Says It's Cutting Off an Entire Town So It Can Sell All Its Power to Data CentersThere is so much to hate here:Tech billionaires building data centers for AI: checkNV Energy is wholly owned by Berkshire Energy which is owned by Warren Buffett: checkTrump appointed asshole running regulatory agency that represented utilities: checkThe town is Lake Tahoe - 50,000 residents have to find a new source of electricity in ONE YEAR because Buffett/Berkshire/NV Energy decided the re-route all energy to data centers for AIGoogle, Apple, MSFT all have facilities, 12 data center projects in Northern NevadaNevada would have to ask woke California to build hundreds of millions of dollars worth of transmission lines in a year to get to Tahoe, FERC would have to approve other changes (Chair Laura Swett, Trump appointee, represented electric utilities and the firm wrote pieces about the glory of data centers - one of the Amicus Briefs they wrote in 2024 was on behalf of… NV Energy)Of the fines issued by FERC this year, 99% are one company: an energy efficiency companySince Trump was elected, FERC has issued fines targeting blue state utilities and renewables at a more than 2:1 rateSo the people are fucked - maybe Warren can tell them to power their town on See's Candy sugar rushesHeadliniest of the WeekDR: Kids with fake mustaches can fool high-tech age verification systemsMM: Waymo recalls 3,800 robotaxis after glitch allowed some vehicles to 'drive into standing water'Who Won the Week?DR: Steve Roth, the CEO of Vornado Realty Trust, expressed his support for fellow billionaire and the Citadel CEO Ken Griffin: “I must say that I consider the phrase tax the rich — quote tax the rich — when spit out with anger and contempt by politicians both here and across the country, to be just as hateful as some disgusting racial slurs”MM: Lawyers - literally everything now is a lawsuit and everyone is a lawyer. PredictionsDR: NYC Mayor Mahmdani asks Steve Roth for “just little more” and Roth replies: “I'm not a fucking Chipotle, commie scum.”MM: Chili's CEO wakes up at 5 a.m., runs daily, and uses that time to generate ideas for the business: On a run next Thursday, May 21, Chili's CEO Kevin Hochman stops short and says out loud, “What if the Big Crispy Chicken Sandwich was BIGGER???”
Vietnam-era U.S. Marine Corps veteran Rusty Fleming was born and raised in Oklahoma City. Following high school graduation, he attended Cameron Junior College on a basketball scholarship but returned shortly to Oklahoma City and started a career with the Bell System in 1964.The draft came calling in January of 1966, and he joined the Marines for two years, deployed to Vietnam in March 1967, and served in an artillery unit. He returned in March 1968, during the Tet Offensive.Rusty resumed his career with the Bell System, which resulted in a transfer to Tulsa and the introduction to Grand Lake, which proved to be a life-changing experience. He left Bell System in 1981, moved to the lake, and actively supported Grand Lake initiatives.In 1988, he established the Grand River Chronicle newspaper. He backed mandated lake level targets, highlighted FERC's lake management role, advocated Shoreline Management and water quality projects, and participated in multiple lake groups.In his oral history, Rusty talks about his Vietnam service, his newspaper, his radio show, and Oklahoma State University on the podcast and website Voices of Oklahoma.
Federal energy regulators are preparing a major proposal that could reshape how energy-hungry data centers connect to America's power grid. POLITICO's AJ Camacho breaks down what to know about FERC's proposal and how that decision -- expected in coming weeks -- could reshape America's AI rollout and power system. Plus, President Donald Trump invoked the Defense Production Act to strengthen federal funding for a host of energy projects. Francisco "A.J." Camacho is a reporter for POLITICO's E&E News. Nirmal Mulaikal is the co-host and executive producer of POLITICO Energy. Matt Daily is the energy editor for POLITICO. Cyril Zaneski is executive editor of POLITICO's E&E News. Debra Kahn is the editorial director for energy and environmental coverage at POLITICO. Veronica Tejera is the deputy head of Audio/Video at POLITICO. Our theme music is by Pran Bandi. Follow the show on Apple, Spotify, Youtube and Instagram. Follow POLITICO here: ➤ X: https://x.com/politico/ ➤ Instagram: / politico ➤ Facebook: / politico For more reporting on energy and the environment, subscribe to Power Switch, our free evening newsletter: https://www.politico.com/power-switch And for even deeper coverage and analysis, read our Morning Energy newsletter by subscribing to POLITICO Pro: https://subscriber.politicopro.com/newsletter-archive/morning-energy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Oral Arguments for the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit
PJM Transmission Owners v. FERC
When the workings of an electricity market come to the attention of the White House, it's usually a sign that something's wrong. Back in January, 13 state governors went to the White House to agree plans for PJM, the largest electricity market in the US. The market is scrambling to find more energy supply to keep up with the boom in data centers, while holding down ratepayers' bills. Managing the PJM grid is one of the toughest jobs in the US power industry. And these days it is being carried out in the full glare of political and public scrutiny.If you want to understand the pressures bearing down on the US electricity, PJM is the place to look. It is the largest grid in the country, serving 67 million people across 13 states and the District of Columbia. And it is some of the world's most intense hotspots for new data center development, including the famous “data center alley” of northern Virginia, which takes roughly 90% of the country's internet traffic . When things get complicated for PJM, they get complicated for everyone.On this episode, host Ed Crooks is joined by Asim Haque, Senior Vice President for Governmental and Member Services at PJM, and by regular guest Amy Myers Jaffe, Director of the Energy, Climate Justice and Sustainability Lab at New York University. Together, they unpack how PJM got itself noticed by the White House, and how its problems can be tackled.Asim explains the organization he works for. PJM is a nonprofit that operates the grid, runs the electricity market, and plans the transmission system. It is regulated by FERC, but also accountable to a thousand-plus members across 13 states, each with its own energy policies, its own governor, and its own politics. That structural complexity is central to why running PJM is so challenging.Those problems converged from two directions: decarbonization and data centers. The result has been soaring prices in the PJM capacity market. And when those prices were capped, the alarms about a future reliability crisis started flashing red.The White House responded by convening all 13 governors of the states covered by PJM, and produced a statement of principles for bringing new generation capacity into the market. As Asim explains, these principles lie behind the plan for a backstop reliability procurement, designed as a one-time mechanism to bring new electricity supply onto the system quickly.There is also an expectation that data centres will bring their own generation; and a "connect and manage" framework for those that don't. The key feature of that: data centers can have their supply curtailed before residential customers lose power. The White House and the governors agreed that the bill for grid and generation improvements to meet rising demand should be paid by the data centers. It sounds straightforward, but is it really? Asim explains his perspective.The episode also examines the deeper design questions about PJM's capacity market: whether a three-year forward procurement window can send the right signals for the long-term investment the grid now needs. Amy brings the consumer and policy lens throughout. Are the complexities of cost allocation and market design inherent to the electricity system, or are they manufactured and even sometimes exaggerated? And can they sometimes militate against lower-cost solutions such as renewables and batteries?Asim ends by offering some advice for other grid operators. If you are not going to gate demand, you need a connect-and-manage approach; if you are not going to gate demand, it will get expensive; and if it is going to get expensive, you need to decide who pays. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
LNG export terminals usually have the ability to export more than their nameplate capacity. This is how we exported a record 18.8 Billion Cubic Feet Per Day (BCF/D) of natural gas in March, compared with FERC's estimated sustainable limit of 14.6-15 BCF/D. Venture Global's (VG) Plaquemines facility was the strongest at exceeding stated capacity. Cheniere's […]
In this episode of The UVM Podcast, hosts Nick Ferguson and Stephen Cieslewicz are joined by Jim Kubrak, Senior Technical Advisor at The North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) and a key author of the newly released draft report, Reducing the Risk of Wildfire Ignition by the Bulk Power System. Together, they explore how wildfire risk is rapidly evolving from a regional concern into a continent-wide reliability issue for the electric grid.Jim shares insights into NERC's growing focus on wildfire as a critical reliability threat, highlighting data that shows increasing outage impacts and significantly longer restoration times compared to other severe weather events. The conversation dives into what prompted the report, namely a FERC directive following a Presidential Executive Order, and why its findings could be as transformative as past regulatory milestones like FAC-003.A major focus of the discussion is how vegetation management must adapt. Key recommendations include expanding FAC-003 applicability down to 100 kV lines, increasing vegetation treatment frequency in high fire risk areas, and extending management practices beyond traditional rights-of-way. The episode also explores the role of advanced technologies. such as satellite data, LiDAR, AI, and weather modeling, in enabling more proactive, risk-based decision-making.Jim emphasizes the importance of collaboration, data standardization, and stakeholder engagement as the industry moves toward implementation. He also underscores the opportunity for utilities to align Wildfire Mitigation Plans (WMPs) with Transmission Vegetation Management Programs (TVMPs) to create a more holistic approach to wildfire prevention.With a public comment period closing on March 27th 2026 and standards development on the horizon, this episode is a must-listen for utility professionals seeking to understand, and influence, the future of wildfire risk mitigation on the bulk power system.A big thank you to this episode's sponsors, Jack McCabe, Ali Kulick, Darik Warnke, and the entire team at Davey Resource Group, Inc., without whose support this episode wouldn't have been possible.The draft report from NERC can be found here.Materials from the NERC Workshop held in January 2026 can be found here.
Today, POLITICO reporter Francisco “A.J.” Camacho sits down for an extended interview with Judy Chang, a Democratic commissioner at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. They discuss the growing strain on America's power grid, rising electricity prices, FERC's independence under the Trump administration, and the key policy issues on the agency's docket. Francisco "A.J." Camacho is a reporter for POLITICO's E&E News. Nirmal Mulaikal is the co-host and executive producer of POLITICO Energy. Matt Daily is the energy editor for POLITICO. Cyril Zaneski is executive editor of POLITICO's E&E News. Debra Kahn is the editorial director for energy and environmental coverage at POLITICO. Veronica Tejera is the deputy head of Audio/Video at POLITICO. Our theme music is by Pran Bandi. Follow the show on Apple, Spotify, Youtube and Instagram. Follow POLITICO here: ➤ X: https://x.com/politico/ ➤ Instagram: / politico ➤ Facebook: / politico For more reporting on energy and the environment, subscribe to Power Switch, our free evening newsletter: https://www.politico.com/power-switch And for even deeper coverage and analysis, read our Morning Energy newsletter by subscribing to POLITICO Pro: https://subscriber.politicopro.com/newsletter-archive/morning-energy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Oral Arguments for the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit
Travis Dardar v. FERC
Oral Arguments for the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit
MISO Transmission Owners v. FERC
Oral Arguments for the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit
American Whitewater v. FERC
In this episode of Climate Positive, Gil Jenkins speaks with Malcolm Woolf, President and CEO of the National Hydropower Association (NHA). They discuss the current state of the U.S. hydropower industry, its role in providing carbon-free electricity, and the challenges and opportunities facing the sector. A central focus of the conversation is the hydropower relicensing process -- how it works, where projects can stall, and how lengthy reviews can delay investment, upgrades, and in some cases lead facilities to shut down.Malcolm shares real-world examples to illustrate what's at stake, while also exploring the potential to add generation to non-powered dams, the role of pumped storage in supporting grid reliability, and emerging marine energy technologies.Links:NHA WebsiteMalcom Woolf LinkedInNHA on LinkedInPress Release: The Hydropower Foundation and NHA Align to Strengthen Workforce Development EffortsArticle: US hydropower is at a make-or-break momentArticle: Google to buy up to 3 GW of hydro power from BrookfieldVideo: Whooshh Innovations' "Salmon Cannon" Gives Fish A Boost Over Dams Email your feedback to Chad, Gil, Hilary, and Guy at climatepositive@hasi.com.
Oral Arguments for the Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit
Montana-Dakota Utilities Co. v. FERC
Hoy nos visita Luis Fercán, para presentarnos su nuevo trabajo, Cerezos en flor, su cuarto disco. Además, podemos disfrutar de su música con la actuación en directo de 'Cristales'. También nos vamos al cine, o mejor dicho, a su conexión con la ciencia. Xaviera Torres nos trae en su sección, la nueva película de Yorgos Lanthimos, Bugonia. Y terminamos escuchando la voz de Marian Anderson. Enrique Mejías rescata en su sección de ópera a la contralto afroamericana, que fue pionera.Escuchar audio
In this episode, Perkins Coie Partner Jane Rueger and Associate Attorney Jacob Neeley join Kaitlin Fallowfield to discuss a 14-page preview recently released by PJM Interconnection detailing its plans for the new rules for data centers seeking to bring their own generation to the grid.The grid operator has been trying to come up with a framework to manage data center load and create more accurate forecasting measures. In December 2025, FERC ordered PJM to write its rules for co-location to include three key services, which include both firm and non-firm capacity contracts, and interim network service contracts.The 14-page plan marked a preview of what PJM's future FERC filing will include, teasing the idea of a separate, albeit limited, expedited queue for large load additions.NPM is a leading data, intelligence & events company providing business development led coverage of the US & European power, storage & data center markets for the development, finance, M&A and corporate community.Download our mobile app.
Abrimos La Ventana de la Música para recibir a Luis Fercán y su quinto disco 'Cerezos en Flor'.
Solar Beats Coal in Texas, Nuclear Returns in NY & the Grid Faces a Load Crisis The League Episode #41 – Show Notes Episode Summary In this episode of The League, we break down the most consequential headlines shaping the energy transition from massive shifts in generation mix in Texas to policy moves in New York, and critical grid reforms at FERC that signal where the market is headed next. Key Takeaways & Analysis 1️⃣ 2025: Solar's Short-Term Downturn, Long-Term Bull Narrative Intact 2️⃣ Solar Has Surpassed Coal in Texas (ERCOT) 3️⃣ New York Aims for 8 GW of New Nuclear 4️⃣ FERC Directs PJM to Reform Interconnection + Large Load Tariffs Host Bio: Benoy Thanjan Benoy Thanjan is the Founder and CEO of Reneu Energy, solar developer and consulting firm, and a strategic advisor to multiple cleantech startups. Over his career, Benoy has developed over 100 MWs of solar projects across the U.S., helped launch the first residential solar tax equity funds at Tesla, and brokered $45 million in Renewable Energy Credits (“REC”) transactions. Prior to founding Reneu Energy, Benoy was the Environmental Commodities Trader in Tesla's Project Finance Group, where he managed one of the largest environmental commodities portfolios. He originated REC trades and co-developed a monetization and hedging strategy with senior leadership to enter the East Coast market. As Vice President at Vanguard Energy Partners, Benoy crafted project finance solutions for commercial-scale solar portfolios. His role at Ridgewood Renewable Power, a private equity fund with 125 MWs of U.S. renewable assets, involved evaluating investment opportunities and maximizing returns. He also played a key role in the sale of the firm's renewable portfolio. Earlier in his career, Benoy worked in Energy Structured Finance at Deloitte & Touche and Financial Advisory Services at Ernst & Young, following an internship on the trading floor at D.E. Shaw & Co., a multi billion dollar hedge fund. Benoy holds an MBA in Finance from Rutgers University and a BS in Finance and Economics from NYU Stern, where he was an Alumni Scholar. Connect with Benoy on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/benoythanjan/ Learn more: https://reneuenergy.com https://www.solarmaverickpodcast.com Host Bio: David Magid David Magid is a seasoned renewable energy executive with deep expertise in solar development, financing, and operations. He has worked across the clean energy value chain, leading teams that deliver distributed generation and community solar projects. David is widely recognized for his strategic insights on interconnection, market economics, and policy trends shaping the U.S. solar industry. Connect with David on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidmagid/ If you have any questions or comments, you can email us at info@reneuenergy.com.
In this episode, James talks with Craig Gordon, Head of Global Policy, Regulatory Affairs, and Business Development at Mainspring Energy. Craig brings deep experience in clean energy—from scaling Invenergy's wind and solar projects to shaping U.S. energy policy with the American Clean Power Association. Today, he's helping Mainspring redefine dispatchable generation for a rapidly electrifying world.They discuss how Mainspring's linear generator technology offers a modular, dispatchable solution ideal for the growing energy demands of hyperscale data centers. Craig shares insights on the importance of fuel flexibility, how the Inflation Reduction Act has reshaped deployment dynamics, and the policy shifts enabling faster, cleaner energy integration behind the meter.How Mainspring's linear generator bridges the gap between renewables and dispatchable generationThe role of fuel-flexibility (natural gas, hydrogen, ammonia) in enabling resilient sitingWhy data center load growth is stressing legacy regulatory frameworksHow recent FERC policy shifts are opening new doors for behind-the-meter innovationA must-listen for developers navigating grid constraints, data center energy needs, and next-gen dispatchable tech.Paces helps developers find and evaluate the sites most suitable for renewable development. Interested in a call with James, CEO @ Paces?
Oral Arguments for the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit
Municipal Energy Agency of Nebraska v. FERC
The new year has only just begun, and already we have seen an event with massive significance for the world of energy. The US operation to remove Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro opens a new era for a country that holds – according to some definitions – the world's largest oil reserves.So far there has been little impact on oil markets. But what are the implications going to be for energy in the months and years to come? To discuss how this volatile situation might evolve, host Ed Crooks is joined by regular guest Amy Myers Jaffe, Director of NYU's Energy, Climate Justice and Sustainability Lab, and an expert on oil earlier in her career. History never repeats itself, the saying goes, but sometimes it rhymes. Amy draws a parallel between Venezuela today, and Iraq after the US-led invasion and the overthrow of Saddam Hussein in 2003. There are some similarities in the position of the two oil-rich countries, which were both dragged down by mismanagement and sanctions. But Amy argues that Venezuela's oil system is in far worse shape, with looted equipment, chronic power and fuel shortages, and damage that may not be reversible.Melissa Lott, another Energy Gang regular, also joins the show, and raises the question of what regime change in Venezuela might mean for the energy transition. Melissa is a partner at Microsoft, but appearing on the show in her usual role as an independent commentator and energy expert. Then it's on to the other places, people and technologies that are likely to make a big impact on energy this year. Ed is watching the Gulf Coast buildout of new liquefied natural gas (LNG) plants. It is a boom so big that Wood Mackenzie expects US LNG exports to roughly double from 2023 levels by around 2030, with more growth beyond.The gang assesses the likely consequences of surging LNG supplies: downward pressure on global gas prices, and potential financial strain for exporters. There is also the possibility that a peace deal in Ukraine could make the oversupply even worse, by allowing more Russian gas to flow west into European markets. Next up, it's people to watch in 2026. Melissa names the US energy secretary Chris Wright, and Ed picks new FERC chairman Laura Swett. As the US power grid, and its energy system more generally, face mounting challenges because of the growth in data centers needed for AI, effective policy and regulation will be critical. Amy chooses China's President Xi Jinping: the country's next five-year plan could reshape the global competition for energy dominance.On technologies to watch, battery storage is a hot topic. Melissa and Ed discuss the supply chains needed to meet growing demand, and innovative products such as Form Energy's iron-air batteries, which are being deployed in a first-ever commercial project that will be fully operational this year. Amy's choice is humanoid robots. They're expensive and still imperfect, but are they going to rule the future? They are already being trialled for repetitive factory tasks. Amy says her Roomba can't cope with a spilt bowl of cereal. But will new flexible AI-guided robots be able to do the job properly?Follow the show so you don't miss an episode this year – it's going to be a busy one.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
At age 10, Neil Chatterjee found common ground with his immigrant father through politics. Watching then-Vice President George H. W. Bush spar with Michael Dukakis during a presidential debate on TV, Neil and his dad connected in a way they hadn't before. Years later, after serving as Senator Mitch McConnell's energy advisor and appointed to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, he found that he needed to shed his partisan views — and his reputation as McConnell's coal guy — to become a convener. Doing so helped him enact policies to make a more resilient electric grid with more renewable and distributed energy resources.This week on With Great Power, Neil Chatterjee explains why he thinks energy policy has gotten so politicized in the U.S. and what could change that trajectory. He and Brad delve into some of the weedy issues FERC will be addressing in 2026 and some “wonky solutions" to load growth and other grid challenges. Neil also talks about his current role as chief government affairs officer at Palmetto, a provider of residential renewable energy products. Credits: Hosted by Brad Langley. Produced by Mary Catherine O'Connor. Edited by Anne Bailey. Original music and engineering by Sean Marquand. Stephen Lacey is executive editor. The GridX production team includes Jenni Barber, Samantha McCabe, and Brad Langley.
Democrats and some Republicans question how the information will be used. Neal Kurk fought for privacy rights for three decades as a Republican state lawmaker in New Hampshire. Now he is joining a fight in the famously libertarian haven to keep the federal government from obtaining a list of the state’s voters. “This is an attempt to exercise federal interference in what is really a state issue,” said Kurk, who is part of a bipartisan group trying to intervene in a lawsuit brought by the Justice Department to get that list. “In New Hampshire, we’re always trying to make sure that our voter lists are accurate.” The Trump administration wants to control how data centers connect to the power grid At a conference of state utility regulators in Seattle, a group of Trump administration officials got an earful of complaints about a plan the White House is pushing for the federal government to take control of part of the country’s power grid in the service of artificial intelligence. Their concerns stem from instructions Energy Secretary Chris Wright recently gave to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, which is known as FERC and oversees wholesale power in the U.S., to draft new rules that would give it oversight of how giant data centers connect to the power grid. The process is typically overseen by states. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Democrats and some Republicans question how the information will be used. Neal Kurk fought for privacy rights for three decades as a Republican state lawmaker in New Hampshire. Now he is joining a fight in the famously libertarian haven to keep the federal government from obtaining a list of the state’s voters. “This is an attempt to exercise federal interference in what is really a state issue,” said Kurk, who is part of a bipartisan group trying to intervene in a lawsuit brought by the Justice Department to get that list. “In New Hampshire, we’re always trying to make sure that our voter lists are accurate.” The Trump administration wants to control how data centers connect to the power grid At a conference of state utility regulators in Seattle, a group of Trump administration officials got an earful of complaints about a plan the White House is pushing for the federal government to take control of part of the country’s power grid in the service of artificial intelligence. Their concerns stem from instructions Energy Secretary Chris Wright recently gave to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, which is known as FERC and oversees wholesale power in the U.S., to draft new rules that would give it oversight of how giant data centers connect to the power grid. The process is typically overseen by states. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Allen, Joel, Rosemary, and Yolanda break down the TPI Composites bankruptcy fallout. Vestas is acquiring TPI’s Mexico and India operations while a UAE company picks up the Turkish factories. That leaves GE in a tough spot with no clear path to blade manufacturing. Plus the crew discusses blade scarcity, FSA availability floors, and whether a new blade manufacturer could emerge. Sign up now for Uptime Tech News, our weekly email update on all things wind technology. This episode is sponsored by Weather Guard Lightning Tech. Learn more about Weather Guard’s StrikeTape Wind Turbine LPS retrofit. Follow the show on Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Linkedin and visit Weather Guard on the web. And subscribe to Rosemary Barnes’ YouTube channel here. Have a question we can answer on the show? Email us! Allen Hall: [00:00:00] Welcome to the Uptime Wind Energy Podcast. I’m your host, Allen Hall. I’ve got Yolanda Padron and Joel Saxum in Texas. And Rosemary Barnes is back from her long Vacation in Australia and TPI. Composites is big in the news this week, everybody, because they’re in bankruptcy hearings and they are selling off parts of the business. Vestas is, at least according to News Reports positioned to acquire. A couple of the LLCs down in Mexico. So there’s uh, two of them, TPI in Mexico, five LLC, and TPI in Mexico, six LLC. There are other LLCs, of course involved with this down in Mexico. So they’re buying, not sure exactly what the assets are, but probably a couple of the factories in which their blades were being manufactured in. Uh, this. Is occurring because Vestas stepped in. They were trying to have an auction and Vestas stepped forward and just ended up buying these two LLCs. [00:01:00] Other things that are happening here, Joel, is that, uh, TPI evidently sold their Turkish division. Do you recall to who they sold? That, uh, part of the Joel Saxum: business too, two companies involved in that, that were TPI Turkey, uh, and that was bought by a company called XCS composites. Uh, and they are out of the United Arab Emirates, so I believe they’re either going to be Abu Dhabi or Dubai based. Uh, but they took over the tube wind blade manufacturing plants in Isme, uh, also a field service and inspection repair business. And around 2,700 employees, uh, from the Turkish operation. So that happened just, just after, I mean, it was a couple weeks after the bankruptcy claim, uh, went through here in August, uh, in the States. So it went August bankruptcy for TPI, September, all the Turkish operations were bought and now we’ve got Vestas swooping in and uh, taking a bunch of the Mexican operations. Allen Hall: Right. And [00:02:00] Vestas is also taking TPI composites India. Which is a part of the business that is not in bankruptcy, uh, that’s a, a separate business, a separate, basically LLC incorporation Over in India, the Vestus is going to acquire, so they’re gonna acquire three separate things in this transaction. The question everybody’s asking today after seeing this Vestus move is, what is GE doing? Because, uh, GE Renova has a lot of blades manufactured by TPI down in Mexico. No word on that. And you would think if, if TPI is auctioning off assets that GE renova would be at the front of the line, but that’s not what we’re hearing on the ground. Joel Saxum: Yeah, I mean it’s, the interesting part of this thing is for Vestas, TPI was about 35% of their blade capacity for manufacturing in 2024. If their 30, if, if Vestas was 35%, then GE had to be 50%. There [00:03:00] demand 60. So Vesta is making a really smart move here by basically saying, uh, we’ve gotta lock down our supply chain for blades. We gotta do something. So we need to do this. GE is gonna be the odd man out because, I mean, I think it would be a, a cold day in Denmark if Vestas was gonna manufacture blades for ge. Allen Hall: Will the sale price that Vest has paid for this asset show up in the bankruptcy? Hearings or disclosures? I think that it would, I haven’t seen it yet, but eventually it’ll, it must show up, right? All, all the bankruptcy hearings and transactions are, they have an overseer essentially, what happens to, so TPI can’t purchase or sell anything without an, um, getting approved by the courts, so that’ll eventually be disclosed. Uh, the Turkish sale will be, I would assume, would be disclosed. Also really curious to see what the asset value. Was for those factories. Joel Saxum: So the Turkish sale is actually public knowledge right now, and [00:04:00] that is, lemme get the number here to make sure I get it right. 92.9 million Euros. Uh, but of, of course TPI laden with a bunch of non-convertible and convertible debt. So a ton of that money went right down to debt. Uh, but to be able to purchase that. They had to assu, uh, XCS composites in Turkey, had to assume debt as is, uh, under the bankruptcy kind of proceedings. So I would assume that Vestas is gonna have to do the same thing, is assume the debt as is to take these assets over and, uh, and assets. We don’t know what it is yet. We don’t know if it’s employees, if it’s operations, if it’s ip, if it’s just factories. We don’t know what’s all involved in it. Um, but like you said, because. TPI being a publicly traded company in the United States, they have to file all this stuff with SEC. Allen Hall: Well, they’ll, they’re be delisted off of. Was it, they were Joel Saxum: in Nasdaq? Is that where they were listed? The India stuff that could be private. You may ne we may not ever hear about what happened. Valuation there. Allen Hall: Okay, so what is the, the [00:05:00] future then for wind blade production? ’cause TPI was doing a substantial part of it for the world. I mean, outside of China, it’s TPI. And LM a little bit, right? LM didn’t have the capacity, I don’t think TPI that TPI does or did. It puts Joel Saxum: specifically GE in a tight spot, right? Because GEs, most of their blades were if it was built to spec or built to print. Built to spec was designed, uh, by LM and built by lm. But now LM as we have seen in the past months year, has basically relinquished themselves of all of their good engineering, uh, and ability to iterate going forward. So that’s kind of like dwindling to an end. TPI also a big side of who makes blades for ge if Vestas is gonna own the majority of their capacity, Vestas isn’t gonna make blades for ge. So GEs going to be looking at what can we, what can we still build with lm? And then you have the kind of the, the odd ducks there. You have the Aris, [00:06:00] you have the MFG, um, I mean Sonoma is out there. This XCS factory is there still in Turkey. Um, you may see some new players pop up. Uh, I don’t know. Um, we’ll see. I mean, uh, Rosemary, what’s, what’s your take? Uh, you guys are starting to really ramp up down in Australia right now and are gonna be in the need of blades in general with this kind of shakeup. Rosemary Barnes: What do we say? My main concern is. Around the service of the blades that we’ve already got. Um, and when I talk to people that I know at LM or XLM, my understanding is that those parts of the organization are still mostly intact. So I actually don’t expect any big changes there. Not to say that the status quo. Good enough. It’s not like, like every single OEM whose, um, FSAs that I work with, uh, support is never good enough. But, um, [00:07:00] it shouldn’t get any worse anyway. And then for upcoming projects, yeah, I, I don’t know. I mean, I guess it’s gonna be on a case by case basis. Uh, I mean, it always was when you got a new, a new project, you need a whole bunch of blades. It was always a matter of figuring out which factory they were going to come from and if they had capacity. It’ll be the same. It’s just that then instead of, you know, half a dozen factories to choose from, there’s like, what, like one or two. So, um, yeah, I, that’s, that’s my expectation of what’s gonna happen. I presumably ge aren’t selling turbines that they have no capability to make blades for. Um, so I, I guess they’re just gonna have a lot less sales. That’s the only real way I can make it work. Allen Hall: GE has never run a Blade factory by themselves. They’ve always had LM or somebody do it, uh, down in Brazil or TPI in Mexico or wherever. Uh, are we thinking that GE Renova is not gonna run a Blade Factory? Is that the thought, or, or is [00:08:00] that’s not in the cards either. Rosemary Barnes: I don’t think it’s that easy to just, just start running a Blade Factory. I mean, I know that GE had blade design capabilities. I used to design the blades that TPI would make. So, um, that part of it. Sure. Um, they can, they can still do that, but it’s not, yeah, it’s, it’s not like you just buy a Blade factory and like press start on the factory and then the, you know, production line just starts off and blades come out the other end. Like there is a lot of a, a lot of knowhow needed if that was something that they wanted to do. That should have been what they started doing from day one after they bought lm. You know, that was the opportunity that they had to become, you know, a Blade factory owner. They could have started to, you know, make, um, have GE. Take up full ownership of the, the blade factories and how that all worked. But instead, they kept on operating like pretty autonomously without that many [00:09:00] changes at the factory level. Like if they were to now say, oh, you know, hey, it’s, uh, we really want to. Have our own blade factories and make blades. It’s just like, what the hell were you doing for the last, was it like seven years or something? Like you, you could easily have done what? And now you haven’t made it as hard for yourselves as possible. So like I’m not ruling out that that’s what they’re gonna try and do, because like I said, I don’t think it’s been like executed well, but. My God, it’s like even stupid of the whole situation. If that’s where we end up with them now scrambling to build from scratch blade, um, manufacturing capability because there’s Yolanda Padron: already a blade scarcity, right? Like at least in the us I don’t know if you guys are seeing it in, in Australia as well, but there’s a blade scarcity for these GE blades, right? So you’re, they kind of put themselves in an even more tough spot by just now. You, you don’t have access to a lot of these TPI factories written in theory. From what we’re seeing. You mean to get like replacement blades? Yeah. So like for, for issues? Yeah. New [00:10:00] construction issues under FSA, that, Rosemary Barnes: yeah. I mean, we’ve always waited a, a long time for new blades. Like it’s never great. If you need a new blade, you’re always gonna be waiting six months, maybe 12 months. So that’s always been the case, but now we are seeing delays of that. Maybe, maybe sometimes longer, but also it’s like, oh well. We can’t replace, like, for like, you’re gonna be getting a, a different kind of blade. Um, that will work. Um, but you know, so that is fine, except for that, that means you can’t do a single blade replacement anymore. Now, what should have been a single blade replacement might be a full set replacement. And so it does start to really, um, yeah. Mess things up and like, yeah, it’s covered by the FSA, like that’s on them to buy the three blades instead of one, but. It does matter because, you know, if they’re losing money on, um, managing your wind farm, then it, it is gonna lead to worse outcomes for you because, you know, they’re gonna have to skimp and scrape where they [00:11:00] can to, you know, like, um, minimize their losses. So I, I don’t think it’s, it’s, it’s Yolanda Padron: not great. Yeah. And if you’re running a wind farm, you have other stakeholders too, right? It’s not like you’re running it just for yourself. So having all that downtime from towers down for a year. Because you can’t get blades on your site. Like it’s just really not great. Rosemary Barnes: Yeah, and I mean, there’s flaws on there. Like they’ve got an availability guarantee. Then, you know, below that they do have to, um, pay for that, those losses. But there’s a flaw on that. So once you know, you, you blast through the floor of your availability, then you know, that is on the owner. Now it’s not on the, um, service provider. So it’s definitely. Something that, yeah, there’s lots of things where you might think, oh, I don’t have to worry about my blades ’cause I’ve got an F, SA, but you know, that’s just one example where, okay, you will, you will start worrying if they, they yeah. Fall through the floor of their availability guarantee. Joel Saxum: Two questions that pop up in my mind from this one, the first one, the first one is [00:12:00] directly from Alan. You and I did a webinar, we do so many of ’em yesterday, and it was about, it was in the nor in North America, ferc, so. They have new icing readiness, uh, reporting you, so, so basically like if you’re on the, if you’re connected to the grid, you’re a wind farm or solar farm and you have an icing event, you need to explain to them why you had an outage, um, and why, what you’re doing about it. Or if you’re not doing something about it, you have to justify it. You have to do all these things to say. Hey, some electrons weren’t flowing into the grid. There’s certain levels. It’s much more complicated than this, but electrons weren’t flowing into the grid because of an issue. We now have to report to FERC about this. So is there a stage when a FERC or uh, some other regulatory agency starts stepping into the wind industry saying like, someone’s gotta secure a supply chain here. ’cause they’re already looking at things when electrons are on the grid. Someone’s got a secure supply chain here so we can ensure that [00:13:00]these electrons are gonna get on the grid. Could, can something like that happen or was, I mean, I mean, of course that’s, to me, in my opinion, that’s a lot of governmental overreach, but could we see that start to come down the line like, Hey, we see from an agency’s perspective, we see some problems here. What are you doing to shore this up? Allen Hall: Oh, totally. Right. I, I think the industry in general has an issue. This is not an OEM specific problem. At the minute, if this is a industry-wide problem, there seems to be more dispersed. Manufacturers are gonna be popping up. And when we were in Scotland, uh, we learned a lot more about that. Right, Joel? So the industry has more diversification. I, I, here’s, here’s my concern at the minute, so. For all these blade manufacturers that we would otherwise know off the top of our heads. Right. Uh, lm, TPI, uh, Aris down in Brazil. The Vestus manufacturing facilities, the Siemens manufacturing [00:14:00] facilities. Right. You, you’re, you’re in this place where. You know, everybody’s kind of connected up the chain, uh, to a large OEM and all this made sense. You know, who was rebuilding your blades next year and the year down, two years down the road. Today you don’t, so you don’t know who owns that company. You don’t know how the manager’s gonna respond. Are you negotiating with a company that you can trust’s? Gonna be there in two or three years because you may have to wait that long to get blades delivered. I don’t know. I think that it, it put a lot of investment, uh, companies in a real quandary of whether they wanna proceed or not based upon the, what they is, what they would perceive to be the stability of these blade companies. That’s what I would think. I, I, Vestas is probably the best suited at the minute, besides Siemens. You know, Vestas is probably best suited to have the most perceived reliability capability. Control, Joel Saxum: but they have their own [00:15:00] blade factories already, right? So if they buy the TPI ones, they’re just kind of like they can do some copy pasting to get the the things in place. And to be honest with you, Vesta right now makes the best blades out there, in my opinion, least amount of serial defects. Remove one, remove one big issue from the last couple Allen Hall: years. But I think all the OEMs have problems. It’s a question of how widely known those problems are. I, I don’t think it’s that. I think the, the, the. When you talk to operators and, and they do a lot of shopping on wind turbines, what they’ll tell you generally is vestus is about somewhere around 20% higher in terms of cost to purchase a turbine from them. And Vestus is gonna put on a, a full service agreement of some sort that’s gonna run roughly 30 years. So there’s a lot of overhead that comes with buying a, a Vestas turbine. Yes. You, you get the quality. Yes. You get the name. Yes, you get the full service agreement, which you may or [00:16:00] may not really want over time. Uh, that’s a huge decision. But as pieces are being removed from the board of what you can possibly do, there’s it, it’s getting narrow or narrow by the minute. So it, it’s either a vestus in, in today’s world, like right today, I think we should talk about this, but it’s either Vestus or Nordic. Those are the two that are being decided upon. Mostly by a lot of the operators today. Joel Saxum: That’s true. We’re, and we just saw Nordex, just inked a one gigawatt deal with Alliant Energy, uh, just last week. And that’s new because Alliant has traditionally been a GE buyer. Right. They have five or six ge, two X wind farms in the, in the middle of the United States, and now they’ve secured a deal with Nordex for a gigawatt. Same thing we saw up at Hydro Quebec. Right. Vestas and Nordex are the only ones that qualify for that big, and that’s supposed to be like a 10 gigawatt tender over time. Right. But the, so it brings me to my, I guess my other question, I was thinking about this be [00:17:00] after the FERC thing was, does do, will we see a new blade manufacturer Allen Hall: pop Joel Saxum: up? Allen Hall: No, I don’t think you see a new one. I think you see an acquisition, uh, a transfer of assets to somebody else to run it, but that is really insecure. I, I always think when you’re buying distressed assets and you think you’re gonna run it better than the next guy that. Is rare in industry to do that. Think about the times you’ve seen that happen and it doesn’t work out probably more than 75% of the time. It doesn’t work out. It lasts a year or two or three, and they had the same problems they had when the original company was there. You got the same people inside the same building, building the same product, what do you think is magically gonna change? Right? You have this culture problem or a a already established culture, you’re not likely to change that unless you’re willing to fire, you know, a third of the staff to, to make changes. I don’t see anybody here doing that at the minute because. Finding wind blade technicians, manufacturing people is [00:18:00] extremely hard to do, to find people that are qualified. So you don’t wanna lose them. Joel Saxum: So this is why I say, this is why I pose the question, because in my mind, in in recent wind history, the perfect storm for a new blade manufacturer is happening right now. And the, and the why I say this is there is good engineers on the streets available. Now washing them of their old bad habits and the cultures and those things, that’s a monumental task. That’s not possible. Allen Hall: Rosemary worked at a large blade manufacturer and it has a culture to it. That culture really didn’t change even after they were acquired by a large OEM. The culture basically Rosemary Barnes: remained, they bizarrely didn’t try and change that culture, like they didn’t try to make it a GE company so that it wasn’t dur, it was wasn’t durable. You know, they, they could have. Used that as a shortcut to gaining, um, blade manufacturing capabilities and they didn’t. And that was a, I think it was a choice. I don’t think it’s an inevitability. It’s never easy to go in and change a, a culture, [00:19:00] but it is possible to at least, you know, get parts of it. Um, the, the knowledge should, you should be able to transfer and then get rid of the old culture once you’ve done that, you know, like, uh. Yeah, like you, you bring it in and suck out all the good stuff and spit out the rest. They didn’t do that. Joel Saxum: The opportunity here is, is that you’ve got a, you’ve got people, there’s gonna be a shortage of blade capacity, right? So if you are, if you are going to start up a blade manufacturing facility, you, if you’re clever enough, you may be able to get the backlog of a bunch of orders to get running without having to try to figure it out as you go. Yolanda Padron: I feel like I’d almost make the case that like the blade repair versus replace gap or the business cases is getting larger and larger now, right? So I feel like there’s more of a market for like some sort of holistic maintenance team to come in and say, Hey, I know this OEM hasn’t been taking care of your blades really well, but here are these retrofits that have proven to be [00:20:00]to work on your blades and solve these issues and we’ll get you up and running. Rosemary Barnes: We are seeing more and more of of that. The thing that makes it hard for that to be a really great solution is that they don’t have the information that they need. They have to reverse engineer everything, and that is. Very challenging because like you can reverse engineer what a blade is, but it doesn’t mean that, you know, um, exactly like, because a, the blade that you end up with is not an optimized blade in every location, right? There’s some parts that are overbuilt and um, sometimes some parts that are underbuilt, which gives you, um, you know, serial issues. But, so reverse engineering isn’t necessarily gonna make it safe, and so that does mean that yeah, like anyone coming in with a really big, significant repair that doesn’t go through the OEM, it’s a, it’s a risk. It, it’s always a risk that they have, you know, like there’s certain repairs where you can reverse engineer enough to know that you’re safe. But any really big [00:21:00] one, um, or anything that involves multiple components, um, is. Is a bit of a gamble if it doesn’t go through the OEM. Joel Saxum: No, but so between, I guess between the comments there, Yolanda and Rosemary, are we then entering the the golden age of opportunity for in independent engineering experts? Rosemary Barnes: I believe so. I’m staking, staking my whole business on it. Allen Hall: I think you have to be careful here, everybody, because the problem is gonna be Chinese blade manufacturers. If you wanna try to establish yourself as a blade manufacturer and you’re taking an existing factory, say, say you bought a TPI factory in Turkey or somewhere, and you thought, okay, I, I know how to do this better than everybody else. That could be totally true. However, the OEMs are not committed to buying blades from you and your competition isn’t the Blade Factory in Denmark or in Colorado or North Dakota, or in Mexico or Canada, Spain, wherever your competition is when, [00:22:00] uh, the OEM says, I can buy these blades for 20 to 30% less money in China, and that’s what you’re gonna be held as, as a standard. That is what’s gonna kill most of these things with a 25% tariff on top. Right? Exactly. But still they’re still bringing Joel Saxum: blades in. That’s why I’m saying a local blade manufacturer, Rosemary Barnes: I think it’s less the case. That everyone thinks about China, although maybe a little bit unconventional opinion a about China, they certainly can manufacture blades with, uh, as good a quality as anyone. I mean, obviously all of the, um, Danish, uh, American manufacturers have factories in China that are putting out excellent quality blades. So I’m not trying to say that they dunno how to make a good blade, but with their. New designs, you know, and the really cheap ones. There’s a couple of, um, there’s a couple of reasons for that that mean that I don’t think that it just slots really well into just replacing all of the rest of the world’s, um, wind turbines. The first is that there are a lot of [00:23:00] subsidies in China. Surely there can only continue so long as their economy is strong. You know, like if their economy slows down, like to what extent are they gonna be able to continue to, um, continue with these subsidies? I would be a little bit nervous about buying an asset that I needed support for the next 30 years from a company like. That ecosystem. Then the other thing is that, um, that development, they move really fast because they take some shortcuts. There’s no judgment there. In fact, from a develop product development point of view, that is absolutely the best way to move really fast and get to a really good product fast. It will be pervasive all the way through every aspect of it. Um, non-Chinese companies are just working to a different standard, which slows them down. But also means that along the way, like I would be much happier with a half developed, um, product from a non-Chinese manufacturer than a half developed product from a Chinese manufacturer. The end point, like if China can keep on going long enough with this, [00:24:00] you know, like just really move fast, make bold decisions, learn everything you can. If they can continue with that long enough to get to a mature product, then absolutely they will just smash the rest of the world to pieces. So for me, it’s a matter of, um, does their economy stay strong enough to support that level of, uh, competition? Allen Hall: Well, no, that’s a really good take. It’s an engineering take, and I think the decision is made in the procurement offices of the OEMs and when they start looking at the numbers and trying to determine profitability. That extra 20% savings they can get on blades made in China comes into play quite often. This is why they’re having such a large discussion about Chinese manufacturers coming into the eu. More broadly is the the Vestas and the Siemens CAAs and even the GE Re Novas. No, it’s big time trouble because the cost structure is lower. It just is, and I. [00:25:00] As much as I would love to see Vestas and Siemens and GE Renova compete on a global stage, they can’t at the moment. That’s evident. I don’t think it’s a great time to be opening any new Blade Factory. If you’re not an already established company, it’s gonna be extremely difficult. Wind Energy O and M Australia is back February 17th and 18th at Melbourne’s Pullman on the park. Which is a great hotel. We built this year’s agenda directly from the conversations we’ve had in 2025 and tackling serial defects, insurance pressures, blade repairs, and the operational challenges that keeps everybody up at night around the world. So we have two days of technical sessions, interactive roundtables and networking that actually moves the industry for. Forward. And if you’re interested in attending this, you need to go to WMA 2020 six.com. It’s WOMA 2020 six.com. Rosemary, a lot of, uh, great events gonna happen at. W 2026. Why don’t [00:26:00] you give us a little highlight. Parlet iss gonna be there. Rosemary Barnes: Parlow is gonna be there. I mean, a highlight for me is always getting together with the, the group. And also, I mean, I just really love the size of the event that uh, every single person who’s there is interested in the same types of things that you are interested in. So the highlight for me is, uh, the conversations that I don’t know that I’m gonna have yet. So looking forward to that. But we are also. Making sure that we’ve got a really great program. We’ve got a good mix of Australian speakers and a few people bringing international experience as well. There’s also a few side events that are being organized, like there’s an operators only forum, which unfortunately none of us will be able to enter because we’re not operators, but that is gonna be really great for. For all of them to be able to get together and talk about issues that they have with no, nobody else in the room. So if, if you are an operator and you’re not aware of that, then get in touch and we’ll pass on your details to make sure you can join. Um, yeah, and people just, you know, [00:27:00] taking the opportunities to catch up with clients, you know, for paddle load. Most or all of our clients are, are gonna be there. So it is nice to get off Zoom and um, yeah, actually sit face to face and discuss things in person. So definitely encourage everyone to try and arrange those sorts of things while they’re there. Joel Saxum: You know, one of the things I think is really important about this event is that, uh, we’re, we’re continuing the conversation from last year, but a piece of feedback last year was. Fantastic job with the conversation and helping people with o and m issues and giving us things we can take back and actually integrate into our operations right away. But then a week or two or three weeks after the event, we had those things, but the conversation stopped. So this year we’re putting some things in place. One of ’em being like Rosemary was talking about the private operator forum. Where there’s a couple of operators that have actually taken the reins with this thing and they wanna put this, they wanna make this group a thing where they’re want to have quarterly meetings and they want to continue this conversation and knowledge share and boost that whole Australian market in the wind [00:28:00]side up right? Rising waters floats all boats, and we’re gonna really take that to the next level this year at Allen Hall: WMA down in Melbourne. That’s why I need a register now at Wilma 2020 six.com because the industry needs solutions. Speeches. That wraps up another episode of the Uptime Wind Energy Podcast. Thanks for joining us. We appreciate all the feedback and support we received from the wind industry. If today’s discussion sparked any questions or ideas, we’d love to hear from you. Just reach out to us on LinkedIn and please don’t forget to subscribe so you’d never miss an episode. For Joel Rosemary and Yolanda, I’m Allen Hall. We’ll catch you next week on the Uptime Wind Energy Podcast.
Microgrids offer utilities eight distinct value stacks (or streams), yet most still treat them as experimental pilots. Today on the Clean Power Hour, we reveal how microgrids are strategic network assets that deliver value every single day, not just when the grid fails. Martin Szczepanik is Director of Energy and Resources at Baringa, a global energy consultancy. He brings 11 years of utility strategy experience, including work with SolarCity, major West Coast utilities, and renewable energy developers. Baringa recently released a white paper called "From Pilots to Portfolios: Scaling the Rollout of Utility Microgrids."Key Discussion Points:• The complete microgrid value stack: resilience, distribution capacity deferral, transmission capacity deferral, ancillary services, energy arbitrage, generation capacity deferral, avoided emissions, and avoided public safety power shutoffs (PSPS)• Why resilience differs from reliability: climate-driven extreme weather events versus age and condition-driven outages• How billion-dollar natural disasters increased from once every 90 days in the 1980s to once every 19 days today, which necessitates the increased need for microgrids• Distribution and transmission capacity deferral: using microgrids to avoid $5-10 million infrastructure upgrades• Energy arbitrage opportunities: charging batteries when solar floods the grid, discharging during peak demand• FERC 2222 enabling distributed energy resources to participate in wholesale markets and earn revenue• California wildfires and PSPS (Public Safety Power Shutoffs) events: how microgrids reduce the cost of de-energizing lines• Why utilities need to assess microgrids in distribution planning instead of defaulting to substations and reconductoringConnect with Martin Szczepanik, Baringa LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/martinszczepanik/Website: www.baringa.com/en/about/regions/north-america/microgrids/Whitepaper: www.baringa.com/en/insights/digitising-the-energy-system/scaling-microgrids/ Support the showConnect with Tim Clean Power Hour Clean Power Hour on YouTubeTim on TwitterTim on LinkedIn Email tim@cleanpowerhour.com Review Clean Power Hour on Apple PodcastsThe Clean Power Hour is produced by the Clean Power Consulting Group and created by Tim Montague. Contact us by email: CleanPowerHour@gmail.com Corporate sponsors who share our mission to speed the energy transition are invited to check out https://www.cleanpowerhour.com/support/The Clean Power Hour is brought to you by CPS America, maker of North America's number one 3-phase string inverter, with over 6GW shipped in the US. With a focus on commercial and utility-scale solar and energy storage, the company partners with customers to provide unparalleled performance and service. The CPS America product lineup includes 3-phase string inverters from 25kW to 275kW, exceptional data communication and controls, and energy storage solutions designed for seamless integration with CPS America systems. Learn more at www.chintpowersystems.com
Oral Arguments for the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit
East Tennessee Group v. FERC
On Today's Episode –Snow has returned to Michigan and Winter is Here. Mark and Matt are jpioned by returning guest Bart Marcois. We meet Bart, and get a little back story. We move into Mark talking about Sec. of War Pete Hegseth being attacked on all fronts. Mark talks us through how we have been running clandestine operations for as long as we have been policing the world. People act like Trump is doing something different than Obama never did, which is preposterous.Tune in for all the Funhttps://aminutewithbart.com/ Bart Marcois is an international expert in energy, foreign affairs, and national security with experience in Europe and NATO, the Arabian Gulf, and East Asia. A senior corporate, government and foundation executive, Mr. Marcois has managed delicate negotiations in uncertain and changing environments.A media analyst in print and broadcast, he has served as a career Foreign Service Officer and as the Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of Energy for Policy and International Affairs. At the Department of Energy, Marcois was the chief operating officer of a department with over 100 senior specialists and a $20 million budget to formulate U.S. domestic and international energy security policy. More recently, he managed an Administration effort at the FERC to streamline the permitting process for large infrastructure projects.As an American diplomat, Mr. Marcois conducted political analysis. He assisted the development of civil society, the rule of law, and democratic institutions in the context of Islamic societies. Mr. Marcois provided early warning of Islamist ideology, at a time when most American officials were oblivious to the threat. He is fluent in Arabic and Dutch.Marcois is a prolific contributor to the national debate about politics, culture, and national security affairs. He has authored over 200 articles in The Hill, American Greatness, OpsLens.com, and The Daily Caller, and is a frequent guest on television and radio broadcasts. He has appeared on Tucker Carlson Tonight, Fox and Friends, National Public Radio, The Hugh Hewitt Show, and The Blaze, among other programs.In the private sector, Mr. Marcois has served as a corporate director in a DC-based investment partnership managing activities in highly regulated sectors in Eastern and Central Europe. He was a director and executive in a Washington-based investment banking and commercial intelligence firm, and was a confidential advisor to several government entities. He conceived and executed public relations campaigns that achieved national impact.Mr. Marcois has served as a consultant to a federal advisory council on energy policy, and has been a course developer and instructor at both the Institute for Public-Private Partnership and The Leadership Institute.He has served as an executive and board member of several non-profit organizations, and is a former member of the Board of Directors of a coalition of 28 Christian churches that cooperate to provide early childhood care and education, food, rental assistance, furniture, and other services to low-income families of all denominations.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
Today, we were delighted to welcome Neil Chatterjee, Former Commissioner and Chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC). Neil served as FERC Chairman from August –December 2017 and again from October 2018–November 2020. During his tenure, he championed several strategic initiatives, including streamlining the liquified natural gas application review and approval process, and advancing the use of technology to mitigate physical and cyber threats to critical energy infrastructure. Prior to his service at FERC, Neil was an advisor to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and worked for the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association. He currently serves as Chief Government Affairs Officer at Palmetto, a Senior Advisor at KKR, a Distinguished Visiting Fellow at the Center on Global Energy Policy, and a Senior Policy Advisor at the Climate Leadership Council, in addition to serving on the Bipartisan Policy Center's Board of Directors. We were honored to host Neil at our offices in Houston for an insightful and engaging discussion. In our conversation, we explore Neil's perspective on the evolving U.S. energy landscape amid surging electricity demand, geopolitical pressure, and the rapid growth of artificial intelligence. Chatterjee explains the unique structure and independence of FERC, emphasizing that this design has helped the agency maintain policy stability even as presidential administrations swing between dramatically different energy priorities. He argues that energy security has become synonymous with national security and that FERC now sits at the center of balancing reliability, affordability, and decarbonization. The discussion highlights how new pressures from data centers, electrification, and reindustrialization are straining a grid shaped by decades of flat demand and policy drift. Chatterjee also reflects on past regulatory controversies, noting that AI-driven load growth may finally push the country beyond polarized debates about “fossil versus clean energy,” because meeting demand will require every available resource, from gas and coal to solar, storage, nuclear, and distributed generation technologies. Neil dives into the operational, political, and economic complexities of meeting this surge in power demand. Chatterjee outlines the emerging challenge of large-load interconnection is how to quickly connect massive hyperscaler data centers without destabilizing markets or burdening consumers, and praises a recent DOE directive that gives FERC flexibility (linked here), while insisting on quicker pathways to power. He details trade-offs such as hyperscalers funding grid upgrades in exchange for curtailment obligations, growing tension between utility and market-based models, and the need for aggressive permitting reform to build pipelines and transmission. He notes that time-to-power constraints favor near-term solutions such as solar-plus-storage paired with gas peakers, while advanced nuclear and new gas capacity remain years away. Throughout, he stresses the importance of depoliticizing energy policy and “empowering the nerds”— letting engineers, economists, and market designers, not political cycles, guide decisions on reliability, infrastructure, distributed resources, and the evolving relationship between front-of- and behind-the-meter systems. It was a tour de force and we greatly enjoyed the discussion. Mike Bradley kicked off the show by noting that U.S. markets are laser-focused on Wednesday's FOMC rate decision. On the bond market front, the 10-year Treasury yield has risen to approximately 4.17% (up from 4% two weeks ago) amid growing concern that the Fed may not deliver the multiple interest-rate cuts expected in 2026. He added that a 25-basis point rate cut is anticipated at the meeting and that Chairman Powell's press conference, particularly his tone and comments on Fed independence,
Oral Arguments for the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit
City Utilities of Springfield, Missouri v. FERC
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission regulates the United States' energy transmission, pipeline networks, and wholesale rates for electricity. For much of its history, FERC was a little-known federal agency. But that's changing. Today, topics like energy affordability and the urgent build-out of data centers to support AI are putting FERC in the spotlight. The Trump administration is also exerting pressure on the agency. This fall, Energy Secretary Chris Wright directed the commission to fast-track grid connections for certain large loads, such as data centers. But many communities have pushed back against new energy infrastructure. So how is this independent agency handling pressures to reform its policies? How might politics play out — or not — in its rulings and in key court decisions that impact the agency? Outside of the agency, what are some solutions to building more energy infrastructure faster? This week, Jason Bordoff talks to Neil Chatterjee about FERC's role in energy policy. Neil is a former commissioner of FERC, where he also twice served as chairman. Neil recently joined the Center for Global Energy Policy as a distinguished visiting fellow. He also currently is an advisor and investor in a number of organizations and is the chief government affairs officer at residential clean energy company Palmetto. Early in his career, Neil worked for Senator Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., as his energy policy advisor. Credits: Hosted by Jason Bordoff and Bill Loveless. Produced by Mary Catherine O'Connor, Caroline Pitman, and Kyu Lee. Engineering by Gregory Vilfranc.
Grid expansion is a challenge. On this, almost everyone can agree. But what will it take to expand electric grid capacity and what barriers need to be broken to advance transmission siting and permitting?On this episode of Alternative Power Plays Christina Hayes, Executive Director at Americans for a Clean Energy Grid (ACEG) and Cici Vu, Director of Energy and Climate Equity at DNV Energy Insights USA, join hosts Alan Seltzer and John Povilaitis for a conversation on ACEG's Report addressing the important issue of public acceptance of new electric infrastructure projects.ACEG is a non-profit public interest advocacy coalition focused on the need to expand, integrate and modernize the North American high-voltage electric grid. Christina has 20 years of experience as a regulatory energy attorney, including a decade at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. She previously served as Vice President for Federal Regulatory Affairs at Berkshire Hathaway Energy. At ACEG, Christina has been a leading advocate for the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission or FERC's landmark rule reforming regional transmission planning, Order No. 1920.Cici works to design strategies that address complex environmental and social challenges, with an emphasis on infrastructure, policy, and community-centered planning. She is a co-author of a report came out in January of this year and is called “The PACE of Trust: A Framework by Community Voices for Advancing Transmission.”To learn more about ACEG, visit: https://www.cleanenergygrid.org/To learn more about Christina Hayes, visit: https://cleanenergygrid.org/team/christina-hayes/To learn more about Cici Vu, visit: https://www.iesna.com/speaker/cici-vu/To learn more about Alan Seltzer, visit: https://www.bipc.com/alan-seltzerTo learn more about John Povilaitis, visit: https://www.bipc.com/john-povilaitis
Today we had the opportunity to host Jim Bride, President of Energy Tariff Experts (ETE). We became familiar with Jim after reading his report on power generation costs and impacts on electric bills earlier this year (linked here). Jim founded ETE in 2013 to provide expert consulting, data products, and analysis related to retail electricity, natural gas, and water rates. Before founding ETE, Jim served as a Portfolio Manager at EnerNOC and earlier in his career worked as an environmental professional at Tetra Tech EMI, focused on EPA Superfund investigations and brownfield remediation. ETE helps clients navigate the complex world of energy rates by providing actionable data and insights on utility pricing structures to facilitate efficient capital deployment, reduce energy expenses, and enhance the performance of distributed energy resource management systems. We were thrilled to visit with Jim to discuss ETE's report and the power landscape more broadly. In our conversation, we begin by exploring how rising power prices, especially in the PJM market, are gaining political attention. Jim then provides a brief history of the utility sector, tracing the deregulation movement that began in the 1980s and ultimately reshaped the industry into separate components for generation, transmission, and distribution. We discuss how each of these components, along with public-policy charges like renewable mandates or green standards, contribute to PJM customers' bills. Jim describes his team's extensive effort to reconstruct 12 years of utility tariff data to understand which costs have been driving recent increases. Their findings show that while generation costs had broadly fallen for a decade due to cheap shale-driven natural gas and competitive markets, only spiking briefly during the Ukraine-related gas price surge, transmission charges have grown significantly as utilities invest heavily in new and replacement infrastructure under favorable FERC rules. In states like New Jersey and Maryland, public-policy charges tied to decarbonization mandates have also risen meaningfully. The result is that today's higher bills stem mainly from transmission spending and policy add-ons, not from generation itself, though all components interact. The discussion closes with reflections on aging grid assets, rising load from electrification and data centers, and how future planning and policy choices will shape costs going forward. It was a meaty conversation and we greatly appreciate Jim joining us. To start the show, Mike Bradley highlighted that markets over the last week can best be described as “wobbly” due to growing interest rate cut concerns, continued broader market valuation concerns, and AI/Tech equity exhaustion. On the bond market front, the 10-year bond yield has crept up recently to just over 4.1% on concerns that the Fed may not cut interest rates at their December FOMC Meeting. The odds of a December rate cut have fallen from ~75% just a few weeks ago to ~50% today. Over the last month, Bitcoin has plunged from a peak of ~$125k to ~$90k, which also implies there's a bit of a risk-off trade occurring. On the broader equity market front, the S&P 500 is down ~3% over the last week (down ~5% from recent highs) and seems to have lost its long-held trading momentum. Big6 AI/Tech stocks are down ~11% from recent all-time highs and both the S&P 500 and Big6 AI/Tech stocks are nearing technically oversold levels, which hasn't been seen since the April tariff scare. NVIDIA will report its Q3 results after the close on Wednesday, and it will be a huge test to see whether Big AI/Tech equities will continue to be the broader equity market leaders. On the oil market front, the WTI price continues to hold the $60/bbl level, with the biggest overhang continuing to be the size of the 2026 global oil supply surplus. The IEA
Utility-scale clean energy projects in development are still facing connection queues and regulatory barriers. RE+ may be done for 2025, but the debate is still going. Host Sylvia Leyva Martinez, Research Director at Wood Mackenzie, sits down with three leaders who are driving progress from different corners of the energy transition, from utility-scale project development to digital grid optimisation and solar system reliability. Sylvia Leyva Martinez and her guests discuss how federal and state regulations shape project timelines and financing, the latest innovations in the grid and the future of interconnection studies, the supply chain outlook for developers and technology providers, and how policy and software are converging to accelerate the energy transition. In this episode you'll hear from: Angela Amos from AES Clean Energy - As Director of Commercial Strategy & Innovation, Angela brings a unique vantage point that bridges policy, finance, and market execution. Drawing on her experience at AES, Uplight, and FERC, Angela shares how developers are navigating an evolving regulatory landscape, adapting to federal and state policy shifts, and rethinking how technology integration shapes long-term strategy. She also discusses how AES is approaching supply chain partnerships and what “innovation” really looks like at a global energy developer. Lindsey Williams from Shoals Technologies Group - Lindsey is VP of Marketing & Communications at Shoals, and she joins Sylvia to unpack the latest in solar and storage performance. Building on Shoals' recent focus on EBOS (Electrical Balance of System), Lindsey reflects on how component design, reliability, and digital monitoring are redefining project outcomes. She also shares what she heard from the floor at RE+, including the big industry talking points shaping developer confidence and long-term investment certainty in clean energy infrastructure. Inalvis Alvarez Fernandez from Simple Thread - Inalvis is a Senior Energy Technology Engineer at Simple Thread, and she explains how digital tools like Minerva are helping reduce project backlogs, streamline utility processes, and unlock grid capacity faster. Inalvis also discusses the challenges clean energy companies face scaling renewables and how regulatory clarity can enable more efficient technology deployment. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
Oral Arguments for the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit
Maryland Office of People's Counsel v. FERC
This week on the EcoNews Report we're excited to share that the comment period for Eel River dam removal has finally opened! Tune in to hear co-hosts Tom Wheeler of EPIC and Alicia Bales of the Redwood Chapter of the Sierra Club talk with Alicia Hamann of Friends of the Eel River about this important moment. The Wild and Scenic Eel River offers an unparalleled opportunity to restore native fish populations. With vast, high-quality habitat protected in wild landscapes and fish that retain their wild genetics, dam removal will reconnect hundreds of miles of prime spawning and rearing habitat, restore natural sediment flow, reduce methylmercury buildup, and improve downstream water quality. Taking down the Eel River dams is the single most important step toward recovering the river's once-abundant salmon, steelhead, and lamprey runs. Supported by Tribes, fishers, recreationists, and conservation groups, the Free the Eel movement invites everyone to help heal a century of harm and restore this iconic river.Learn more and find information about upcoming comment workshops and instructions for submitting comments at eelriver.org.Support the show
The liquids pipeline rate index, which the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission uses to adjust the rates charged to shippers on the crude oil, refined products and NGL pipelines it regulates, is the most important rulemaking proceeding for interstate oil pipelines. In today's RBN blog, we take a deeper dive into the rate index, the disruptions caused by recent attempts to adjust it mid-cycle, and how delays in the review process could cause problems down the road.
Last Thursday, Energy Secretary Chris Wright directed the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to consider rulemaking to fast-track interconnection for large loads — as long as they agree to be curtailable or colocate with dispatchable generation. So what does this proposal actually mean for interconnection? In this episode, Shayle talks with Allison Clements, former FERC commissioner and current partner with digital infrastructure advisory firm ASG. Allison is also principal of 804 Advisory. Shayle also talks with Tyler Norris, doctoral student at Duke University's Nicholas School of the Environment. Allison, Tyler, and Shayle cover topics like: How the proposal would standardize interconnection procedures for certain large loads, with study periods no longer than 60 days The jurisdictional shift: asserting federal authority over a process traditionally under state purview The types of eligible loads, including traditional data centers as well as ones that colocate with generation, also known as “hybrid facilities” The duration of flexibility and whether 2-hour, 4-hour, or longer durations are needed for curtailment Whether flexibility resources should be behind-the-meter or front-of-meter The potential disadvantages for bring-your-own-supply or bring-your-own-VPP Resources: Latitude Media: Wright directs FERC to fast track large load interconnection Latitude Media: How the world's first flexible AI factory will work in tandem with the grid Latitude Media: OpenAI pushes the White House to invest in the grid to compete with China E3: Demand Response as a Capacity Resource in SPP's Era of Data Center Growth Canary Media: In a first, a data center is using a big battery to get online faster Credits: Hosted by Shayle Kann. Produced and edited by Daniel Woldorff. Original music and engineering by Sean Marquand. Stephen Lacey is our executive editor. Catalyst is brought to you by EnergyHub. EnergyHub helps utilities build next-generation virtual power plants that unlock reliable flexibility at every level of the grid. See how EnergyHub helps unlock the power of flexibility at scale, and deliver more value through cross-DER dispatch with their leading Edge DERMS platform, by visiting energyhub.com. Catalyst is brought to you by Bloom Energy. AI data centers can't wait years for grid power—and with Bloom Energy's fuel cells, they don't have to. Bloom Energy delivers affordable, always-on, ultra-reliable onsite power, built for chipmakers, hyperscalers, and data center leaders looking to power their operations at AI speed. Learn more by visiting BloomEnergy.com.
This past spring — 10 years after Williams Cos. first proposed the Northeast Supply Enhancement Project and one year after it scrapped plans for it — the effort to add 400 MMcf/d of natural gas pipeline capacity into New York City was revived. Since then, FERC has re-approved the project and regulators in New York and New Jersey have been mulling over whether to issue water-quality permits. In today's RBN blog, we discuss Williams's renewed push to get NESE permitted and built.
This is episode 37 of The League, hosts David Magid and Benoy Thanjan (aka The Solar Maverick) break down the biggest clean energy headlines of the week. They discuss why community solar installations fell 36% in early 2025, how storage pairing and IRA incentives could reignite growth, and the impact of Abby Hopper's departure from SEIA after nine years of leadership. David also unpacks the Grid Power Act and how new FERC mandates could finally ease the interconnection backlog. Tune in for clean energy briefing packed with sharp insights and industry updates. Host Bio: Benoy Thanjan Benoy Thanjan is the Founder and CEO of Reneu Energy, solar developer and consulting firm, and a strategic advisor to multiple cleantech startups. Over his career, Benoy has developed over 100 MWs of solar projects across the U.S., helped launch the first residential solar tax equity funds at Tesla, and brokered $45 million in Renewable Energy Credits (“REC”) transactions. Prior to founding Reneu Energy, Benoy was the Environmental Commodities Trader in Tesla's Project Finance Group, where he managed one of the largest environmental commodities portfolios. He originated REC trades and co-developed a monetization and hedging strategy with senior leadership to enter the East Coast market. As Vice President at Vanguard Energy Partners, Benoy crafted project finance solutions for commercial-scale solar portfolios. His role at Ridgewood Renewable Power, a private equity fund with 125 MWs of U.S. renewable assets, involved evaluating investment opportunities and maximizing returns. He also played a key role in the sale of the firm's renewable portfolio. Earlier in his career, Benoy worked in Energy Structured Finance at Deloitte & Touche and Financial Advisory Services at Ernst & Young, following an internship on the trading floor at D.E. Shaw & Co., a multi billion dollar hedge fund. Benoy holds an MBA in Finance from Rutgers University and a BS in Finance and Economics from NYU Stern, where he was an Alumni Scholar. Connect with Benoy on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/benoythanjan/ Learn more: https://reneuenergy.com Host Bio: David Magid David Magid is a seasoned renewable energy executive with deep expertise in solar development, financing, and operations. He has worked across the clean energy value chain, leading teams that deliver distributed generation and community solar projects. David is widely recognized for his strategic insights on interconnection, market economics, and policy trends shaping the U.S. solar industry. Connect with David on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidmagid/ If you have any questions or comments, you can email us at info@reneuenergy.com.
The Trump administration is pressing the newly whole Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to speed up how quickly data centers can connect to the U.S. power grid. POLITICO's Isa Domínguez breaks down the ambitious DOE proposal, the reaction from FERC watchers, and what to expect next. Plus, Exxon Mobil is suing California over its first-in-the-nation climate disclosure laws. Isa Domínguez is an energy reporter and author of Morning Energy for POLITICO. Josh Siegel is an energy reporter for POLITICO and the host of POLITICO Energy. Nirmal Mulaikal is the co-host and producer of POLITICO Energy. Alex Keeney is a senior audio producer at POLITICO. Ben Lefebvre is the deputy energy editor at POLITICO. Matt Daily is the energy editor for POLITICO. For more news on energy and the environment, subscribe to Power Switch, our free evening newsletter: https://www.politico.com/power-switch And for even deeper coverage and analysis, read our Morning Energy newsletter by subscribing to POLITICO Pro: https://subscriber.politicopro.com/newsletter-archive/morning-energy Our theme music is by Pran Bandi. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
President Donald Trump is ramping up efforts to boost America's supply of critical minerals by striking a deal with Australia, pitching potential partnerships with African leaders, and launching a multibillion-dollar investment fund to develop new sources. The push comes as Washington tries to loosen its reliance on China, which still dominates the global supply of critical minerals and recently flexed that control as a geopolitical weapon. Hannah Northey from POLITICO's E&E News breaks down Trump's critical minerals strategy and what it means for the U.S.-China relations. Plus, the Trump administration has officially elevated Republican Laura Swett to FERC chair. Hannah Northey covers the nexus of mining, environmental policy and politics for POLITICO's E&E News. Josh Siegel is an energy reporter for POLITICO and the host of POLITICO Energy. Nirmal Mulaikal is the co-host and producer of POLITICO Energy. Alex Keeney is a senior audio producer at POLITICO. Ben Lefebvre is the deputy energy editor at POLITICO. Matt Daily is the energy editor for POLITICO. For more news on energy and the environment, subscribe to Power Switch, our free evening newsletter: https://www.politico.com/power-switch And for even deeper coverage and analysis, read our Morning Energy newsletter by subscribing to POLITICO Pro: https://subscriber.politicopro.com/newsletter-archive/morning-energy Our theme music is by Pran Bandi. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Everyone agrees it takes too long and costs too much to build energy infrastructure in America, but what exactly needs fixing, and can we make progress without rolling back vital environmental protections?In this special episode of Energy Gang, recorded live at the ACORE Grid Forum in Washington D.C., host Ed Crooks takes a deep dive into one of the most complex and consequential issues in US energy policy: permitting reform. Ed begins the episode in conversation with Matt Christiansen, partner at Wilson Sonsini and former General Counsel at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC). Drawing on his experience inside the commission, Matt explains where the real choke points lie in the permitting process, how federal and state powers intersect, and what the newly confirmed FERC commissioners could do to accelerate much-needed grid investment.Later, Ed sits down with three experts who work daily on these challenges in Congress and the private sector: Elizabeth Horner, partner at ArentFox Schiff and former counsel to Senators Shelley Moore Capito and John Barrasso; Daniel Palken, Director of Infrastructure for Energy and Permitting at Arnold Ventures; and Jeremy Horan, Permitting Lead at ACORE. Together, they unpack the politics behind reform, the relationship between permitting and transmission planning, and the growing urgency created by surging power demand from data centers and new manufacturing.The group also discusses the mood in Washington, and hopes that bipartisan momentum can be built to support pragmatic, economy-wide permitting reform.This episode is the first of two recorded live at the ACORE Grid Forum, where industry leaders, regulators, and policymakers came together to discuss the future of America's electricity system.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission finally has a full slate of commissioners for the first time in six months, and the agency faces a packed agenda. POLITICO's Isa Domínguez breaks down what's ahead for the commission, how the White House is influencing its agenda, and why these decisions matter for consumers and the tech industry alike. Plus, President Donald Trump's trade war just cost Canada's auto industry in a big way. Isa Domínguez is an energy reporter and author of Morning Energy for POLITICO. Josh Siegel is an energy reporter for POLITICO and the host of POLITICO Energy. Nirmal Mulaikal is the co-host and producer of POLITICO Energy. Alex Keeney is a senior audio producer at POLITICO. Ben Lefebvre is the deputy energy editor at POLITICO. Matt Daily is the energy editor for POLITICO. For more news on energy and the environment, subscribe to Power Switch, our free evening newsletter: https://www.politico.com/power-switch And for even deeper coverage and analysis, read our Morning Energy newsletter by subscribing to POLITICO Pro: https://subscriber.politicopro.com/newsletter-archive/morning-energy Our theme music is by Pran Bandi. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
The Trump administration promised to put wind in the sails of the fossil fuels industry, but the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has failed to resolve a key issue regarding the liquids pipeline rate index, under which the commission adjusts the rates charged to shippers on FERC-regulated crude oil, refined products and NGL pipelines. In today's RBN blog, we'll review the recent history of the rate index, why it moved sharply higher (and then lower) in recent years, and what lies ahead.
Today we were thrilled to host Julien Dumoulin-Smith, Managing Director of U.S. Power, Utilities, and Clean Energy Research at Jefferies. Julien joined the firm in July 2024 after serving as a Senior Research Analyst at Bank of America Merrill Lynch and as an Executive Director at UBS. He holds an MBA and a B.S. in Applied Mathematics from Columbia University. Institutional Investor magazine has ranked Julien as a #1 double-ranked analyst in both Utilities and Alternative/Clean Energy, and he was inducted into the II Hall of Fame for his cumulative accomplishments. It was our pleasure to welcome Julien to our office and hear his thoughtful perspectives on the ever-evolving energy and power landscape. In our discussion, we explore Julien's coverage universe, which he describes as “the full electron and derivatives landscape” spanning utilities, IPPs, renewables, gas plants, industrial adjacencies, and service providers. We discuss the influx of new investors entering power and utilities, Julien's observation that the biggest surprise isn't data center proliferation, but rather how tech companies are paying premiums for power to secure supply, and how utilities once seen as “defensive” are now showing growth characteristics. We touch on the tension between tech companies' need for rapid, large-scale power and their reluctance to become capital-intensive or FERC-regulated, why we're not seeing more long-term offtakes with existing power plants and how state level politics play into it, and how legacy players, new entrants, and regulators are all adapting to a power market being reshaped by AI demand, infrastructure bottlenecks, and novel deal structures. Julien shares that rising inflation across the economy is showing up in utility bills and expresses concern that LNG developers or data centers could be scapegoated for higher gas and power prices. He highlights the parabolic rise in the value of capacity and reliability, the drivers of power inflation including turbine shortages and rising capital costs, whether utilities are properly incentivized to control costs, the role of demand-response mechanisms, and how regulatory and state-level actions are shaping markets. We cover power market scenarios for high and low demand cases, the role of innovation in batteries, fuel cells, and other technologies, and the tension between patching existing systems versus building large-scale infrastructure. We also discuss constraints on ramping renewables, the growing influence of behind-the-meter power, implications for Q3 earnings, and much more. We covered a lot of territory and greatly enjoyed the conversation. To be added to Julien's research distribution list, click here. To start the show, Mike Bradley noted that markets continue to be mostly focused on the U.S. Government shutdown. The 10-year bond yield continues to trade sideways at ~4.1% with economic reports on pause until the government reopens. Internationally, Japan's Liberal Democratic Party elected Sanae Takaichi (who is viewed as fiscally expansionary), which some believe increases the risk of an unwind of the long-standing Yen carry trade. The S&P 500 is up roughly 80bps since the government shutdown, with Healthcare and Technology outperforming. He highlighted AMD's chip deal with OpenAI, which added roughly $70B in market cap, and Oracle's pullback on AI cloud margin concerns. On the crude oil market front, WTI price has increased modestly this week due to OPEC+ announcing a smaller than expected ~135kbpd oil production increase for November. While this could widen the 2026 surplus, traders are weighing when and how prices might react amid limited OPEC spare capacity. On the energy equity front, he pointed out FERMI America's strong IPO debut and continued investor enthusiasm for electricity generation. He ended by flagging the upcoming Rockpoint Gas Storage IPO (280bcf in Canada &
LAS NOTICIAS CON CALLE DE 22 DE SEPTIEMBRE DE 2025 - Owens Delerme hace historia por PR, medalla de plata en mundial de atletismo - Primera Hora Tirotean cerca de casita modelo de residencia de Bad Bunny - Policía .Verifican los gastos de Genera para saber si va o no aumento de 8.1% en la tarifa - El Nuevo Día Ilegal el muelle de dueños de Genera, pero depende de que FERC actúe o no - El Nuevo Día Hoy comienza el otoño oficialmente - SNM Esencia compra 147 cuerdas por 4.45 millones en valle agrícola de Lajas - El Nuevo Día Rivera Schatz dice que no puede investigar lo de PRITS porque sería investigarse a sí mismo - El Nuevo Día Pablo José pide proteger medición neta - El Nuevo DíaParece que nuevos dueños vendieron sueños con el Normandie - El Nuevo Día Lenta la demanda de la junta para evitar ser sacados por Trump - El Nuevo Día Reviven la caña de azúcar en Yabucoa como industria - Primera Hora Advierten de que guerra entre médicos y planes médicos no resuelve el problema sino que lo agudiza - El Nuevo Día Envejecidos regresan a su retiro en PR a pesar de situación de salud - El Nuevo Día UPR acaba con baños inclusivos - El Nuevo Día Informe advierte que la UPR está en problemas de cierres - El Nuevo Día Mueren 3 en accidentes de motoras - El Nuevo Día JOvencita de 13 años víctima de agresión sexual de robo en la casa a las 4AM - El Nuevo Día Una sola escuela pública ha arrancado desde María - CPI Llevamos 40 años bregando con mitigación de inundaciones que no se hacen hace 40 años - El Vocero Trump contra la transparencia, menos info de empresas y menos info inflación - Axios Se unen para reconocer estado en Palestina, Canadá, Australia, Portugal e Inglaterra - Reuters Tom Homan perdonado por Trump aunque está grabado cogiendo 50 mil cash - Reuters Trump evitaría que vengan los mega expertos tras meterle impuesto a H-1B visas - Reuters Hoy Trump atará Tylenol y autismo por uso durante embarazo, vitamina folate tmb - Axios RD produce mega proyecto hotelero en zona antes no impactada y super pobre - Bloomberg HOY SE ORDENA DE MARTINS BBQ LA BOLSITA DE SABORDONDE SIRVEN AHORA EL POLLO ASADO. HOY PUEDES ORDENAR EL MEJOR Y MAS SABROSO POLLO ASADO SERVIDO EN LA CLASICA BOLSITA DE LA RECETA ORIGINAL PARA MAS FRESCURA Y SABOR.¡AHORA LLEGA A CASA EL POLLO CALIENTITO Y JUGOSITO!¡LLEVATE TU POLLO DE MARTINS EN LA BOLSITA DEL SABOR!MMM...HOY VOY PA MARTINSBBQ...ASADO, JUGOSO, SABROSO!Incluye auspicio
The ZENERGY Podcast: Climate Leadership, Finance and Technology
Welcome to The Zenergy Podcast! Today, Former Chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, Neil Chatterjee, returns to the podcast. This episode, Karan and Neil discuss bridging the political left and the political right in terms of climate and energy and how it has gotten so contentious in the past few years. Neil shares how he believes AI could bring bipartisanship to climate issues and if he thinks we will get permitting reform this congressional cycle. He gives his predictions for where clean energy and natural gas will be in the next 10 years and provides insight into his time at FERC. They wrap up with some advice for those fresh out of college and those in their 30s who are on the energy track. As always, thank you for listening! Credits:Editing/Graphics: Desta Wondirad, Wondir Studios