Welcome to a new week. On Friday, we asked for your POV on the (apparently) popular consumer belief that profits are driving rising energy bills. 30% of Daily readers found it surprising, 27% were a bit shocked, and 43% saw this coming.
One reader said this: “Utilities generally have not done a good job of proactively communicating these new capital expenditures with their customers.”
Another noted that “40% pointing to grid updates and expansion shows more a more nuanced view than I would have expected of the general public.”
— Molly, Alex, and the Energy Central editorial team
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The White House is placing big bets on the US nuclear revival.
The DOE could soon offer loan guarantees for a coalition of five to six (mysterious) utilities. They’d jointly order long-lead equipment for up to 10 future AP1000s—the hope is to speed up the oft-sluggish nuclear building process.
Worth noting: This tranche is separate from the $80B Westinghouse deal with the Department of Commerce, which covers another 10 AP1000s. But the two efforts could eventually merge.
On the fuel side: The National Nuclear Security Administration received 1.7 metric tons of HALEU from Japan—the biggest international uranium shipment in agency history. It’ll feed the DOE’s HALEU Availability Program and help close fuel gaps for advanced reactor developers.
BLM is offering up nearly 200K acres in New Mexico for geothermal leasing. (Think GeoEnergy)
There’s geothermal in them thar hills? A June 16 auction in NM kicks off a Western leasing spree that includes Utah (Aug.), Nevada (Oct.), and Idaho (Nov.). Project InnerSpace pegs New Mexico's geothermal potential at 163 GW. Today, the state has just one operational plant.
More states are pushing big power users to pay their own way.
In Texas: As the Lone Star State is on track to beat VA for the country’s most data centers, the PUC staff recommended a slate of transmission cost reforms. These include 1) scrapping cost allowances for large load customers and 2) requiring new large large customers in IOU territory to pay retail transmission rates based on minimum billing demand.
In Florida: Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a law requiring any 50 MW+ data center to take on the “full cost of service,” which he called the first legislation of its kind. It also directs water districts to deny permits if proposed water use would harm local resources.
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Speaking of, Maryland ratepayers want out of paying for Virginia’s data centers—so they’ve taken their fight to FERC. (RTO Insider)
PJM's method of splitting transmission costs across the region is now “unjust and unreasonable,” according to a recent complaint from the Maryland Office of People’s Counsel. OPC says Marylanders will pay roughly $1.6B over the next decade for transmission projects, which mainly serve out-of-state data centers.
The argument: OPC says PJM’s cost-sharing rules were built for an era of slow, broadly distributed load growth—not for an influx of data centers that can gobble up as much power as a midsize city.
An increasingly popular incentive lets utilities bill customers for unfinished projects—the backlash is building, too. (Reuters)
The mechanism: Construction Work in Progress (CWIP) lets utilities recover financing costs for power plants and transmission before they come online. Over 40 states now allow some form of it—2X more than a decade ago. Last year, Missouri reversed a five-decade CWIP ban, and AR, KS, OK, and NC have all adopted pro-CWIP provisions since 2024.
The wake-up call: GA households have paid roughly $1K each in CWIP charges since 2009 toward the long-delated Vogtle reactors, which cost more than 2X the original estimate. Last Nov., GA voters unseated two Republican PSC commissioners due to the cost overruns.
New Jersey is rethinking how its utilities make money. (New Jersey Monitor)
Per Gov. Mikie Sherrill’s executive order, the NJ Board of Public Utilities is weighing the model for orgs like PSE&G and JCP&L (their current ROE, usually around 9.6%, is tied to capital investments). The alternative? One rewarding performance metrics like affordability, reliability, and interconnection speed.
Yes, but: Current and former utility regulators from performance-based states broadly endorsed the shift…yet warned that the framework was designed for an era of flat load growth. Per Illinois Commerce Commission chair Carrie Zalewski: "That world, obviously, is gone."
We technically have a say. It’s just indirect, diluted, and kind of buried under layers of process. Which is why it often feels like energy decisions are happening around us, not with us.
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Thanks for reading. Enjoy your Monday!
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