What's Happening in Energy

What's Happening in Energy - Aug 15

Written by Nat Bullard | Aug 15, 2025 4:00:00 AM

What's Happening in Energy highlights the most interesting findings from public utility commission filings.

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What's Happening in Energy — Aug 15
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Sierra Pacific Power in Nevada has filed an application on August 7 (recorded Aug 8) for permission for Valmy Capacity Project, a 400 megawatt (2x200MW) gas combustion turbine.


Plant announcements and project data are exactly the sort of thing that Halcyon tracks in our regularly updated Gas Power Plant Tracker. See the full Valmy project details (including capital costs), and track the pipeline of ~65 gigawatts of other projects under development right now in the U.S.: get free sample data here.

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In Michigan, Consumers Energy is examining potential data center loads. Here is a 318-page file of exhibits in support of its need to accommodate large load customers, along with 67 individual data center inquiries it has received (the largest of which is a modest 2,100 megawatts).

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In Texas, Entergy has so many large load requests that it has redacted a load of details about these major projects from its justification for the Legend and Loan Star Power Stations: 

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Also in Texas — Walmart is intervening in Oncor’s application to increase its electricity rates by $834 million. Quote: 

Walmart is currently reviewing Oncor's Application and the supporting evidence and has not yet finalized its position. However, an increase in the rates and charges for electricity such as that requested by Oncor could directly and substantially affect Walmart's business and operations in Oncor's service territory. Accordingly, Walmart has a direct interest in the outcome of this proceeding. 

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Also also in Texas, an ERCOT report on renewable power generation (given here as “Intermittent renewable resource,” or IRR) as a percentage of load from June 2024 to June 2025, inclusive:

Maximum IRR penetration for June 2025 was 68.47% on 6/17/2025 interval ending 10:00 and minimum IRR penetration for June 2025 was 7.91% on 6/11/2025 interval ending 07:00. 


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A quick look at how California trimmed its 2023 interconnection queue from 347 gigawatts to 68 gigawatts, with resubmissions and subsequent project studies. 

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Participants in the Georgia Power Electric Vehicle Charger Rider “CIEV-1” saw a 27-37% savings from the program.

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PJM released its review of system performance during very hot weather in June. TL/DR: forecasts on July 26-27 broke down a bit due to a weather model error, meaning that solar also slightly under-performed expectations on both days. 

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Thoughtful commentary in Arizona “In the Matter of the Commission’s Inquiry and Review of the Existing Rate Classifications and other Potential Issues relating to Data Centers.”

From a smaller technology company: 

I am opposed to this as written. I own and operate a small but growing technology company in Phoenix, that is in the process of acquiring an existing small data center. We are investing millions of dollars into the real estate rehab, which includes electrical, structural, cooling and more. We have been facing increasing uncertainty in our costs. My company would be extremely disadvantaged as a small data center operator compared to large industry hyperscaler players should we be faced to pay a higher rate compared with any other company solely because we would be classified as a data center. Having said that, I would be in favor of this if it only applied to "hyper scalers", as they are the companies driving the demand. Therefore, if this only applied to data centers in excess of 20 megawatts, I would be in favor. Otherwise, a blanket classification of "data center" would disproportionately affect the small businesses which operate smaller local data centers that are not driving the excess demand on the grid.

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And finally in Mississippi, a new qualifying facility standard offer for projects under 100 kilowatts of capacity. It includes both peakhours and all-hours options. 
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