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What's Happening in Energy — Sept 25
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FERC Declines Requests for Clarification and Rehearing // PJM // Show Cause
Lawyers will love this one. Multiple parties requested clarifications or rehearing after FERC issued its Show Cause Order to PJM in June. The requests sought further clarity on various parameters and on cost allocation for large loads. FERC denied all of these requests because, under Rule 713(b) of the Commission’s procedures, such requests apply only to “final decisions” or “final orders” and the Commission has not made a final decision or determination in the PJM Show Cause Order. Rather, the “Commission determined only that the Tariff appears [emphasis ours] to be unjust, unreasonable, and unduly discriminatory…”
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Nuclear Plant Uprates // Hatch Units 1-2 // Georgia Power
Georgia Power filed an application outlining its plans to increase the nuclear power generated by Plant Hatch Units 1 and 2. The units, built in the 1970s, total roughly 1.8 GW. The utility will own 50.1% of the uprates, matching its ownership share of the plant. Here is a table of the megawatts that Georgia Power will own. Although “final delivery dates are subject to change,” the utility expects the uprates to enter service in 2030.
Georgia Power plans to offset the cost of the uprates through its “Nuclear Uprate” tariff NU-1." Large commercial and industrial (C&I) customers with loads greater than 100 MW can subscribe to the tariff and earn “Zero Emission Credits” that Georgia Power will attribute to generation from the nuclear uprates. The tariff also lets the utility charge customers to recover upfront costs before the uprates enter service.
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New Minimum Load Threshold // LARS // MISO
MISO’s draft tariff language for its proposed Load Addition Resource Study (LARS) process lowers the minimum load size from 250 MW to 200 MW in response to stakeholder feedback from this week’s Large Load Working Group meeting. LARS evaluates large loads and their associated generation in parallel, producing an optimized list of network upgrades within 120 days.
According to MISO, the change is based on “...stakeholder feedback that many emerging data center and large industrial projects in the 200-250 MW range can have significant system impacts and would benefit from the coordinated study process. Lowering the threshold allows access to the LARS framework while maintaining its focus on large, impactful load additions.”
MISO plans to file the proposal with the FERC on September 30.
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Google Testimony Against a Large Load Tariff // Oklahoma Gas and Electric
An expert witness for Google filed testimony opposing the $2.50/kW-month “Reservation Charge”in Oklahoma Gas and Electric’s (OG&E) Extra Large Power and Light (XLPL) tariff. OG&E would begin collecting the charge as soon as a customer signs a Preliminary Agreement or an Electric Service Agreement, and would use it to fund “future bill credits for residential customers”.
The witness argued that “...the charge functions as a cost-free loan,” allowing OG&E “...to earn unearned equity returns. By collecting millions of dollars in monthly pre-service cash and depositing it into general corporate accounts, OG&E can obtain cost-free working capital at a 0.0 percent borrowing cost…Permitting a regulated utility to use prospective customer balance sheets as a captive, interest-free commercial bank violates basic principles of utility finance.”
The testifier listed concerns such as:
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Wholesale Prices and Gas // July 2026 Report // ISO-NE
In July 2026, ISO-NE’s peak demand increased by 2% compared to July 2025. However, average real-time electricity prices fell 9.3% to $54.66/MWh. How is this possible? Average natural gas prices fell almost 36%, from $4.23/MMBtu to $2.71/MMBtu.
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CPCN Denied // Duke Energy Progress // North Carolina
The North Carolina Utilities Commission denied Duke Energy Progress’ request for a Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity (CPCN) to construct a 255 MW F-class simple-cycle combustion turbine at the Smith Energy Complex in Richmond County. Why? According to Commissioner Tucker:
“Given the size of this expenditure and the associated possibility for stranded assets, I believe that the Commission requires more evidence supporting the need for the Proposed Facility. …the record does not adequately establish the specific extent to which the Proposed Facility is intended to serve the anticipated growth in data center customer demand… it is not lost on me that the Proposed Facility will be built in the same county as a transmission project previously approved by the Commission to support the load needs of a new customer data center campus.”
The Commission left the door open for Duke to refile if it can sufficiently establish the system need for the project.
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ALJ Recommends Conditional Approval // Meta // El Paso Electric
Administrative law judges recommended that the Public Utility Commission of Texas approve El Paso Electric’s (EPE) request for a Certificate of Convenience and Necessity to construct the 366 MW of gas generation at the McCloud facility to serve a Meta data center, on the condition that other customers pay none of the project’s costs. The ALJs found that EPE proved a need for more capacity, but not that the proposed resources are the most cost-effective option. However, because Meta agreed to pay for the project’s costs, they recommended approval.
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A New Framework for Load Flexibility // FERC Show Cause Order // NYISO
NYISO presented the details of its proposed non-firm withdrawal service (NFWS), which would let flexible large loads interconnect to the transmission system under non-firm service. If you are familiar with Price Adaptive Load Service (PALS) from SPP, or the Provisional Controllable Load Resource (PCLR) concept from ERCOT, this new acronym will sound familiar. Like those mechanisms, NFWS lets large loads interconnect, with a catch: their service is non-firm and subject to automatic curtailment under specific market pricing conditions. In NYISO, the bid cap is $200/MWh; above that price, these loads are automatically curtailed.
Halcyon angle: Many ISO/RTO responses to the FERC’s Show Cause Orders share similar characteristics, but their acronyms and distinct stakeholder processes make them difficult to compare. Halcyon’s FERC Show Cause Tracker sorts market design initiatives like PALS, PCLR, and NFWS into comparable buckets, each tied back to the specific FERC reform category in the Show Cause Orders. The tracker also covers existing large load interconnection mechanisms already in use, key stakeholder groups, and timelines leading up to the FERC’s November 16 response deadline. Reach out for more details.
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Draft Orders // ComEd Grid Plan // Illinois
The Illinois Commerce Commission is set to rule December 15 on Commonwealth Edison's (ComEd) $15.2 billion 2028–2031 Multi-Year Integrated Grid Plan. Position statements and draft orders are in. Commission Staff’s 331-page position statement covers a lot of ground (including oversight of AI) and recommends approval of the grid plan. Still, some issues remain:
Affordability: Citizens Utility Board / IIEC, and Attorney General recommend reduction in spend,
Large load interconnection: Parties want more transparency; ComEd argues this docket is the wrong forum to discuss these topics.
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Higher Demand and Generation // Arizona Corporation Commission
The Arizona Corporation Commission filed its 14th Biennial Transmission Assessment, which shows higher demand forecasts and more capacity in generator interconnection queues than the 13th assessment. Much of the growth is driven by load from “large customers” and residential demand in Phoenix, which depends heavily on transmission imports for its energy needs.
Across utilities, there are roughly 10 GW more in the generation interconnection queue, much of it for Arizona Public Service’s network.
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New Docket of the Week
New Data Center in San Jose // Prologis // California Energy Commission
Prologis applied for a Small Power Plant Exemption (SPPE) from the California Energy Commission to construct 99 MW of backup diesel generators for the Silver Creek Data Center (SCDC). The generators would help the data center maintain 99.999% uptime if its power from Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) is interrupted. Check out this map of the site. The dark dashed boundary marks the proposed data center, and the light blue lines are the PG&E transmission lines that will interconnect it to the grid through the Hellyer switching station (shaded purple).
Excerpt(s) of the Week
Most clicked from last week’s WHiE