You probably already know the electric power industry is, at the moment, more than a little obsessed over what to do about data centers of the AI variety and their massive demand for power from the underprepared U.S. grid.
All of which means, NetZero Insider has been just as obsessively following the story. K Kaufmann was at the recent Exelon Innovation Expo, where former Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz said a rational approach for data center demand would be to build more natural gas plants now and then catch up on emissions reductions later.
Utilities in Virginia and Georgia are already beefing up their integrated resource plans with new natural gas plants, K reports in her deep dive on a new report from the Electric Power Resource Institute, which instead calls for better efficiency and “scalable clean energy” to ensure reliable power for “hyperscale” data centers.
In our curated content, Inside Climate News provides a closer look at the situation in Virginia, where the state’s huge concentration of data centers is increasingly in conflict with the Clean Economy Act of 2020, which requires its largest utility, Dominion Energy, to provide its customers 100% clean electricity by 2045.
Taking another tack, an op-ed in California’s Capitol Weekly proposes setting efficiency standards for data centers; for example, requiring them to use efficient semiconductor-based flash storage instead of the kilowatt-guzzling hard disk drives that still hold 80% of the digital information in the state’s data centers.
The Nuclear Innovation Alliance has yet another approach to data center demand ― small modular nuclear reactors that can provide 24/7 carbon-free power but are still largely in the demonstration stage. K has a rundown of a new NIA report advocating for cost- and risk-sharing to get from first-of-a-kind SMRs to nth-of-a-kind projects.
We have plenty of action at the state level as well.
K reported on Maryland Gov. Wes Moore’s June 4 executive order mobilizing an all-of-government drive for cutting the state’s greenhouse gas emissions 60% by 2031, including a Subcabinet on Climate and a new zero-emission standard for heating equipment.
New Jersey is working on an update of its Energy Master Plan, and our correspondent Hugh Morley provided a wrap-up of a series of public hearings the state’s Board of Public Utilities has held to get input, with a strong presence from clean energy advocates calling for the state to up its game on renewables and storage.
Returning to our curated content, Vermont made headlines for its new Climate Superfund law, authorizing the state to dock fossil fuel companies for the damages their greenhouse gas emissions have caused, The Christian Science Monitor reports. A New York Times op-ed describes the law in more basic terms: “When you make a mess, you clean it
up.”
Illinois also had big news, with the state’s Commerce Commission adopting its inaugural Renewable Energy Access Plan, which seeks to “facilitate improvements in long-range transmission planning that are crucial for accommodating forthcoming renewable energy development,” according to Hoodline Chicago.
Other stories include:
Mexican President-elect Claudia Sheinbaum is a climate scientist who “was part of a United Nations panel of climate scientists that received a Nobel Peace Prize in 2007,” a Reuters analysis notes. But she cruised to victory promising to continue her predecessor’s support for fossil fuels and faces a steep
budget deficit.
Heat-related deaths and emergency room visits in the U.S. hit an all-time high in 2023, the Associated Press reports, and with temperatures in May already hitting new records, summer 2024 could be even more deadly.
And, Reuters reports, the world’s countries are not stepping up to meet their commitments to triple renewable energy output by 2030, pledged during COP28 in the United Arab Emirates in December.
Read on for more in this week’s Intelligence Report:
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