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April 9, 2026

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Arizona Task Force Issues Data Center Recommendations

Data centers are a hot topic for Arizona state officials in April, as the Arizona Corporation Commission has scheduled a workshop on the subject and the governor’s office has released a task force report with six data center-related recommendations.

The Arizona Corporation Commission workshop April 16 comes about a year after Commissioner Kevin Thompson opened a docket to review data center rate classifications and the possibility of more transparent rates.

Thompson said the docket could explore other topics such as behind-the-meter solutions for data centers and user-funded generation to help large customers meet their power needs.

“It’s important to balance the economic opportunities presented by data centers with the need to financially protect other ratepayers to ensure they are not bearing the rising energy generation and transmission costs associated with this burgeoning industry,” he said.

An agenda for the April 16 workshop was not yet available.

Revisiting Tax Incentives?

Gov. Katie Hobbs on April 2 released a report from the Arizona Energy Promise Taskforce, a group she established through a September 2025 executive order.

The 36-member task force consisted of private and public sector representatives, consumer advocates and subject-matter experts, whose goal was to address Arizona’s rapid growth in electricity demand. The work was managed by the Governor’s Office of Resiliency.

The task force report is divided into three sections, with one section devoted to data centers and other large loads.

The task force recommended an update to tax and financial incentives for large load customers. One possible next step is to propose statutory changes for the legislature to consider, “including eliminating the current tax incentive for data centers.”

Although task force members reached consensus on the recommendations, the Data Center Coalition, Microsoft and Google dissented on the recommendation regarding tax incentives.

Another recommendation is to require or incentivize large load customers to “proactively engage with communities and invest in community-identified priorities.” The report noted that siting and permitting large load facilities is becoming more difficult “due to local opposition and land-use conflicts.”

The task force also recommended helping local governments navigate large load development. That might include creating a technical assistance program for local jurisdictions and providing materials that explain to the public the energy, water and affordability considerations of large load facilities.

Other data center recommendations include:

    • supporting large load customer adoption of energy management tools;
    • exploring bring-your-own-capacity initiatives that work with utilities for project delivery; and
    • supporting the ACC’s data center docket “to prevent cost shifts, mitigate stranded asset risks and increase development transparency.”

In addition to the task force report’s large load discussion, the report includes sections on an Arizona strategic energy plan and a generation and transmission corridor strategic plan. The task force issued 31 recommendations.

“[The task force] came together and developed commonsense policies that lower costs, reduce bottlenecks and can help us deliver continued prosperity and economic growth,” Hobbs said in a statement.

Stakeholders Weigh In

Since Thompson opened the data center docket at the Arizona Corporation Commission in April 2025, comments have poured in from utilities, advocacy groups and Arizona residents.

In a July filing, Arizona Public Service said it had committed to serving about 3,296 MW of data center load, including 1,215 MW from existing facilities, with prospective customers expressing interest in about 17,000 MW.

“Through commission regulatory policy, customer contractual protections, and reforming rates for high-load-factor customers, Arizona can ensure that costs are fairly allocated … and large, high-load-factor customers do not shift cost to other customers,” APS wrote.

Southwest Gas also said it is seeing growth in its service territory, including inquiries from data centers and others with a high demand for natural gas. The company said it supports the commission’s efforts to address data center growth.

Resident Margo Itule wrote to the commission to highlight what she called “the dramatic dangers of data centers,” which she referred to as “energy vampires.”

“These mega corporations are harvesting and depleting our precious resources,” Itule said.

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TOs Ask FERC to Suspend Competitive Bidding in MISO and SPP

International Transmission Co., American Transmission Co., Ameren, Xcel, Entergy, Cleco and other transmission owners have asked FERC to suspend competitive bidding on transmission projects in MISO and SPP so the grid can be built out faster to accommodate the AI data center explosion.

The TOs argued in an April 7 complaint that MISO’s and SPP’s project solicitations impose “unjust and unreasonable” delays of 16 to 20 months — “just as harmful as broken permitting” — at a time when the U.S. “faces an unprecedented energy emergency and time is of the essence” (EL26-58). They characterized the grid operators’ competitive processes as a “morass” when demand is rising at rates not seen since World War II.

The group said FERC should either place a five-year moratorium on competitive bidding in MISO and SPP or exempt any transmission project needed to interconnect new generation or load from a solicitation process.

The collection of TOs, which includes Evergy, Oklahoma Gas and Electric Co., The Empire District Electric Co. and subsidiaries of ITC, Ameren and Xcel, calls itself the “Grid Acceleration Coalition.”

A pro-competition group, the Electricity Transmission Competition Coalition (ETCC), opposes the complaint, calling it “tone deaf” to concerns over ratepayer affordability.

“Without competition, a monopoly incumbent utility has zero incentive to reduce costs because the more they spend, the more their profits increase,” ETCC wrote.

The TOs asked FERC for fast-tracked treatment of their complaint by mid-July, before SPP would issue requests for proposals on two 765-kV projects from its 2025 Integrated Transmission Planning assessment: the Crawfish Draw-Woodward project and the Anthem-Seminole project in Texas and Oklahoma.

MISO’s and SPP’s competitive bidding processes inhibit the timely interconnection of loads and generation, hampering utilities’ ability to connect customers, preventing FERC from fulfilling its duty under the Federal Power Act to ensure access to electricity, and handicapping the race to develop advanced AI, the group argued.

The TOs cast doubt on claims that competition ultimately saves customers money, arguing that actual costs of projects exceed winning bids by 59 to 66%.

“The benefits of solicitations in MISO and SPP are (at best) unproven and, in all events, do not outweigh the certain harms from delay in those regions,” they wrote in the joint complaint. “Winners can promise the moon and then, after prevailing in the yearslong and opaque administrative process, leverage exceptions and escalators to blow through bids.”

The coalition predicted that competitive developers and their supporters would respond to the complaint with their “usual talking points” about the cost savings associated with Order 1000. But it said reviews of actual construction costs show anticipated savings have not appeared.

To submit a commentary on this topic, email forum@rtoinsider.com.

“Competitive developers will have their anecdotes — of solicited projects completed on time and under budget, and of directly assigned projects that incurred delays or overruns. The coalition can meet those stories with examples of its own — solicited projects that are delayed for years and bust their budgets, and directly assigned that are completed timely and under budget,” the coalition said. “Building transmission is hard, and delays and cost increases are sometimes unavoidable. The important point, however, is that no publicly available study to date supports the proposition that solicitations systematically reduce construction costs or delays in MISO and SPP, accounting for differences across projects.”

The group reasoned that directly assigning transmission projects needed to connect new data center load would improve ratepayer affordability, given the White House’s Ratepayer Protection Pledge, which seven major technology companies reportedly signed on to. It said now that hyperscalers have committed to paying their fair share, bringing large loads online faster would help dilute costs among new customers.

The complaint argued that “bureaucratic red tape” brought on by MISO’s and SPP’s application of FERC Order 1000 “harms national security and economic growth.” It said electricity availability is the “binding constraint” to realizing the U.S.’s AI potential.

“And if we are serious about winning the AI race, that looming need must be solved now. If we choose in 2026 to add two years of delay to transmission projects in MISO and SPP, we will seriously undermine our nation’s ability to meet that challenge,” the coalition said, referencing its 16- to 20-month figure. It said the most “consequential” AI technologies likely would be developed between 2028 and 2035.

Among other projects, the coalition pointed to MISO’s 345-kV Wisconsin Southeast long-range transmission project, which was partially accelerated due to large loads. MISO reassigned some substation work associated with the project to incumbent ATC after originally awarding it to Chicago-based developer Viridon Midcontinent. (See MISO Reassigns Competitive Substation Project to ATC on Data Center Rush.)

The TOs said instead of MISO letting ATC take the lead without delay, the RTO assigned the project to a “nonincumbent developer — one with vanishingly little experience and not even authorized to operate in Wisconsin.”

The TO coalition added that it seeks “prospective relief limited to MISO and SPP” and isn’t asking FERC to rescind any projects that MISO or SPP already awarded to developers or reverse in-the-works solicitation processes.

MISO said it is reviewing the complaint and will file its response at FERC in the coming weeks.

Pro-competition Group Calls Complaint ‘Tone Deaf’

In an April 7 statement, the ETCC condemned the complaint and said it flies in the face of the Ratepayer Protection Pledge and President Donald Trump’s executive order to reduce anti-competitive regulatory barriers.

The organization said its data show that six recent winning bids in SPP reduced costs on average by 21% from the RTO’s estimate, and eight MISO winning bids lowered the RTO’s cost estimate by an average of 38%.

“The complaint is tone deaf to the electricity affordability crisis facing Americans. Suspending competition for five years in MISO and SPP would expose consumers in these regions to unchecked cost escalation for years, guaranteeing higher utility bills,” ETCC Chair Paul Cicio said. “MISO and SPP competitive transmission projects have been shown to have a better track record of adhering to cost containment and completion schedules than noncompetitive projects. A moratorium would move us backward at precisely the wrong time.”

ETCC said it will urge the U.S. Department of Justice to review the complaint.

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RFF Report Says 1.5-degree Climate Target No Longer Possible

Too many emissions are baked in to the atmosphere for the world to limit global average temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius, which was the target for the 2015 Paris Agreement, Resources For the Future said in its Global Energy Outlook 2026 report.

The report summarized and compared eight reports with 14 forecasts on energy and the environment out to midcentury from groups and companies such as the International Energy Agency, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, BP and ExxonMobil. RFF harmonized those results to provide an apples-to-apples comparison, Senior Research Associate Emily Joiner said during a webinar April 7.

The scenarios include six baseline projections in which current trends continue, six based on announced policies and two ambitious climate scenarios where warming is held to 2 C by the end of the century.

“It’s evident from current emissions trajectories and still peaking emissions that the world will exceed 1.5 C of warming, and because of this, we chose to exclude 1.5 C scenarios this year,” Joiner said. “Second, global energy demand continues to grow strongly, with projections of generation to 2050 being revised upwards over the past few years of outlooks. Third, as electricity demand has grown, so too has the demand for electricity generated from coal, leading to a slower-than-previously-predicted transition away from the fuel.”

There is some variation in the numbers, but the report notes that the world has either already reached the 1.5-degree target, or it will soon.

“In the last three years, global temperatures averaged between 1.44 and 1.55 C above preindustrial levels,” the report said. “Although average temperatures could temporarily recede due to natural fluctuations in Earth systems, it is clear that the world cannot meet its 1.5 C goal.”

The fourth major trend is how different parts of the world are diverging, with the report splitting it into the west (the Americas, Europe, and Russia and its Commonwealth of Independent States) and the east (the rest of Asia, Africa, the Pacific and the Middle East).

Coal in the U.S. is getting a boost from the Trump administration and the growing demand for electricity. Emergency orders under Section 202(c) of the Federal Power Act are keeping about 21 GW of plants open, while plant owners have announced $175 million for upgrades to other plants, making them more likely to stay open, the report says. By 2050, cumulative carbon emissions from longer-lived coal could be 4,125 million metric tons by midcentury, which is equal to almost 90% of U.S. emissions from 2024.

“While the east and west consumed similar amounts of coal at the turn of the century, by 2024 the east used almost six times more,” Joiner said. “Coal declines in both regions under all scenarios, but the pace varies pretty widely.”

China and India are still building more coal plants than they retire, but projections are for China’s coal use to drop by midcentury, while India’s shows some growth in the next decade before leveling out. The studies RFF tracks in the report have revised their forecasts for Asian coal use upwards since 2024.

Power demand globally has been growing this century, and that trend is expected to continue for the next quarter century.

“From 2000 to 2024, world power generation roughly doubled,” the report says. “Over the next 25 years, growth ranges from a low of 59% … to more than doubling again under ambitious climate scenarios.”

Renewables are projected to make up most of that growth, with wind and solar accounting for 40 to 72% of world electricity generation by 2050. Nuclear generation grows under all scenarios, but the projections vary widely, from 31% to doubling under the ambitious climate scenarios.

While the world is not going to limit climate change to 1.5 C, and net-zero emissions by 2050 also is off the table, the goal was always going to be a stretch even when it was hatched at the 2009 U.N. Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, RFF CEO Billy Pizer said.

“Even when we were talking about 1.5 degrees in 2009, we knew it was very aspirational,” Pizer said on the webinar. “It was going to be very difficult to achieve. I would also just note, you know, the 1.5-degree target, or the 2-degree target, those were always sharing the stage with net zero, at least over the last decade, as a way to articulate what we really mean.”

The world is at a dynamic place for climate negotiations and activity, he added. The report was released as the Iran War continues, and it is unclear how long the disruption to global oil and gas flows will last.

Climate negotiators are unlikely to revisit the 1.5 C target anytime soon, especially given that it is existential for some island nations, University of Michigan professor Jennifer Haverkamp said.

“I don’t think it would be the best use of the negotiators’ time and energy to be trying to revise the targets now,” she added. “Maybe some years from now, after we get past the Iran War and the Trump administration and figure out just how big an issue AI is for electricity demand, countries might want to revisit it.”

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PGE Asks Oregon PUC to Approve $1.9B PacifiCorp Deal

Portland General Electric has asked the Oregon Public Utility Commission to approve its proposed $1.9 billion purchase of PacifiCorp’s Washington assets, saying the deal paves the way for continued investments in the Pacific Northwest.

The deal, which is subject to state and federal regulatory approval, was first announced in February 2026. PGE submitted its application with the PUC April 3. (See PGE to Acquire PacifiCorp’s Wash. Operations for $1.9B.)

Under the agreement, PGE would set up a new Washington utility to purchase three PacifiCorp generation facilities, 4,500 miles of transmission and distribution lines, and a 2,700-square-mile service territory containing about 140,000 electricity customers concentrated in Yakima, Walla Walla and nearby areas, according to PGE’s application (UP 443).

The new utility goes by the working name Gem and would be a separate corporate entity from PGE, which will own 51% of the company, with Manulife Investment Management holding the balance.

PacifiCorp’s approximately 150 employees will be offered employment with Gem after the deal closes, PGE said.

In written testimony, Sujata Pagedar, PGE senior director of rates and regulatory affairs, said the deal is part of PGE’s efforts to tackle affordability pressures, reliability requirements, wildfires and the integration of clean energy resources.

The purchase “reflects the movement toward consolidation in the utility industry over the past decades,” Pagedar said. She noted utilities have “experienced strong demand and evolving policies that require significant investment in infrastructure.”

“Combined with steady increases in operating costs, utilities face financial pressure on cash flows, balance sheets and credit metrics,” Pagedar wrote. “The strategic combination of two operating utilities in the Pacific Northwest will enable PGE and Gem to attract the capital needed to finance capital investments on favorable terms in the future.”

The facilities include the 477-MW gas-fired Chehalis Power Plant, as well as the Goodnoe Hills and Marengo wind farms, rated at 94 MW and 234 MW, respectively.

The service area includes 84% residential and 16% commercial and industrial customers, according to the application.

Pagedar said the transaction would not impact PGE’s upcoming participation in CAISO’s Extended Day-Ahead Market (EDAM).

PGE and PacifiCorp are among the utilities that withdrew from the first “binding” season of the Western Power Pool’s Western Resource Adequacy Program (WRAP). They exited after voicing concern that participants in SPP’s alternative day-ahead market Markets+ would gain outsized influence because WRAP is a program requirement for Markets+.

Both utilities have backed development of an alternative RA program geared toward non-EDAM participants. (See Pathways’ ROWE Could Offer Western RA Program, PGE Says.)

“A regional resource adequacy framework that is under development offers a market-aligned approach to providing sufficient power supply across the region, reducing the need for redundant resources, lowering costs, and improving system reliability during extreme weather events or unexpected outages,” Pagedar noted in the written testimony.

Pam Sporborg, PGE’s director of transmission and markets, is also co-chair of the West-Wide Governance Pathways Initiative’s Launch Committee. The initiative was created as an independent organization to oversee CAISO’s energy markets.

In separate testimony, PGE Senior Director Treasurer Christopher Liddle said the combination of PGE and Gem would “serve a greater number of customers, gaining size and greater geographic and earnings diversification due to Gem’s operations in another state.”

“As a larger company, funds invested in any given capital project will represent a smaller proportion of overall company assets and capitalization,” Liddle said. “The combined companies will gain a larger, experienced workforce to share across systems.”

“This is a targeted step toward ensuring the continued delivery of safe, reliable power to our nearly two million customers in the West and Intermountain West,” PacifiCorp CEO Darin Carroll said. “This will improve the company’s financial stability while simplifying our operations to support our long-term commitment to customers in each of our remaining states.”

PGE asked the PUC to approve the transaction on or before March 1, 2027.

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Constellation Asks FERC for PJM Tariff Waivers for Crane

Concerned its restart of the former Three Mile Island nuclear plant could be constrained for years, Constellation Energy is asking FERC for waivers to parts of PJM’s Open Access Transmission Tariff.

Constellation’s March 31 request to FERC (ER26-2028) entails transferring capacity interconnection rights from Units 3 and 4 at its Eddystone Generating Station near Philadelphia to Unit 1 at Three Mile Island near Harrisburg, which it renamed the Crane Clean Energy Center.

As it stands, numerous regionally planned transmission projects must be completed before Crane can be fully deliverable, Constellation said.

Those projects have scheduled in-service dates as late as December 2030 but many of them already have experienced years of delays and could be delayed further, Constellation said.

Constellation has moved the expected completion date for Crane forward to the second half of 2027, and Constellation CEO Joe Dominguez said during a March 31 conference call with financial analysts that the company still expects to meet that goal despite the potential delays outlined in the FERC filing.

“I want to assure you we are working on that with PJM, and we continue to expect to start this unit in ’27,” he said.

The subject was not raised again during the call, either by Constellation officials or by analysts.

A company spokesperson elaborated April 7 via email:

“The Crane restart remains on track for the second half of 2027, and we continue to expect to be able to deliver energy to the grid at that time. While PJM projected 2031 for full deliverability of the facility based on the preliminary results of its first phase interconnection study, Constellation is actively engaged with various parties, including our utility partners, to evaluate a range of potential options to move that schedule forward.”

A PJM spokesperson said: “PJM recognizes the urgency of bringing new generation online as quickly as possible. We expect to clear up to 30 GW of projects for interconnection this year, including Crane. We are committed to connecting resources quickly and safely while maintaining the reliability of the grid and the integrity of the interconnection process.”

As of April 7, the PJM Independent Market Monitor and The New Jersey Division of Rate Counsel had motioned to intervene on the request in the FERC docket.

Constellation in its request to FERC noted the transmission projects identified as contingent facilities were planned and approved before Constellation asked PJM to include Crane in its Reliability Resource Initiative, the effort to expedite interconnection of new capacity in a market with potential capacity deficits looming. (See PJM Selects 51 Projects for Expedited Interconnection Studies.)

These contingent facilities include hundreds of miles of new 500-kV and 765-kV lines that are as far away as West Virginia and have a timeline stretching to December 2030, Constellation wrote.

Rather than wait for the work to be completed, the company is requesting a tariff waiver to remove Eddystone 3 and 4 from capacity resource status and a waiver allowing it to transfer Eddystone’s capacity interconnection rights to Crane.

Eddystone 3 and 4, each about 50 years old, had been scheduled for retirement May 31, 2025, but U.S. Department of Energy 202(c) orders have kept the two 380-MW gas/oil units online. (See DOE Extends Eddystone Emergency Order Through May.)

However, DOE specifically directed that the Eddystone units are not considered capacity resources and makes the case for transferring its capacity interconnection rights, Constellation pointed out.

Constellation added the waivers it seeks entail no known harm to third parties, no delay to PJM Transition Cycle No. 2, no effects to other projects and no market power concerns — the Independent Market Monitor already determined there were no market power concerns from deactivating Eddystone 3 and 4.

“Simply put, this is a Goldilocks opportunity,” Constellation wrote. “These circumstances present a one-time opportunity for the commission to ensure that more than 800 MW of baseload, dispatchable capacity can support customers and the grid as quickly as possible.”

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Company Briefs

GM Idles EV Plant, Temporarily Lays off 1,300 Workers

General Motors is idling its Factory ZERO EV plant in Detroit until April 13, extending downtime ​that began March 16, the ​company said.

“Factory ZERO will temporarily ⁠adjust production to align EV production with ​market demand,” a GM spokesperson said. The temporary ​layoff affects 1,300 workers.

More: Reuters

Google, Microsoft Seek Gas Plants for Data Centers

Google and Microsoft are looking to secure natural gas resources to power data centers.

Google is partnering with Crusoe Energy to build a 933-MW gas plant in Armstrong County, Texas. The plant would be built on the site of the Goodnight campus and would operate off grid to provide energy to at least two buildings. It is the third known gas facility in Texas that Google has become involved in over the past few months.

Microsoft signed a “letter of intent” in March to secure nearly 1.4 GW from a microgrid project in Mason County, W.Va. The developer, Nscale, said it plans to deploy hundreds of gas generators by the first half of 2028. The deal marks the first time Microsoft has committed to a fully off-grid, gas-powered data center at gigawatt scale.

More: The Guardian; Latitude Media

Pattern Energy Purchases Clean Power Producer Cordelio

Pattern Energy, a U.S. developer of renewable energy and transmission infrastructure, finalized the acquisition of Cordelio Power, a renewable independent power producer with 1.55 GW of assets.

Cordelio Power has a gigawatt-scale portfolio of operating and in-construction wind, solar and storage capacity in the U.S. and Canada. The assets, along with most of the company’s wind and storage development projects, will become part of Pattern Energy’s nearly 12-GW operating and under-construction fleet.

More: Renewables Now

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Federal Briefs

Renewables Grew to Nearly 50% of Global Capacity in 2025

Renewable power made up almost 50% of the world’s electricity capacity in 2025 following a record ‌increase in solar installations, according to data from the International Renewable Energy Agency.

Global renewable capacity reached a record ​5,149 GW at the end of 2025, up 692 GW from 2024. The growth was led by a leap in solar capacity, which grew by 511 GW in 2025 to 2,392 GW. There were 159 GW of new wind installations, taking the total installed capacity ​to 1,291 GW.

The data show ​the annual growth rate in ​renewable capacity in 2025 ⁠rose to 15.5% compared to 15.1% in 2024. Renewable groups in 2025 said meeting COP28’s renewables target by 2030 would require annual growth of ​16.6% from 2025-2030.

More: Reuters

U.S. LNG Exports Break Record as Middle East War Disrupts Supply

U.S. ​exports of LNG rose to an all‑time high in March as plants ran above nameplate capacity and ‌new units started up, according to preliminary data from financial firm LSEG.

Exports in March climbed to 11.7 million metric tons, up from 9.94 million tons in ​February, and surpassed the previous monthly record of 11.5 million tons set in December 2025.

More than 1 million tons of LNG that departed in March is currently signaling for orders or idling near the entrance to the Suez Canal.

More: Reuters

Interior Department Offering Another Round of Buyouts

The Interior Department is offering its staff another round of buyouts and early retirements.

A department press release announced it “will be offering another deferred resignation program as well as another opportunity for voluntary early retirement.” No other information was released.

More: The Hill

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State Briefs

REGIONAL

New England States Commit to Exploring Nuclear Energy

The governors of Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire and Rhode Island released a joint statement committing to exploring advanced nuclear energy technologies to meet the region’s electricity needs.

The group directed state energy offices to work together to pursue financing structures, federal funding opportunities, public-private partnerships and regulatory designs for nuclear opportunities. 

More: Maine Morning Star

ALABAMA

Gov. Ivey Signs Bill Giving Governor More Control over PSC

Gov. Kay Ivey signed a bill that will give the governor significantly more power over the Public Service Commission.

The bill will expand the PSC to seven members, allow Ivey to appoint four new members this summer and direct the next governor to create a secretary of energy to supervise the commission. The PSC will not be able to hold a rate hearing until 2029 unless the secretary of energy or five of the seven commission members call for it.

More: Alabama Reflector

GEORGIA

Georgia Power Says Toxic Coal Ash Costs Increasing

Georgia Power said it will cost at least $500 million more than its previous estimates to clean up toxic coal ash ponds across the state. 

In a report filed with Public Service Commission, Georgia Power said “several market factors” have driven up costs from $8 billion to $8.5 billion. The utility said it already has spent $2 billion cleaning up 29 coal ash ponds in 11 sites across the state.

More: The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

MONTANA

PSC: NorthWestern Doesn’t Have to Release More Info in Merger Case

The Public Service Commission approved a staff recommendation to reject motions to compel NorthWestern Energy to provide details about its planned service to data centers as part of its proposed $15.4 billion merger with Black Hills Corp.

The Montana Farmers Union and 350Montana made the requests for information, saying NorthWestern couldn’t show it isn’t going to harm consumers in the merger without providing details about its plans to meet 1,400 MW of new data center load. NorthWestern argued details about data centers weren’t relevant to whether the PSC should approve the merger.

More: Daily Montanan

NEVADA

Judge Upholds BLM Approval of Rhyolite Ridge Lithium Mine

U.S. District Judge Cristina Silva upheld the approval of the Rhyolite Ridge Lithium-Boron Project.

Conservation groups argued the mine would threaten an endangered wildflower and fish native to Nevada. Silva ruled the Interior Department took a sufficiently “hard look” at the impacts of the mine on Tiehm’s buckwheat and Fish Lake Valley tui chub and “reasonably found” the project would “not result in unnecessary or undue degradation of Tiehm’s buckwheat.”

More: Nevada Current

NV Energy’s Peak Demand Charge Postponed until Jan. 1

The Public Utilities Commission voted to postpone NV Energy’s new peak demand charge until Jan. 1.

The charge, which will be based on a customer’s highest 15-minute period of usage each day, was set to go into effect April 1 and would have been tested during the high-consumption summer months. NV Energy filed a request with the PUC on March 10 to delay the charge until Oct. 1, saying it was busy refunding customers who were overcharged for more than two decades and that it needed more time to educate customers about the new charge.

The utility intends to provide customers with comparisons in May and August of their bills with and without the demand charge, based on usage in April and July.

More: Nevada Current

OHIO

FirstEnergy Bribery Case Ends in Hung Jury

Following eight days of deliberations, Summit County Common Pleas Judge Susan Baker Ross announced the FirstEnergy bribery case centering around former CEO Chuck Jones and former Senior VP of External Affairs Mike Dowling has ended with a hung jury.

One juror said at different times for different charges, the jury was roughly 8 to 4 toward conviction. At others, it was close to 10 to 2.

The state can either retry or end the case. Attorney General Dave Yost said the state plans to retry the case.

More: Signal Ohio

OREGON

PUC Approves Pacific Power, PGE Rate Hikes

The Public Utility Commission approved rate increases for Pacific Power and Portland General Electric.

PGE rates will increase by 5% (around $8/month for the average customer), while Pacific Power’s customers will see a 3% increase (more than $4/month).

The increases went into effect April 1.

More: Oregon Capital Chronicle

TENNESSEE

State Proposes Oak Ridge as Nuclear Lifecycle Innovation Campus Site

Gov. Bill Lee announced the state submitted a proposal to DOE asking for Oak Ridge to be the site of a Nuclear Lifecycle Innovation Campus.

According to DOE, the proposed campus would support the creation of nuclear power through every stage of the process. In January, the agency asked state governments to submit information on potential locations. In its proposal, Tennessee said it had “the most comprehensive nuclear ecosystem in the U.S.” including “fuel fabrication, enrichment, reprocessing, advanced separations and recycling of used nuclear fuel.”

More: WATE

TEXAS

Supreme Court Ends Lawsuits Against Generators over 2021 Winter Storm

The Texas Supreme Court ended lawsuits against power generators from Texas residents and small businesses who lost electricity during the 2021 winter storm.

The Supreme Court provided no insight into why it ended the five separate appeals. Four of the nine justices did not participate in the ruling. The appeals sought to challenge a ruling from the state’s First Court of Appeals that dismissed the cases for having “no basis in law or fact.”

Regional utilities claimed the storm was to blame for the damages, not deficiencies in their own actions.

More: The Texas Tribune

WISCONSIN

We Energies Considering Keeping Coal Plant Open

We Energies said it is considering keeping the two units at its Oak Creek coal plant open into 2027.

The units were scheduled to be shut down in 2023 before being delayed again to 2025 and 2026.

The company said it wants to ensure reliability before shutting the units down and is waiting for two natural gas plants to come into service.

More: Milwaukee Journal Sentinel 

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Don Moul to Retire After 1 Year as CEO of TVA

Tennessee Valley Authority CEO Don Moul notified the TVA Board of Directors on April 3 that he would retire July 1, 2026.

“The board appreciates Don’s service to TVA, its employees and the people of the Tennessee Valley region,” Chair Mitch Graves said in a statement. “Under his leadership, TVA has had strong operational and financial performance delivering reliable, affordable, American energy that helps communities across our seven states prosper.”

Moul joined TVA as its COO in mid-2021 and was promoted to president and CEO in April 2025. His tenure has been marked by tension with President Donald Trump, who fired three of the six sitting members of the nine-person board in spring 2025, eliminating the chance of a quorum, then nominated four new members.

To submit a commentary on this topic, email forum@rtoinsider.com.

Most recently, Trump had vowed to make Moul’s life “miserable” and issued a memorandum in March directing the board to set total annual individual employee compensation at a $500,000 maximum.

Trump’s dissatisfaction with the TVA spans a few issues. During his first term, he proposed a partial privatization, but Congress was not receptive to the idea. In his second term, Trump wants TVA to expedite nuclear power development and halt coal-fired power plant retirements.

Some people were concerned the nominees would renew Trump’s push for privatization, but they denied any such intentions. (See Nonprofits Warn of Potential TVA Privatization Ahead of Board Hearings and Trump’s TVA Nominees Reject Privatization.)

The Senate confirmed the nominees Dec. 18, and they joined the board Jan. 12, re-establishing a quorum.

On Feb. 11, the board voted unanimously to revoke TVA’s previous decision to retire 11 units at two coal plants. (See TVA Cancels Decisions to Close 2 Coal Plants, Cites Growing Demand, Trump Tone.)

Trump apparently remained unhappy with Moul, however.

When former CEO Jeff Lyash announced in early 2025 that he would retire, Tennessee’s Republican senators worried that his successor would be chosen from within and would not move nuclear development forward sufficiently quickly. The board did promote Moul from within but said an external and internal search preceded the move.

Trump sacked the board chair the day after TVA announced Moul’s appointment.

A 10-K report filed by TVA on Nov. 13, 2025, listed Moul’s 2025 salary at $1,000,923, but it indicates other streams brought his total compensation to $5,710,167.

Trump called this excessive and noted that as president, he is paid only $400,000 a year.

The Tennessee Valley Authority Act of 1933 stipulates that compensation for all TVA employees “shall be based on an annual survey of the prevailing compensation for similar positions in private industry.” Trump’s memo directed the board to, “as appropriate and if consistent with its annual survey, adopt and implement policies” to cap the CEO’s salary at $500,000.

Other large utilities in the Southeast pay their CEOs base salaries in the same range as Moul’s but provide much more in total compensation:

    • Duke Energy CEO Harry Sideris received $13.7 million in 2025; his predecessor, Lynn Good, got $21.3 million and $20.6 million in 2024 and 2023.
    • Florida Power & Light CEO Brian Bolster got $9.2 million and $9.6 million in 2025 and 2024. (John Ketchum, CEO of parent company NextEra Energy, got $24.2 million and $21.6 million.)
    • Southern Co. CEO Chris Womack got $19.3 million, $16.7 million and $14.2 million in 2025, 2024 and 2023.

The head of the TVA typically is the highest-paid federal employee. During his first term, Trump had attacked Lyash’s multimillion-dollar compensation package.

Lyash, who became CEO of TVA in April 2019, received $10.5 million in total compensation in 2024 and 2023, his last two full years in that role. He received $6.8 million in 2025.

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New England TOs Seek Stay of ‘Astonishing’ Refund Obligations

Eversource Energy and Avangrid have asked FERC to pause refund obligations stemming from the commission’s recent order cutting the return on equity for New England transmission owners and requiring the companies to issue extensive refunds (EL11-66, et al.).

The order on March 19 reduced the TOs’ base ROE from 10.57% to 9.57%. It set an Oct. 16, 2014, effective date, which coincides with the previous effective date for the 10.57% base ROE overturned by the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. FERC also required the TOs to issue refunds for a 15-month period following the date of the original 2011 petition that triggered the ongoing regulatory proceeding. (See FERC Cuts ‘Ping-ponging’ ROE for New England Transmission Owners.)

In a filing submitted April 2, Eversource and Avangrid estimated that the regionwide refund obligations would total about $1.5 billion, including interest.

“The magnitude of the required refunds is astonishing,” they wrote.

They estimated the refund obligations would total about $880 million for Eversource and about $203 million for Avangrid. The companies are the two largest TOs by mileage in the region and also own the two largest distribution networks.

They argued the refund requirements would “cause immediate and irreparable harm” to themselves, their investors and energy consumers. The obligations would hurt the companies’ financial liquidity, cost of capital and stock prices, and would lead to “operational instability, including risks to system planning and investment if funds must be diverted abruptly to pay refunds,” the companies wrote.

Eversource CFO John Moreira said the refund obligation “requires utilities to raise and carry a massive, unplanned financial liability and fundamentally disrupts liquidity, credit metrics, capital planning and investor confidence.”

“Higher borrowing costs and constrained access to capital increase the long-term cost of service and place upward pressure on customer rates,” he said.

The companies argued that processing the refunds while regulatory and legal challenges are underway would create risks of volatility on customers’ electric bills.

“Rather than providing durable customer benefits, immediate refunds followed by later recovery would subject customers to fluctuating charges that are difficult to predict, budget for or understand,” they wrote.

In contrast, state officials and consumer advocates applauded FERC’s ruling as a win for customers.

“This decision makes clear that utilities should not be allowed to make exorbitant profits on the backs of ratepayers, and that those profits should go back in people’s pockets where it belongs,” Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey (D) said.

The state estimated the refunds would return about $900 million to New England ratepayers.

Massachusetts Attorney General Andrea Joy Campbell said the decision “reflects years of work to challenge excessive transmission profits and deliver meaningful relief.”

Tina Bennett, CEO of PowerOptions, a nonprofit energy-buying consortium, said FERC’s decision to cut the ROE “confirms what we argued all along — that regulated returns must track actual financial conditions, not outdated assumptions.”

While the utilities may appeal, “the broader outcome is clear: ratepayers are better protected,” she said.

Extension Request

In a separate filing on April 2, the New England transmission owners and ISO-NE asked FERC for an extension to the time allowed to complete the refunds.

The commission’s order included just a 30-day period to complete the refunds. The TOs and ISO-NE asked FERC to extend the refund deadline until Dec. 13, 2027, and the deadline for the refund report until Feb. 1, 2028.

They argued that the complicated nature of calculating and issuing the extensive refunds makes the 30-day timeline infeasible.

“The refunds must be processed on three tracks: regional, Schedule 12C and local rates,” they noted. “Each track involves different billing entities, sequencing requirements and reconciliation steps, further compounding the complexity of implementing refunds over such an extended historical period.”

Debbie DiFiore of ISO-NE said in an affidavit that “the proposed refund schedule represents the fastest timeline under which ISO-NE can calculate and administer the refunds, provided that the [New England TOs] submit the necessary information in a timely manner and in the agreed-upon format.”