Harrisburg, pa. – Facing the projections of the energy demand of the increase, US states are pressing ways to build new power plants faster as policy formulators are increasingly concerned about protecting their residents and economies from increasing electrical invoices, energy cuts and other consequences of being left behind in a great technology in a race for electricity.
Some states are hanging financial incentives. Others are getting rid of decades of regulatory structures in what they frame as a breed to meet the basic needs of residents, avoid a catastrophe and maintain their economies on the road in a society that quickly electrifies.
“I don’t think we have seen anything like this,” said Todd Snitchler, president and CEO of the Association of Electric Power Supplies, which represents the independent owners of energy plants.
The increase in the demand for electricity is being promoted, in large part, by the artificial intelligence race as technology companies are Taking real estate and energy search to feed their hungry data centers. Federal incentives to rebuild the manufacturing sector are also helping to boost demand.
In some cases, Big Tech is arrangement Your own energy projects.
But energy companies are also looking for ways to capitalize on the opportunities provided by the first major increase in electricity consumption in a couple of decades, and that is to face state political leaders with each other for new jobs and the investment that comes with new power plants.
The movements of the states come as a fossil fuel – friendly President Donald Trump and Congress controlled by Republicans take power in Washington, DC, reducing regulations around oil and gas, impulsedrilling opportunities and encourage the construction of pipes and refineries which can export liquefied natural gas.
The states seek action, with the National Association of Governors asking Congress to be easier and faster to build power plants and criticize the United States as among the slower nations developed in the approval of energy projects.
But there may be less than the federal government can immediately do on a shortage of imminent energy, since green lighting power plants to feed the electricity network are largely the province of regional state regulators and network operators.
The governor of Pennsylvania, Josh Shapiro, wants to establish an agency to accelerate the construction of large power plants and hang hundreds of millions of dollars in Tax exasperations For projects that provide electricity to the network.
The State and the country need more power plants to win the artificial intelligence career and provide reliable and affordable power to residents, Shapiro said, who suggested that Pennsylvania can leave the regional grid operated by the interconnection of PJM in favor of “go alone.”
“He has demonstrated in the last issue of years too difficult to make enough new generation projects due to how slow the PJM tail,” Shapiro said at a press conference on February 27.
Indiana, Michigan and Louisiana are exploring ideas to attract nuclear energy, while Maryland’s legislators are floating ideas about the implementation of the construction of a new energy plant there.
In Ohio, a legislator wants to restrict the influence of electrical services in the hope of giving independent energy producers more incentives to build electrical plants to feed the state rapid technology sector.
The bill, which awaits a vote, won the support of Ohio’s consumer lawyer, the vigilant dog of state residential rates and business groups whose members care about electrical prices. However, he divided the energy sector between companies that operate in competitive markets and those that operate under state monopolies of public services.
In Missouri, public services such as Amen and Evergy, as well as the Missouri Chamber of Commerce and Industry, industry, unions and the main public service regulator of the State are supporting the legislation to repeal an old law of almost half a century that prevents public services from charging customers to build an energy plant until it is operational.
The law was approved in a 1976 voter referendum when states sought to protect themselves against public services from tariff fixing services with advanced financing, potentially swollen, inefficient or, worse, aborted energy projects.
The consumer and environmental groups protested the bill, saying that it would result in new natural gas plants that are more likely to be more expensive for taxpayers.
Last year, similar legislation was almost approved unanimously in Kansas, together with complementary legislation that extends tax exemptions to new electric power plants.
In a matter of months, Evergy announced together with the state leaders who would build two 705 megawatt natural gas plants and said that the legislation “will help Kansas compete with other states for investment and finally save customers money.”
John Coffman, the public services consumption advisor for the Missouri Consumer Council, said public services are interpreting the two states, Missouri and Kansas, with each other and planned to build the electrical plants anyway.
But, he said, “they are only looking for opportunities to squeeze more money from the process.”
Snitchler said that the action is being stimulated by the states that realize that long -standing energy reserves are decreasing, especially as nuclear and coal power plants retire, and now all kinds of energy companies are jumping to the opportunity to earn money.
A trap that sees in the race to build plants is a ruin of the protections that some states once adopted to protect taxpayers and put the risk of building expensive energy projects in corporate shareholders.
“The problem, of course, is that it changes the risk of people who might not be supporting it,” Snitchler said.
A legislator of the State of Pennsylvania, Senator Gene Yaw, wants Mortal winter blackout In 2021.
Yaw, a Republican, has no doubts about Pennsylvania helping to finance electrical plants. Even according to conservative estimates, the State will need dozens more of power plants to meet the projections of the growing demand, he said.
“And what are we underway or planned at this time? Nothing, “said Yaw.” And we have not built anything since 2019. So we have to do something to encourage people to come here and build in Pennsylvania just to keep the status quo. “
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Follow Marc Levy in X in https://x.com/timelywriter.
