DTE Energy’s five-year spending plan has increased 20%, boosted by data center demand and reliability investments, officials said Tuesday during the company’s fourth-quarter earnings call.
The company’s 2026-2030 investment plan clocks in at $36.5 billion, up from the $30 billion in investments it identified in its 2025-2029 plan. The increase is primarily to serve data center customers, said President and CEO Joi Harris.
DTE negotiated its first hyperscale data center contracts last year, to provide 1.4 GW of load to power Oracle’s new data center in Saline Township, Michigan. It has another 3 GW of load in advanced discussions that could be finalized in the coming weeks, Harris said. Beyond that, it has a pipeline of 3-4 GW of load that provides upside to the capital spending plan.
Demand from Oracle will ramp up over the next 2-3 years, according to DTE’s earnings presentation. The demand is backed by a 19-year power supply agreement with minimum monthly charges and a 15-year energy storage contract that covers capital investment, it said.
The five-year plan to support the Oracle load includes a nearly $2 billion energy storage investment, the company said.
DTE’s identified data center opportunity is largely unchanged from the total of 8.4 GW it identified last year, which included the Oracle deal.
“Near-term data center growth will create substantial affordability headroom, driving $300 million in annual benefits,” Harris said.
DTE placed 330 MW of solar projects in service in 2025 and has an additional 745 MW under development. The utility also is advancing a 220-MW battery energy storage project, targeting a late 2026 in-service date.
In China Township, Michigan, DTE converted its Belle River unit 1 from coal to natural gas last year, officials said; the second unit is on track for conversion this year. Tax credits that have been safe harbored into 2029 allow the company to “execute investments affordably” while building about 900 MW of renewables per year, on average, over the next five years, they said.
Customers have seen an approximately 90% improvement in outage duration since 2023, the company said. To further those improvements DTE officials say the utility is continuing to install smart grid devices, perform pole-top maintenance, has a robust tree-trimming program and continues to rebuild its 4.8-kV system.
