Opinion
The latest opinion pieces by industry thought leaders
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America’s new power barons: Who will rule the AI-grade megawatt megasector?
The winning model will be hybrid: gas for firmness, renewables for optics and cost, and storage for stability, writes NOVUS Energy Advisors’ Emily Easley.
Emily Easley • Jan. 15, 2026 -
Retrieved from Gregory Cooper/National Renewable Energy Laboratory.
Why winning the AI race requires systems intelligence, not just electric capacity
The future won’t belong to the nations with the most generating capacity, but to those with the best grid coordination, writes Evan Caron, co-founder of Montauk Capital.
Evan Caron • Jan. 14, 2026 -
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America’s energy innovation crossroads: Why federal investment matters now
Meeting the United States’ energy challenges will require a federal investment of $25 billion for Department of Energy R&D by 2030, writes Clean Tomorrow Senior Director of Policy Evan Chapman.
Evan Chapman • Jan. 13, 2026 -
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Building security into energy infrastructure by design is lower cost and more effective
Data centers and their energy partners would be wise to ramp up cybersecurity efforts to match the pace of development, writes Leo Simonovich of Siemens Energy.
Leo Simonovich • Jan. 12, 2026 -
Courtesy of GE Vernova
How VPPs can help data centers connect to the grid faster
Virtual power plants can be developed quickly to satisfy data center demand, but reaching the scale required to meet soaring load growth will require new commercial models, according to RMI.
Jesse Cohen, Mark Dyson and Lauren Shwisberg • Jan. 8, 2026 -
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The next-gen retail energy mix: Aligning supply portfolios with customer expectations
Retail energy providers must move beyond managing kilowatt-hours and toward orchestrating portfolios that reflect both the realities of modern supply and the values of modern customers, writes Tamara Grose of VertexOne.
Tamara Grose • Jan. 7, 2026 -
Permission granted by Base Power
Programmatic alignment is key to scaling residential battery demand response
Utilities, battery manufacturers, technology providers and customers all operate under different incentive structures, writes Uplight’s Sneha Vasudevan.
Sneha Vasudevan • Jan. 6, 2026 -
Permission granted by LeFrak
Rooftop solar is booming, but not in the communities that need it most
Prioritize community-led promotions and education strategies to have far-reaching impacts, writes Planno CEO Daniel Domingues.
Daniel Domingues • Jan. 5, 2026 -
Mario Tama via Getty Images
Using scenario modeling to address uncertainty in the clean energy transition
Scenario modeling and forecasting gives us the ability to answer multiple “what-ifs” and explore many futures before committing to one, making it a crucial tool during the energy transition, writes Kaushik Telgaonkar.
Kaushik Telgaonkar • Dec. 23, 2025 -
Mario Tama via Getty Images
What the Western REC registry shake-up means for corporate clean energy
The process of rebuilding the Western Renewable Energy Generation Information System creates near-term uncertainties and risks, Roger Ballentine of Green Strategies writes.
Roger Ballentine • Dec. 22, 2025 -
Ron Jenkins via Getty Images
Energy evolution: Meeting the demands of an AI-powered world
By pairing human expertise with AI-driven insights and forging collaborations across industries, we can build an energy ecosystem that is reliable and affordable for all, EPRI’s Remi Raphael writes.
Remi Raphael • Dec. 19, 2025 -
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Hybrid heating: A bridge to decarbonization or a road to obsolescence for gas utilities?
Combining heat pumps with gas furnaces can help manage winter peaks, lower energy costs and cut carbon emissions. But this approach requires well-structured regulatory frameworks and cost-recovery mechanisms, West Monroe experts write.
Andrew Biondi, Margaret Oloriz and Estelle Mangeney • Dec. 18, 2025 -
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New role for nuclear power emerges in New York energy plan
New York’s recently-approved energy plan indicates that new nuclear power plants could lower the cost of reaching a carbon-free power system by 2040, Clean Air Task Force advocates write.
Kasparas Spokas and John Carlson • Dec. 17, 2025 -
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Coordinating short-, ultra-long-duration storage unlocks maximum clean energy value
The United States needs to integrate short-duration energy storage with multi-day storage to build a secure, reliable grid, Noon Energy’s Aric Saunders writes.
Aric Saunders • Dec. 16, 2025 -
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Thermal batteries are ready. Our electricity rules aren’t.
Exposing thermal batteries to real-time market signals would help lower system costs and strengthen America’s manufacturing base and AI infrastructure, write Katherine Hamilton and Isaac Brown of the Thermal Battery Alliance.
Katherine Hamilton and Isaac Brown • Dec. 15, 2025 -
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CCS generation projects are coming. New ways to track and claim their emissions must follow.
Clean energy buyers need a mechanism to claim the low-carbon attributes of carbon capture and storage to advance this method of reducing CO2 emissions from electric generation, NorthBridge Group experts write.
Iain Kaplan and Gustaf Michaelsen • Dec. 12, 2025 -
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To power the AI revolution, we need a grid built for speed
Advancing AI requires utility incentive reforms that value digital upgrades like advanced metering and distributed energy resource management systems, Schneider Electric’s Jeannie Salo writes.
Jeannie Salo • Dec. 11, 2025 -
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Permitting reform is critical to meeting our AI moon shot
Congress can either deliver durable permitting reform or continue outsourcing America’s future to Moscow and Beijing, writes Tim Tarpley, president of the Energy Workforce & Technology Council.
Tim Tarpley • Dec. 10, 2025 -
Certainty through transparency: A new planning paradigm for data center loads
To keep pace with accelerating digital demand, we need utility frameworks that are more transparent, more flexible and more responsive, Stack Infrastructure’s Tim Hughes writes.
Tim Hughes • Dec. 9, 2025 -
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The SPEED Act is an opportunity to align permitting policy with grid reality
Reform is overdue, and the House deserves credit for pushing it forward. But Congress should apply it to multistate transmission in its entirety, not in bits and pieces, says Christina Hayes, Grid Action executive director.
Christina Hayes • Dec. 5, 2025 -
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Google just backed carbon capture tech for data center energy providers. Will other tech giants follow?
The fast-growing electricity demands of data centers could be a game-changer for carbon capture technology in the U.S. power sector, say experts from the Payne Institute at the Colorado School of Mines.
Anna Littlefield, Simon Lomax and Morgan Bazilian • Dec. 4, 2025 -
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Why wireless monitoring belongs in every utility’s security plan
Monitoring the radio frequency spectrum closes blind spots, supports critical infrastructure protection and speeds incident response, writes Brett Walkenhorst of Bastille, a security company for wireless communication.
Brett Walkenhorst • Dec. 3, 2025 -
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Solving PJM’s data center problem
The grid operator must stop buying capacity for new data centers. Instead, it can provide them with only interruptible service until they bring their own capacity, write Tom Rutigliano and Claire Lang-Ree of the Natural Resources Defense Council.
Tom Rutigliano and Claire Lang-Ree • Dec. 2, 2025 -
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Beyond new wires: The untapped path to grid resilience
The fastest, most affordable path to resilience lies in maximizing distributed energy resources already in homes and businesses, and incentivizing more installations, Uplight’s Hannah Bascom writes.
Hannah Bascom • Dec. 1, 2025 -
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Data centers are breaking the old grid. Let AI build the new one.
Utilities that embrace artificial intelligence will set reliability and affordability standards for decades to come, writes Hari Vasudevan, founder and CEO of KYRO AI.
Hari Vasudevan • Nov. 26, 2025
