Weather Guard Lightning Tech
US Grid Strain, Possible Allete Sale
Allen discusses the strain on America’s largest power grid due to data center demand, Taiwan’s $3 billion wind farm project, the potential sale of Allete and new data center regulations in Ohio.
Sign up now for Uptime Tech News, our weekly email update on all things wind technology. This episode is sponsored by Weather Guard Lightning Tech. Learn more about Weather Guard’s StrikeTape Wind Turbine LPS retrofit. Follow the show on Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Linkedin and visit Weather Guard on the web. And subscribe to Rosemary Barnes’ YouTube channel here. Have a question we can answer on the show? Email us!
America’s largest power grid is under serious strain. Data centers and AI chatbots are using electricity faster than new power plants can be built.
PJM Interconnection covers thirteen states from Illinois to Tennessee and Virginia to New Jersey. The company serves sixty seven million customers. This summer, electricity bills could jump more than twenty percent in some areas.
The region has the most data centers in the world. Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro is threatening to pull his state out of the grid entirely. Recently, PJM’s CEO has announced he’s leaving and PJM Board members have been voted out.
PJM spokesman Jeffrey Shields says the problem is simple economics. “Prices will remain high as long as demand growth is outstripping supply. Right now, we need every megawatt we can get.”
The grid lost more than five point six gigawatts in the last decade. Old power plants shut down faster than new ones come online. Meanwhile, data center demand keeps growing. By twenty thirty, PJM expects thirty two gigawatts of increased demand. Almost all of that will come from data centers.
Ørsted has secured three billion dollars in financing for a major wind farm project in Taiwan.
The Greater Changhua Two project will supply clean energy to over one million households once it’s fully operational. The wind farm sits thirty to thirty seven miles off Taiwan’s coast.
Taiwan wants twenty percent of its electricity to come from renewable sources by twenty twenty five. This project is a critical step toward that goal.
Ørsted plans to sell part of its ownership stake after the project is completed. This strategy lets the company recycle money into new projects while keeping operational control.
Allete is one step closer to being sold. The Minnesota Department of Commerce has withdrawn its opposition to the six point two billion dollar deal.
Canada Pension Plan Investment Board and Global Infrastructure Partners want to buy the company. Allete runs Minnesota Power and Superior Water, Light and Power of Wisconsin.
The sale still needs approval from the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission. That’s the last hurdle before the deal can close.
The new owners have agreed to several customer protections. They’ll freeze rates for one year and reduce the company’s allowed profit margin. They’ve also promised fifty million dollars in additional clean energy investments.
AEP Ohio has won approval for new rules that protect customers from data center costs.
The Public Utilities Commission of Ohio approved the plan on July ninth. Large data centers will now have to pay for at least eighty five percent of the electricity they sign up for, even if they use less.
AEP Ohio President Marc Reitter says the rules align data center demand with infrastructure costs. “This infrastructure will support Ohio’s growing tech sector and help secure America’s data storage facilities here in the U.S.”
The requirements will last twelve years, including a four year ramp up period. Data center owners must also prove they’re financially able to meet their obligations.
RWE has extended CEO Markus Krebber’s contract until twenty thirty one. The early extension adds another five years to his current agreement.
Krebber has led the German energy company since twenty twenty one. He joined the company in twenty twelve and became an Executive Board member in twenty sixteen. The Supervisory Board praised his leadership during the energy crisis and his work positioning the company for future growth.
That’s this week’s top news stories, join us tomorrow for the Uptime Wind Energy podcast.
https://weatherguardwind.com/grid-strain-allete/
The substance of the meme here is correct; Florida public schools require comprehensive K-12 instruction on the history and dangers of communism, following a series of legislative moves and curriculum standards. The updated “History of Communism” curriculum is rolling out for the 2026–2027 school year, mandating that students learn about the “brutal realities” and (the catastrophic) global impact of communist regimes.
When I was a schoolboy in the 1960s and early 1970s, we came to learn that all efforts to establish a viable communist nation had failed, but our teachers were not shackled as to what they could teach and how they could teach it. As a result, we came to a variety of helpful viewpoints, and these are what I offered my own kids as they were growing up, e.g.,
- “Men are not angels,” as my sixth-grade social studies teacher explained. Those who do not need to work in order to survive can simply goof off.
- Yet idleness is averse to most people’s psychological needs to be an active and productive person, and member of society.
- Power corrupts, and absolutely power corrupts absolutely. Democracy prevents the accumulation of a pathological amount of power on the part of any one leader. (This was assumed to be true until Donald Trump’s second term.)
- If Lenin (a butcher) hadn’t had Trotsky (a compassionate intellectual) assassinated, the entirety of the USSR would have turned out completely differently.
- If the U.S. hadn’t, through its embargoes, made it impossible for Cuba to offer its people a decent quality of life, their revolution may have succeeded and brought forth a new way of thinking.
- There are examples of smaller scale societies in which the ideals of communism work out very nicely, e.g., the Israeli kibbutz.
- We read and discussed at length a book called “Social Ideals and Ideal Societies” in which these concepts were analyzed fairly and in great depth.
Now, will the typical American schoolchild turn out better if he’s cut off from thinking critically about all this and forced to accept the mantra that “communism = evil?” The typical Florida Republican would say the answer is an obvious yes, but most intelligent people would dispute that.
Producing educated people who can think for themselves is an idea quite opposed to the ongoing control of a population.
To the author of the meme here, I say: It’s safe to say that most folks in Trump’s MAGA base are stupid, though one needs more than a low IQ to fit into this segment.
In particular, we mustn’t omit mean-spiritedness. People who are kind, compassionate, decent and tolerant of others are grossly unqualified to be rank-and-file Trumpers.
Trump appeals to two groups of constituents: a) a small group of billionaires who lavish him with campaign contributions in exchange for huge financial favors, and b) a large number of poorly educated white people who call themselves Christians–the so-called MAGA base.
Trump has little if any appeal to everybody else: honest, fairly well-educated people of a variety of ethnicities and religious affiliations.
For Trump, staying in power means making sure that there is a minimum of leakage away from the MAGA base. That requires barraging these people with messaging to the effect that the president is the only thing standing in the way of communism/socialism, open borders, the invasion of Muslims, godlessness, teaching our little children about LGBTQs, critical race theory, choking environmental regulation, and whatever else may be on the radical left’s agenda.
Maintain this chasm means not letting up on the propaganda for a single minute. No nuance, no critical thinking, no considering what we’ve learned from history–just constant bombardment.
-
Climate Change1 year ago
Guest post: Why China is still building new coal – and when it might stop
-
Greenhouse Gases1 year ago
Guest post: Why China is still building new coal – and when it might stop
-
Greenhouse Gases2 years ago嘉宾来稿：满足中国增长的用电需求 光伏加储能“比新建煤电更实惠”
-
Climate Change2 years ago嘉宾来稿：满足中国增长的用电需求 光伏加储能“比新建煤电更实惠”
-
Climate Change2 years ago
Bill Discounting Climate Change in Florida’s Energy Policy Awaits DeSantis’ Approval
-
Renewable Energy10 months agoSending Progressive Philanthropist George Soros to Prison?
-
Greenhouse Gases1 year ago
嘉宾来稿：探究火山喷发如何影响气候预测
-
Carbon Footprint2 years agoUS SEC’s Climate Disclosure Rules Spur Renewed Interest in Carbon Credits