(Updated August 19, 2026, with actual August 18 numbers and latest peak forecasts)The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) continues to brace for a multi-day stretch of extreme heat that is expected to push power demand past the current all-time record of 91.089 GW. ERCOT is forecasting that peak demand will exceed that mark each […]
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How Blue States are lining up to follow the UK and EU into fiscal and energy collapse. We are getting Kathryn scheduled on the Energy News Beat podcast soon. In her August 13, 2026, commentary for The Telegraph, independent energy analyst Kathryn Porter delivers a stark warning: Britain’s National Energy System Operator (NESO) is making […]
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We had Doomberg ready, and the system was overwhelmed, so we rescheduled for tomorrow. How will the US Grid Handle the Cuts to Wind, increased Nat Gas, and can it be maintained? Tomorrow we have the CEO of Jackery Power Solutions and Doomberg stopping by the podcast for two different interviews. We will be covering the home […]
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Texas Governor Greg Abbott’s directive pausing new data center interconnections to the ERCOT grid has placed nearly one-fifth of the entire U.S. data center development pipeline at risk of delays, according to analysis from BloombergNEF (BNEF). The move, announced August 3, 2026, requires a comprehensive audit of energy use, water consumption, financing, ownership, and community […]
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The Wall Street Journal recently highlighted how battery energy storage systems (BESS) are shifting from niche applications to meaningful scale in the United States, with residential deployments accelerating particularly fast. Companies like Base Power are installing home batteries at a rapid clip, and broader market data confirm strong growth in both utility-scale and behind-the-meter segments. […]
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New York City’s lights increasingly depend on a pair of half-century-old floating power plants that were never meant to run this hard. The Gowanus and Narrows barge-mounted generating stations, moored off Brooklyn in the Upper Bay, serve as the city’s last line of defense against blackouts. As intense heat waves and rising demand strain the […]
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Hat Tip to NBC4 Washington and the LinkedIn post by Bethany Boo, which highlighted the story. We covered this on the Energy News Beat Substack. Just before 8 a.m. on Wednesday, July 22, 2026, electricity flickered on and off for roughly 10 minutes across a vast stretch of the eastern United States—from Chicago to Boston […]
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Texas ratepayers are on the hook for a $33 billion high-voltage transmission expansion that critics call a classic power grab—funneling guaranteed returns to transmission monopolies, condemning thousands of acres of private land, and primarily enabling more intermittent wind and solar that many of today’s assets won’t economically or physically outlast another decade. The Electric Reliability […]
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German companies are delaying investments and increasingly eyeing production moves abroad as stubbornly high energy costs erode competitiveness, according to the latest survey from the German Chambers of Industry and Commerce (DIHK). The findings, highlighted in a July 27, 2026 Bloomberg report drawing on the DIHK’s Energiewende Barometer 2026, underscore deepening structural pressures from Germany’s […]
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Back-to-back heat waves sweeping the United States are pushing electricity grids to a tipping point, as temperatures topping 100°F (38°C) drive households to max out air conditioners while a surge in around-the-clock demand from AI data centers and factories shrinks power reserves and strains decades-old transmission equipment. This is emerging as the new normal for […]
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