The Energy Realities Team of Dr. Nemeth, David Blackmon, and Stu Turley was in rare form this morning. In this roundtable discussion, three energy experts examine the perfect storm of policy decisions, geopolitical conflicts, and ideological commitments that have created a global energy crisis. Hosted by Stu Turley of Energy News Beat, with guests Dr. […]
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September 18, 2026, the North Carolina Utilities Commission denied Duke Energy Progress a Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity for a new natural-gas simple-cycle combustion turbine at the Sherwood H. Smith Jr. Energy Complex in Richmond County. The denial is without prejudice, meaning Duke can refile. The message, however, is clear: data-center load forecasts and […]
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The official line since the energy crisis has been simple. Families and businesses are exposed because fossil-fuel prices are set internationally. After the latest Middle East shock, ministers said Britain had to “get off the fossil fuel rollercoaster” and that “when global gas prices spike, people here shouldn’t be picking up the tab.” Ofgem and […]
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If the latest Colorado Public Utilities Commission findings surprised anyone, they have not been watching the grid. On September 26, 2026, The Denver Post reported that Xcel Energy’s Colorado customers are losing power more often and for longer periods than they did from 2015 through 2023—and that the pattern continued through the first half of […]
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The U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Electricity announced on September 24, 2026, that it intends to help fund 31 grid-improvement projects across 26 states under the Speed to Power through Accelerated Reconductoring and other Key Advanced Transmission Technology Upgrades (SPARK) initiative. The package totals $5.25 billion—$1.9 billion in federal funding and $3.35 billion in […]
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TC Energy’s Columbia Gas Transmission (TCO) declared force majeure Thursday after an unexpected mechanical issue on the Mountaineer XPress (MXP) system forced an immediate pressure reduction on Line 100 between the Mt. Olive Compressor Station in Jackson County and the Saunders Creek Regulator Station in Cabell County, West Virginia. The restriction takes the MXPSEG MA42 […]
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Mercedes-Benz is no longer talking about “transformation.” It is talking about survival in Germany. WirtschaftsWoche, citing three people familiar with the talks, reports that Mercedes wants about €800 million in German labor-cost savings — roughly $911 million at current rates. Options on the table include longer hours without extra pay, cuts to holiday and Christmas […]
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Europe spent a decade congratulating itself for pushing coal to the edge of the power system. Then it priced itself back onto the fuel it spent political capital destroying. Benchmark Dutch TTF gas prices spiked above €80 per megawatt-hour this month, the highest in three years, after the Iran conflict choked LNG shipments through the […]
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On Thursday, September 24, 2026, Bloomberg reported that Oracle sent a force majeure notice to the developer of Project Jupiter — the 1,400-acre AI campus in Doña Ana County, New Mexico — in an effort to defer payments if the facility misses its planned 2028 in-service date. Shares of Oracle fell about 4–5%. Blue Owl […]
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The wind industry is approaching a structural inflection point. Early fleets in Europe and the United Kingdom are aging faster than advertised, composite blade waste is outrunning recycling capacity, and decommissioning liabilities are coming due just as subsidy structures change. Two recent posts by Peter Clack capture the twin problems: rapid performance decay well short […]
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