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• Electrical line work pays a median salary of more than $95,000 and does not require a college degree. 
• The demand for electricity, driven by data centers, means line workers enjoy job security and union benefits in addition to their salaries. 
• However, the work can be dangerous, with line workers exposed to the elements, heights and thousands of volts of power. 
• Wisconsin Watch visited a pre-apprenticeship program at Northcentral Technical College in Wausau that trains 14 students annually to learn more about the work.

On a sunny morning in late August, a dozen teenagers wearing reflective vests and work boots stand on a hill overlooking the farm fields of their central Wisconsin college.

A few steps away is the classroom where they’ll learn how electricity works. Beside it, a handful of poles six stories tall mark the training yard where they’ll train to install and repair power lines, a skill that’s increasingly in need as Wisconsin’s infrastructure ages and data centers demand ever more energy. 

Today, they’ll try out some of the toughest physical parts of the job — while racing against the clock. 

The students have just 30 minutes to dig a hole 4 feet deep and 2 feet wide. Then they must walk two 100-pound wooden pole chunks down the school’s dirt road and haul a 70-pound piece of wood up a 65-foot pole twice, using only a pulley and their own strength. The student who finishes in the shortest time wins.

This is day three of the nine-month Electrical Power Distribution Program at Northcentral Technical College in Wausau, which prepares about 14 students each year for careers with electric utilities or power line construction companies. 

It’s one of seven such programs at the state’s tech colleges, which together enrolled 265 students in 2025. 

With a median salary of more than $95,000, electrical line work is one of the country’s most lucrative jobs for people without a college degree. It can also be dangerous and draining, as it often involves long days of manual labor, as well as exposure to the elements, heights and thousands of volts of power.

Most of the students in this class were still in high school just a few months ago. By the end of September, they’d begun scaling utility poles six stories tall. Within a year, they could land apprenticeships that pay more than $34 an hour and put them on track to earn union pensions.

It’s instructor Marc Cegielski’s job to make sure they’re ready.

“It is physically demanding. It is mentally demanding, and your work-life balance is probably not going to be very good — unless you want your work-life balance to be more work than not work,” said Cegielski, who spent four years doing line work before he started teaching. He still works as a lineman for several weeks each summer to keep his skill sharp. 

The field of electrical line work is thriving. The country is expected to add 13,600 line worker jobs between 2025 and 2035, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. That’s a jump of 10%, much faster than the average for all jobs. In Wisconsin, the ranks are expected to swell nearly 14% from 2024 to 2034, with about 240 job openings projected each year. The International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) Local 2150, which represents line workers and a variety of other workers in Wisconsin, reports its membership is at an all-time high. 

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One reason for that growth: the explosion of artificial intelligence. 

While the data centers that provide the computing power for all that AI tend to employ relatively few people once they’re up and running, constructing them takes a lot of labor. And it’s not just the work of building the data centers themselves. Hyperscale data centers, designed to be able to scale up their computing power as needed, will need massive amounts of electricity to power their computers, and Wisconsin will need to expand and update its electrical grid to meet the demand. Wisconsin’s first hyperscale data center opened in Mount Pleasant this summer, and others are under construction in Beaver Dam and Port Washington. Proposals for additional centers are under review in other communities, including Kenosha and Wisconsin Rapids.

The new energy demand comes at a time when states finally have the money to strengthen and expand aging electric grids, thanks to the $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill signed into law in 2021. Those funds could help Wisconsin’s electrical infrastructure accommodate more energy sources and rebound more quickly after storms, changes proponents say are needed whether or not the state adds more data centers.

Meanwhile, line workers, like many other tradespeople, have been in increasingly short supply as Wisconsin’s workforce shrinks.  

“There’s never been a better time to get involved in this trade, and the work outlook right here at home in Wisconsin looks awesome for the next 10-plus years,” said IBEW Local 2150 business manager Jim Meyer. 

Risk versus reward

Installing and maintaining power lines is rewarding work, Cegielski said, because workers can see the difference they’re making. Sometimes they turn the lights back on after a storm. And sometimes, they bring electricity to a place that’s never had it, as he and a few students do each spring on the Navajo Reservation. 

“Getting people’s electricity back feels really good,” Cegielski said.

But the job isn’t for everyone. 

Line work involves heavy exertion in all kinds of weather. Machines can handle the tough tasks some of the time, but Cegielski warns his students there are plenty of times when they’ll need to dig or lift by hand because no machine is available, or it’d be too hard to maneuver the machinery — say, in a residential backyard. Plus, if there are buried utilities within 18 inches, mechanical digging is prohibited. 

“You can’t always use a machine. Sometimes you’re the machine,” Cegielski tells his students as they race to dig their holes. He says he’s sometimes spent a whole day digging a single hole, with or without a machine to help.

The students wipe their brows. One slips off his gloves. Cegielski urges them on. “Come on, man. The customer needs their electricity back.” 

With four minutes left on the clock, Sam Volm, 18, unfolds a ruler to check his progress. 

“I’m only about 2 feet deep! This is so crazy,” he says. He’s not alone. None of the holes are nearly deep enough. 

It’s just one example of the challenges of the job. Some line workers work for contractors hired by utility companies to build or maintain their infrastructure. Those workers could be on the road, often out of state, for weeks or months at a time. Line workers employed by local utility companies generally work close to home. Still, many work 12- to 16-hour shifts, and they may need to be available to help on nights or weekends.

“Your phone rings a lot,” Cegielski said. “You’re going to be missing a lot of things that you’d rather be doing with your friends and your family to answer that phone call and get people’s power back on so that they can cook supper, so that they can go to work and earn money for their own families.”

And then there are the safety concerns. Cegielski said he’s never been seriously injured doing line work, but he knows the risks that come from working with high voltage and at high heights, sometimes on busy roads. Electrical power line installers and repairers had the 16th highest fatal injury rate of all U.S. jobs, with an annual rate of around 24 fatalities and 189 nonfatal injuries per 100,000 workers, according to a USA Today analysis of federal data from 2020 and 2021.

Despite the challenges of the job, the training program at Northcentral Technical College consistently has a waitlist. 

For Volm, who’s worked in construction since he was 14, spending his days outside was part of the appeal. 

“You’re not behind a computer or nothing. It’s real physical work, it’s what I’m used to,” Volm said. 

His dad, an electrician, encouraged him to consider line work. Bigger lines mean bigger money, he said, plus he’d get to travel. 

The morning drill didn’t deter him. He’s been wrestling since first grade, so he’s got lots of practice putting his body to the test. 

“It was pretty tough, but I muscled through it, obviously, and embraced the suck.”

College classes not required

Training programs like these are an optional extra step for those looking to enter the field. Line workers get most of their training through apprenticeships that last three to six years and require only a high school diploma. But doing a program like the one at Northcentral Tech first gives students a chance to try out the work before they commit. 

That’s how Pat Keegan, a business agent with IBEW Local 2150, got started in the industry 25 years ago. 

“I’m glad I did it because I got comfortable with climbing and I knew I wanted to do this career,” Keegan said, though plenty of line workers go straight into apprenticeships. 

“I’ve seen people right out of high school, skip the tech school part of it … and have no issues,” Keegan said.

Prospective line workers shouldn’t assume this training will help them get an apprenticeship faster, Meyer said. Instead, they should think of it as a chance to solidify their skills and learn more about things like electrical theory. 

For Cegielski, the Northcentral Tech program is also about teaching the all-important “soft skills” that employers are increasingly looking for, like how to solve problems and persevere through challenges.

Take the August morning’s drill. What the students don’t know is that Cegielski designed the digging portion to be nearly impossible within the time limit.

“I like to observe to see, once they figure out they’re running out of time, do they continue trying, or do they give up? It’s a really good marker of character,” Cegielski said. “Even if they don’t think they can complete the task, they should keep going at it.”

Six other Wisconsin tech colleges offer electrical power distribution programs, but capacity is limited. Graduates earn around $43,000 more a year than the median high school graduate, according to an analysis of earnings data from three of the programs, conducted by Open Campus and The HEA Group. Program cost varies by school but typically runs from $8,500 to $11,000. 

Despite the growing demand for line workers, Northcentral Technical College hasn’t expanded its small program. Cegielski says he hasn’t heard anything about plans to do so. 

“They need more people than I can provide,” Cegielski said, “and I don’t see that changing anytime in the near future … I don’t know if that’s a problem that the technical college system wants to handle or can even handle.”

Leaders at Northcentral Technical College did not respond to a request for comment. 

Kristina Haensgen, a spokesperson for Moraine Park Technical College, which also trains future line workers, noted the “strong and ongoing demand for skilled electrical line workers” but said the school has no immediate plans to grow its program.

Chippewa Valley Technical College, Milwaukee Area Technical College and Southwest Wisconsin Technical College did not offer comment on their line worker training programs. 

If colleges do want to expand these programs, the booming industry might actually make it tougher, said Katy Pettersen, a spokesperson for the Wisconsin Technical Colleges System.

“We have not heard much on this front, other than colleges may be having trouble finding qualified instructors because the companies building the data centers are paying so well.”

Jobs aplenty

Meyer of IBEW Local 2150 said the number of apprenticeships available through his union depends on how much local employers are hiring. In a good year, there could be room for around 170 new apprentices, he said, and it looks like Wisconsin is on track for some good years. Those waiting for an apprenticeship can get jobs as “groundmen” assisting line-working crews until a spot opens. 

Cegielski talks with many of his former students, and he doesn’t think any of them are struggling to find work.

That stands in contrast to many other fields, where AI has left many uncertain about the future. Recent college graduates with four-year degrees are having more trouble finding jobs. Across the country, office workers are wondering if they’ll be replaced by increasingly powerful AI agents, or if they’ll have the skills they’ll need to use ever-more-ubiquitous AI tools. 

“At the moment, it doesn’t seem like AI is knocking at our door to take our jobs,” Cegielski said with a laugh. ”(The work) is hands-on, and it doesn’t look like machines and robots are going to be able to take it in the future. Maybe someday.”

Natalie Yahr reports on pathways to success statewide for Wisconsin Watch, working in partnership with Open Campus. Email her at nyahr@wisconsinwatch.org.

As data centers test Wisconsin’s electrical grid, job opportunities flourish 60 feet in the air is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

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• Wisconsin’s largest utilities are on track to contribute less to political campaigns than in the last two gubernatorial election years, despite the enormous stakes for the state’s energy future.
• Neither Republican Tom Tiffany nor Democrat David Crowley received contributions from utility political action committees through September. 
• Utilities have directed nearly all their campaign contributions toward state legislative races. 
• Democrats are gaining ground in utility fundraising, receiving about 45% of contributions to legislative candidates and fundraising committees this year, compared with less than 20% in 2022.

Wisconsin’s multibillion-dollar energy infrastructure construction boom isn’t fueling a similar deluge of utility-related campaign spending ahead of the election.

The state’s largest utilities are collectively on track to spend less supporting political candidates this year than in the last two gubernatorial election years.

Utility campaign contributions to Wisconsin’s local, state and federal campaigns — and state-level partisan fundraising groups — reached just under $300,000 by late September, down roughly $50,000 from the same point in 2022.

Neither Republican gubernatorial candidate Tom Tiffany nor Democratic candidate David Crowley took in any contributions from the utilities’ political action committees (PACs) between January and September. 

Utilities could still make last-minute contributions before the election, as they have in years past.

Utilities are dialing back contributions despite the influence the next governor and Legislature will wield over the industry. Next month’s winners will appoint and confirm a new majority to the state commission that regulates utilities and weigh in on legislation that could shape Wisconsin’s energy future for decades.

Some industry observers speculate that the mismatch between utilities’ political spending and the election’s ramifications reflect the mounting public hostility to the data center boom — and, by extension, to the utilities themselves. 

“I think utilities are beginning to recognize that their brand is increasingly toxic,” said Jonathan Kim, a Chicago-based researcher for the Energy and Policy Institute, a nonprofit watchdog. As of August, Kim is also the institute’s registered lobbyist in Madison, focusing on residential ratepayer concerns. 

If past ties to utilities put a target on a candidate’s back, Kim added, the companies would have good reason to avoid making direct contributions in hotly contested races. 

Wisconsin isn’t the only state where utility political spending appears to be softening. In Michigan, for example, the state’s largest investor-owned utilities are on track to spend less supporting political candidates this year than they did in the last three midterm cycles. 

The drop in political spending falls short of an all-out retreat in Wisconsin. Utilities have steered nearly all of their contributions toward state legislative contests — and, for the first time in at least a decade, divided their giving almost evenly between Democrats and Republicans. The shift coincides with Democrats’ improved prospects of securing a majority in at least one legislative chamber for the first time since 2010.

How utilities spend on politics

Three companies provide electricity for a majority of Wisconsin households: Alliant Energy, owner of Wisconsin Power and Light; WEC Energy Group, the parent company of We Energies and Wisconsin Public Service Corporation; and Xcel Energy, owner of Northern States Power Company. 

Each company operates separate federal and state political action committees, or PACs. The committees collect voluntary contributions from company executives, employees and shareholders, then distribute those funds to political candidates and organizations chosen by their boards of directors. Candidates can spend donations on their current or future campaigns — or share them with other candidates. They cannot legally spend on personal expenses. 

Can utilities use ratepayer dollars for campaign contributions? (Click to expand)

Wisconsin’s Public Service Commission doesn’t explicitly prohibit it, but utility spokespeople told Wisconsin Watch that their companies do not bill ratepayers for political contributions. We Energies said the same to the state’s Public Service Commission in April.

Voters in Michigan will decide in November whether to prohibit utilities from contributing to state political campaigns entirely.

 Wisconsin law caps how much a PAC can contribute to a given state-level candidate in a single cycle — up to $2,000 for a Senate campaign, for instance, or $86,000 for a gubernatorial campaign. Federal rules similarly limit PAC contributions to individual candidates. Utilities’ federal PACs can give up to $5,000 to a federal candidate.

Utility employees and executives, meanwhile, can donate via employer-sponsored “conduits.” Alliant, WEC Energy and Xcel each sponsor conduits, as do Madison Gas and Electric and the American Transmission Company, Wisconsin’s largest transmission utility. 

Like PACs, conduits serve as pass-throughs for political donations. Unlike PACs, employees choose which candidates receive their donations. The conduit’s sponsor may recommend candidates or races to support, and candidates who receive conduit contributions often also receive PAC donations. 

Conduit contributions appear in campaign finance records under the individual donor’s name. Although state law limits how much individuals may contribute to a candidate, the combined donations routed through a utility’s conduit can exceed the amount a utility’s PAC may give in a single cycle. 

How much have utilities spent on congressional races?

Alliant, WEC Energy and Xcel’s federal PACs gave roughly $23,500 to Wisconsin’s congressional delegation between January and late July.

U.S. Rep. Bryan Steil, facing a competitive race for a district stretching from Janesville to Racine, received $5,000 from Alliant’s PAC in early March — the largest Wisconsin utility contribution to a single candidate this year. Federal campaign finance records show no utility PAC contribution to Steil’s Democratic opponent, Mitchell Berman. 

The state’s utilities have largely steered clear of the high-profile race in Wisconsin’s 3rd District, where incumbent Republican Rep. Derrick Van Orden and Democratic challenger Rebecca Cooke have tried to link each other to data center interests.

Utility PACs have donated to all eight Wisconsinites in the U.S. House in the last decade. But annual donations have plunged from 2016, when the three utilities’ PACs gave over $94,000 to the Wisconsin delegation, primarily to Paul Ryan, who was House speaker at the time.

U.S. Rep. Mark Pocan, the Madison area’s representative in Washington since 2013, hasn’t  received a utility contribution since 2018. 

How much have utilities spent on state races? 

Contributions from the state-level utility PACs and their conduits to Wisconsin legislative candidates and legislative fundraising committees totaled roughly $250,000 between January and September.

Much of the decline in utility contributions from 2022 stems from reduced spending by WEC Energy’s PAC and conduit. 

Democratic lawmakers have received about 45% of utilities’ year-to-date contributions, compared to just under 20% in 2022.

“We work with both sides,” WEC Energy President Scott Lauber told investors on a July quarterly earnings call. “It’s just a matter of how we make Wisconsin successful.”

Taylor Adams, an Alliant Energy spokesperson, said the utility’s political giving is bipartisan and varies from year to year based on the communities and elected officials within its service territory, not partisan preference. Adams added that his company focuses on policies that support “reliable and cost-effective energy.”

Rep. David Steffen, chair of the Assembly Committee on Energy and Utilities, is the top individual recipient of utility dollars, campaign finance records show. He has received roughly $13,655 via utility PACs and conduits this year, accounting for roughly a third of his total 2026 fundraising as of September.

Alliant and WEC Energy’s PACs have already given Steffen’s campaign the maximum $1,000 allowed by state statute for an Assembly candidate in a single cycle. Three WEC executives have done the same through their company’s conduit. 

The Assembly committee’s ranking Democratic lawmaker, Rep. Lisa Subeck, D-Madison, received $3,980.

Sen. Melissa Ratcliff of Cottage Grove, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Committee on Utilities, Technology and Tourism, received $5,250, including $2,000 from Alliant alone — the maximum state law allows for a Senate candidate. Ratcliff is not up for reelection until 2028.

Assembly Majority Leader Tyler August, R-Walworth, has received $7,500 from utilities and their conduits while Senate Minority Leader Dianne Hesselbein, D-Middleton, took in $5,560. With longtime Assembly Speaker Robin Vos set to retire, August is likely among top contenders to become speaker if Republicans keep the majority after Election Day. 

August led Assembly’s Republicans through the two consecutive fights over utility-backed “right of first refusal” (ROFR) bills, which would grant Wisconsin’s transmission utilities first dibs on any electrical grid projects within their territory. Ratepayer advocates argue the proposal would risk driving up electricity prices by stifling competition in the transmission market. 

Speaking at a June WisPolitics luncheon, Hesselbein blamed Republicans for the bill’s failure last session, casting the policy as a means to shore up Wisconsin-based businesses and union jobs.

Chamber leadership and members of the Senate and Assembly utilities committees received over a quarter of all utility PAC and conduit contributions this year. 

That pattern isn’t unusual. Other industry interest groups, including in agriculture, also focus contributions on the committees most relevant to their businesses. 

“Election spending from industry and wealthy special interests is about wanting access and sway over policy agendas that could affect their bottom line,” said Nick Ramos, executive director of the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign. “It’s no surprise that they assess the landscape and find who might have the most impact.”

Some top recipients are less obvious. 

Rep. Tip McGuire, D-Kenosha, has received $4,750 this year — more than many lawmakers on the Assembly utilities committee, despite not serving on it. McGuire is one of four Democrats on the Joint Finance Committee, which drafts the state’s two-year budget.

Other key lawmakers received relatively little this year. Senate utilities committee chair Sen. Julian Bradley, R-New Berlin, received $1,500 from utility PACs and conduits as of late September, and Assembly Minority Leader Greta Neubauer received $1,175. 

Not all utility money reaches lawmakers directly. Utility PACs also contribute to partisan fundraising groups like the Republican Assembly Campaign Committee, which contributes to legislative campaigns. 

Partisan committees also receive contributions directly from the utilities, rather than from their PACs. WEC Energy, for instance, gave $14,000 to partisan fundraising groups between January and June. 

State law doesn’t cap contributions to party fundraising committees. 

“There’s not supposed to be any sort of coordination between donors to the party committee and the campaigns that receive that money,” Kim said, making it difficult to know which candidates ultimately benefit from the utility’s committee contribution.

Scant spending on the governor’s race

About 2% of contributions from utility PACs and utility conduits between January and September flowed directly to gubernatorial candidates — including to candidates who lost their primary. 

Wisconsin hasn’t held an open gubernatorial election since 2010, muddying comparisons with other recent elections. 

Former Republican Gov. Scott Walker collected roughly $269,000 in contributions — not adjusted for inflation — between the launch of his gubernatorial campaign in 2009 and his exit in 2019, including about $86,000 ahead of his 2018 defeat by Democratic Gov. Tony Evers. 

Evers received about $11,000 in utility contributions during that race. Utilities have since contributed roughly $330,000 to his campaign committee.

Ahead of the 2022 election, utilities contributed more than twice as much to Evers as they did Tim Michels, his Republican opponent.

Some gubernatorial spending in 2018 and 2022 came in late October, just after the candidates turned in their final pre-election fundraising reports. 

Utilities haven’t transferred that financial support to Crowley, whom Evers backed during the chaotic final leg of this year’s Democratic primary. Utility PACs have yet to contribute to his or Tiffany’s gubernatorial campaigns.

Tiffany has received roughly $3,600 via WEC and MGE’s conduits while Crowley has drawn none during the campaign. 

Still, both accepted utility contributions during previous runs for office.

Tiffany brought in at least $17,000 from utility PACs and through their conduits over a decade of state legislative campaigns, followed by another $11,500 during and after his U.S. House campaign in 2020.

Crowley’s state Assembly campaign committee raised just over $1,600 from utility PACs and conduits — mostly WEC, which serves households in the Milwaukee district he represented. His Milwaukee County executive campaign committee accepted another $9,900 from WEC’s PAC and via its conduit between 2020 and 2024.

Any additional contributions between Oct. 26 and Election Day will appear on the candidates’ next finance report in January.

Crowley and Tiffany’s visions for the PSC (click to expand)

Both Crowley and Tiffany are picking up the banner of energy affordability, promising to follow through in part via their appointments to the PSC.

“Under David Crowley, the PSC will become a watchdog for taxpayers, ensuring that Wisconsinites’ utility bills stay as low as possible while creating greater transparency in where their tax dollars are going,” Crowley spokesman Philip Schulman wrote in an email. “This includes empowering the PSC to reject rate hikes in favor of cheaper options and publishing a quarterly score card detailing everything from avoided outages to fuel cost savings.”

Tiffany doesn’t shy away from criticizing the current commission, in no small part because of his objections to converting cropland into solar farms. “Day one when I become governor, they will be replaced,” he said at a September town hall in Sauk County, referring to the two acting commissioners — Kristy Nieto and Marcus Hawkins — serving without Senate confirmation.

Utility allies spend more

Utilities share interests with other groups, some of which have poured far more into this year’s governor’s race.

Crowley has received separate $86,000 donations — the PAC cap for a single cycle — from at least four labor groups that often align with utilities on energy infrastructure projects:  International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers PAC, International Union of Operating Engineers Local 139 PAC, Wisconsin Laborers’ District Council and Wisconsin Pipe Trades Association PAC. Two other construction trades unions contributed smaller sums to Crowley’s campaign; a PAC representing a carpenters’ union gave $82,500 and a PAC representing plumbers and steamfitters gave $25,000.

Those unions represent workers who build or operate power plants and transmission lines. The political director of the Wisconsin Laborers’ District Council sits on the board of Fair Rates for Wisconsin’s Dairyland alongside WEC and Alliant representatives.

Tiffany seized on that support in an attack ad that dubbed his opponent “Data Center David Crowley,” citing the labor groups’ vocal support for developing data centers and associated energy infrastructure.

“IBEW certainly supports responsible data center development,” the IBEW state conference vice chair, John Jacobs, wrote in an email. “We also support renewable energy and countless projects that support family supporting jobs, great healthcare, great retirement benefits and a path to the middle class. All priorities of David Crowley – and that’s why we support him.”

Those labor groups had not contributed to Tiffany’s campaign through September. But Robert Marchant, the Wisconsin Data Center Coalition’s sole lobbyist, donated $5,000 in early June. Alliant, WEC and Xcel are founding members of the coalition. 

Spending strategically

Utilities’ spending this year leaves them far behind Wisconsin’s top political donors. Diane Hendricks, for example, has already given exponentially more than utilities in 2026 — all to the Wisconsin Republican Party, which has transferred most to Tiffany’s gubernatorial campaign.

But the companies’ political goals don’t match those of explicitly partisan spenders like Hendricks.

“They just want to be able to wield sufficient political power to get the things that they need,” Kim said. “They’re not going to spend dumb money.”

Despite high stakes for energy future, Wisconsin’s utilities scale back campaign spending — so far is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

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Editor’s note: This story has been corrected to reflect uncertainty about when Consumers Energy will close the J.H. Campbell plant. 

Wisconsin ratepayers may no longer be on the hook to keep a Michigan coal plant running past its retirement date. 

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on Friday overturned a U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) order keeping the 60-year-old J.H. Campbell power plant online. The plant’s operator, Consumers Energy, approached the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission in 2025 for permission to bill ratepayers across the Midwest for the plant’s operating costs.

The Energy Department intervened to block the western Michigan plant’s scheduled retirement last spring, arguing the closure could exacerbate an “emergency” electricity shortfall in the region. Its operator, Consumers Energy, has since spent at least $295 million to operate the plant as the department repeatedly extended its life.

Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers urged Energy Secretary Chris Wright in July to allow the plant to close, citing a projection that Wisconsinites alone could spend $117 million on the facility over “the next few years.” 

Wisconsin’s Citizens Utility Board joined a coalition of ratepayer advocacy groups in a December amicus brief supporting Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel’s lawsuit challenging the extension orders.

The court ruled unanimously for Michigan Friday, questioning the federal agency’s authority to invoke emergency powers to keep the plant open. 

“The Department’s position would empower it to pick its preferred power sources in Michigan — or, presumably, any other state — and order them to operate without regard to the multiple procedural and substantive constraints built into state reliability planning processes,” Judge Cornelia Pillard wrote. 

Nessel applauded the ruling in a Friday press release. 

“By forcing its continued operation, DOE tried a never-before-used tactic to illegally prop up the aging J.H. Campbell coal plant that nobody asked to keep, sticking ratepayers with a bill for a facility that should have been retired more than a year ago,” Nessel said. “I am relieved that the Court saw through this facade.”

Consumers Energy told reporters on Friday it is reviewing the ruling but does not plan to immediately close the plant.

The Energy Department has not made similar efforts to block the retirement of Wisconsin coal plants, though the agency plans to spend $425 million to shore up 13 coal plants in 10 states, at least $19 million of which may be used to extend operations at Alliant Energy’s coal-powered units at the Columbia Energy Center near Portage. 

Meanwhile, Wisconsin ratepayers still owe more than $1 billion in costs tied to retired coal plants. The Citizens Utility Board estimates that We Energies would collect more than $100 million in returns from those retired assets over the next two years under a rate proposal pending before Wisconsin’s Public Service Commission.

Court ruling could spare Wisconsin ratepayers costs of keeping Michigan coal plant open is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

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In Wisconsin, utility Alliant Energy has called off a project meant to reduce power outages in disadvantaged and tribal communities after the Trump administration terminated a federal grant that would have supported it.

In California, the Sacramento Municipal Utility District, which has deployed and upgraded hundreds of thousands of advanced smart meters, has not received any reimbursement from the U.S. Department of Energy for the work since October, when the Trump administration declared it was killing grants that it described as fueling ​“the Left’s climate agenda.”

And in the upper Midwest, a consortium of regional grid operators, utilities and state agencies is still waiting for $464 million in DOE funds meant to help build high-voltage transmission lines to reduce grid congestion — although the agency in charge of the project says the funding will soon be restored.

Across the country, hundreds of such projects to improve grid reliability and make electricity more affordable face a highly uncertain future — the result of Trump administration actions that have slowed the outflow of billions of dollars of DOE funds to a trickle.

Some of those projects in ​“blue states” were targeted as political retribution, as recent reporting from The New York Times has made clear. A handful of grant awardees in this category have won favorable court rulings, and more are seeking legal redress.

But many others are suffering from the DOE’s broader failure to carry out work that Congress has tasked it to do, according to groups that have been monitoring the agency since the start of last year. In red and blue states alike, the DOE is forcing thousands of grantees to undergo a laborious review process, so even projects that have not been officially terminated are stuck, unable to determine when or if they’ll start getting the money they’re owed.

According to an April report from the DOE Alumni Network, a group of former agency employees, the DOE has announced the termination of 356 awards totaling $12.5 billion since January 2025 and has threatened to terminate 303 additional awards worth $12.2 billion.

But the DOE has also stalled projects for ​“a large number of awardees who have never appeared on any list,” the report found. ​“This means the agency is not moving forward to resolve disputes, finalize conditional awards, or respond to continuation applications, leaving projects in administrative limbo and functionally freezing promised funds.”

“DOE both overtly canceled a set of projects, then had this pattern of behavior where for 15 months they stopped actively managing projects,” said one former DOE official. ​“Projects can’t proceed to the next stages and get their next tranche of funding.”

The former official, who asked not to be named, described a pattern of stalling, stonewalling and ​“ghosting” utilities, state governments, energy companies, and nonprofit groups awarded grants under the Biden administration.

Many of those projects have been caught up in a process the DOE announced in May 2025 to review all financial assistance ​“on a case-by-case basis to identity (sic) waste of taxpayer dollars, protect America’s national security and advance President Trump’s commitment to unleash affordable, reliable and secure energy for the American people.”

Then, in October, the DOE announced the ​“termination of 321 financial awards supporting 223 projects” — all of them tied to states that voted for Kamala Harris in the 2024 election. The DOE’s termination announcement came right after Russ Vought, director of the White House Office of Management and Budget, declared in a social media post that the administration would cancel ​“nearly $8 billion in Green New Scam funding.”

Canary Media reached out to a subset of DOE grantees that had won funding from the Grid Resilience and Innovation Partnerships (GRIP) program created by the 2021 bipartisan infrastructure law. The DOE issued a total of more than 100 GRIP grants — in October 2023, August 2024 and October 2024 — for projects to enlarge the grid, harden it against extreme weather, build microgrids to protect vulnerable communities, and deploy technologies to integrate solar, wind, EVs, and batteries.

Some of the GRIP projects involve expanding clean energy and serving disadvantaged communities, two bugbears of the Trump administration. But many more are straightforward grid improvement projects that need federal dollars to reduce the costs borne by utilities and regional or state agencies.

The largest of these is in California. In 2024, the DOE awarded a $630.6 million grant aimed at upgrading more than 100 miles of high-voltage power lines in the state with advanced power cables capable of carrying more electricity along existing transmission corridors, a project estimated to be capable of delivering about $200 million in savings from improved energy efficiency. That project appeared on the termination list in October, and the DOE has not disbursed money for it, according to federal records, though negotiations for resuming funding are underway.

This uncertainty appears to apply to the majority of GRIP projects, according to Emlyn Bottomley, founder of the consultancy High Road Analytics, which focuses on workforce development, and a former Department of Labor deputy policy director in the Biden administration.

According to his tracking of federal spending, of the roughly $11.4 billion in DOE funds obligated to grid infrastructure and resilience — a category that includes GRIP program funds — $9.1 billion remains ​“at risk,” with funding stalled or timelines for completion shortened. That’s compared with $400 million in grants that have been canceled outright and $1.3 billion not yet disbursed but showing no signs of being stalled.

“It’s a shame these projects are being held up or canceled, especially since the case for them is fairly bipartisan — spanning national security, economic competitiveness, and cost and affordability,” Bottomley said.

All of the GRIP projects required partners to provide matching funds at an amount at least equal to the money DOE is providing, the former DOE official added. ​“You’re talking about folks putting hundreds of millions of dollars on the line. People have skin in the game for these awards.”

The costs of losing federal funding

Many of the GRIP grantees contacted by Canary Media declined to comment, citing ongoing discussions with DOE. Others reported that they are no longer pursuing the projects as described in their grant applications, at least not with the help of DOE money.

The latter is the case for Alliant Energy’s Smart Power Automation in Rural Communities (SPARC) project, which won a $50 million grant in late 2024 to add grid visibility and control devices to 140 grid circuits in disadvantaged and tribal communities served by subsidiary Wisconsin Power & Light — a utility in a blue state.

Those devices could allow the utility to quickly find and isolate faults on its grid, cutting power outages in targeted communities by up to 50%. They could also support grid-management software to help integrate more renewable and distributed energy and potentially expand wireless communications access to these remote areas.

Alliant ​“voluntarily withdrew” from the grant award process in April, six months after its grant was terminated by the DOE, Alliant spokesperson Melissa McCarville told Canary Media. The agency has disbursed no funds to the project, according to federal records.

Alliant is ​“actively pursuing many of the goals that were outlined in the SPARC project,” McCarville wrote in a May email, but as part of a 10-year strategic plan with no set timeline. ​“While the grant did provide valuable funding, it also required a significant investment, and we want to ensure our contributions are properly prioritized,” she wrote.

Still, at least one grant-funded project in a blue state is proceeding despite the absence of DOE funds. 

That’s the case for the Sacramento Municipal Utility District, which serves the state’s capital and environs. In 2023, SMUD won a $50 million grant to support a project to deploy 200,000 smart meters and grid devices and underlying software controls to ​“improve grid reliability, resilience, visibility and efficiency,” utility spokesperson Gamaliel Ortiz told Canary Media in an email. 

SMUD has carried out much of that work, which includes close to $100 million in utility spending, and has received almost $33 million in reimbursements from DOE, according to federal records. However, SMUD ​“has not received reimbursement for any costs incurred after the grant was cancelled on October 10, 2025,” Ortiz wrote. ​“We remain committed to this critical work and stay flexible as we evaluate how the loss of grant funding may impact the project timeline.”

In other blue states, some grants have been canceled and others are still under negotiation. In Oregon, utility Portland General Electric has recently learned that the DOE may reinstate a previously terminated $50 million grant to support next-generation ​“grid edge computing” devices, utility spokesperson John Farmer told Canary Media in an August email. That project had received only $1.2 million in DOE funding, according to federal records.

The purpose of the project was to integrate batteries, EVs, and community solar into its grid to ​“improve resilience, enable the integration of distributed energy resources, and maximize customer investments in home energy solutions.”

“PGE is evaluating the benefits and risks of reinstating the grant,” Farmer told Canary Media. The utility ​“recognizes that there are inherent risks of additional and changing demands by the DOE as the administration’s priorities change.”

At the same time, PGE remains in discussion with the DOE on a $250 million grant to build a high-voltage transmission line with the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs, Farmer wrote. ​“Without this funding, we would lose the opportunity to offset those costs with external dollars, which could limit how efficiently we can advance needed grid improvements.”

Red state projects are also being held up because the grantee is located in a blue state. Such is the case of the aforementioned $464 million DOE grant for the Joint Targeted Interconnection Queue project to build new transmission lines between the Midcontinent Independent System Operator and Southwest Power Pool, two grid operators spanning nearly a dozen Midwestern states.

The $464 million GRIP grant was meant to bolster $1.3 billion in matching funds from utilities in the region to enable nearly 30 gigawatts of new generation to be built in Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, and South Dakota. All but one of those states voted for Donald Trump in the 2024 election — but the Minnesota Department of Commerce, the entity awarded the grant, is in a blue state.

In May, the Minnesota Department of Commerce announced that the DOE ​“will honor its $464 million grant,” which will ​“unlock more than $1 billion in additional private investment and provide communities across the region with economic and infrastructure benefits.”

A DOE spokesperson told Canary Media in a July email that the DOE has conducted its review of GRIP projects based on a ​“number of criteria,” including whether it has ​“achieved the milestones set forth in the terms of the award,” whether it ​“remains technically and economically feasible,” and whether it ​“continues to effectuate the purpose of the program or the Department’s priorities.”

The spokesperson added that ​“none of the termination decisions were based on political considerations.” That statement is belied by court testimony reported by The New York Times last month, in which a DOE lawyer stated that none of the October grant terminations were ​“based on any programmatic, statutory, cost-reduction or performance-based factor,” and that all but one of them ​“had a recipient location and/​or at least one place of performance in a state that awarded its electoral votes to Kamala Harris in the 2024 election and has two Democratic-caucusing senators.”

During a series of congressional hearings in April, Energy Secretary Chris Wright stated that the DOE’s review of more than 20,000 grants was almost complete and that more than 80% of grantees had received notice that their awards could proceed as is or with modifications.

But an Alumni Network analysis of DOE data shared with Congress showed that the DOE’s review both failed to restore the vast majority of projects caught up in the ​“blue state” termination action in October and failed to address the hundreds of projects that have never been officially terminated but remain unable to secure funds.

The revelation of the DOE’s explicit targeting of blue states for grant termination spurred 39 Senate Democrats to sign a letter to Wright and Vought demanding the immediate restoration of funding for DOE projects terminated in October.

“Once an Administration begins punishing Americans for how they vote,” the senators wrote, ​“the threat extends far beyond these projects: no state, community, business, or worker can trust that the federal government will apply the law fairly.”

A version of this article was first published by Canary Media.

Trump is blocking billions of dollars of grants that would fix the grid is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

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A major national credit rating agency downgraded Oracle’s rating last week, citing uncertainty about the tech giant’s investments in artificial intelligence. The drop comes just weeks after the company sued Wisconsin’s utility regulator over new credit requirements for data center operators in We Energies territory — a lawsuit spotlighting the company’s financial condition.

S&P Global Ratings, one of the “big three” ratings agencies responsible for assessing the creditworthiness of government and corporate debt, lowered Oracle’s rating from a BBB to a BBB- on July 9. The rating places Oracle on the bottom edge of S&P’s “investment-grade” tier; any additional downgrades will land the company’s credit rating in the “high yield” or “junk” tier. 

“Oracle Corp.’s rapidly expanding AI infrastructure business is increasing its overall credit risk,” S&P analysts wrote in an announcement of the downgrade, pointing to high capital spending, “an uncertain path to profitability” and stiff competition as reasons to be “more cautious” in its approach to AI infrastructure businesses. 

Still, S&P isn’t wholly pessimistic about Oracle’s finances. 

“Despite the stretched leverage and cash-flow profile over the next two years, we expect Oracle to demonstrate consistent improvements toward profitability as capacity comes online and business scales,” the analysts added.

Oracle is co-developing a vast new data center campus in Ozaukee County, and its BBB- credit rating adds a hurdle to its efforts to connect the campus’ servers to the grid.

The reason: new rules for data centers seeking electrical service in We Energies territory. Wisconsin’s Public Service Commission (PSC) recently approved a rate structure for We Energies’ “very large customers” that requires operators like Oracle to pay for the construction of new power plants needed to meet data center energy needs.

But constructing a new plant can cost hundreds of millions of dollars, and any unpaid debts tied to the plants could fall to We Energies’ other customers if a data center operator becomes insolvent.

To shield ratepayers from a potential cost shift, the PSC set a AAA- credit rating threshold for data center operators seeking electric service from We Energies. Companies below the threshold must post steep collateral, either in cash or lines of credit, as a backstop.

For Oracle, that could mean paying $100 million or more a year as a condition of receiving electric service for Port Washington servers.

We Energies asked the PSC in June to reconsider the credit requirements, arguing that the rule unfairly penalizes Oracle based on an overly cautious reading of the company’s financial health. 

“In practical terms, tens of billions of dollars in Oracle’s value would need to be destroyed before creditors or counterparties, such as Wisconsin Electric and its other customers, could experience losses,” the utility’s lawyers wrote. 

The PSC declined to reconsider the requirements last week.

Oracle sued the commission in Ozaukee County Circuit Court as a backup to the reopener request. The company’s lawsuit asks Judge Sandy Williams to “set aside, reverse, and remand” the credit rating requirements, arguing that they aren’t “needed to prevent harm” to We Energies’ other customers or shareholders. 

In a response filed July 9, the commission accused Oracle of trying to dodge regulatory scrutiny. The company seeks “to overturn over one-hundred years of established caselaw and allow it to dictate one-off preferential terms of service with the utility, bypassing Commission oversight altogether,” commission attorneys wrote.

Wisconsin’s Citizens Utility Board (CUB) and renewable energy advocacy group Clean Wisconsin also weighed in this week to support the credit ratings requirements. 

“An investment grade credit rating provides little advance warning of financial difficulties that may worsen rapidly,” CUB attorney Daniel Narvey wrote in a position statement filed Monday in Ozaukee County Circuit Court. “If a data center customer suffered financial distress and had not been required to post collateral, (We Energies) and its other customers could be on the hook for billions of dollars of stranded investments.”

Oracle’s stock value has tumbled by more than 25% in the month since it sued the PSC.

Wisconsin isn’t the only state embroiled in a fight over Oracle’s data center operations. In March, Michigan’s Public Service Commission declined to revisit its approval of an electrical service agreement between utility DTE Energy, Oracle and OpenAI. Michigan’s utility regulator approved the contracts in an expedited, uncontested process that drew criticism from ratepayer advocates and Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel.

Oracle credit rating drops amid Wisconsin fight over data center credit rules is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

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Wisconsin’s largest transmission utility is seeking federal intervention months after the Midwest’s regional grid operator awarded a major project to a startup competitor.

The American Transmission Company (ATC), which owns and operates transmission lines across eastern and central Wisconsin, asked the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) last month to force the grid operator to either redo its bidding process or reconsider earlier bids. 

The request escalates a protracted fight over who profits from billions of dollars in new transmission investments — costs that electricity customers pay through their utility bills — and whether competitive bidding limits those costs. The race to serve energy-hungry data centers has raised the stakes, and ATC’s request is intertwined with plans to connect a massive data center campus in Port Washington to the grid by the end of next year.

The fight to build transmission lines

Wisconsin’s latest high-capacity transmission buildout began in 2022, when the nonprofit Midcontinent Independent Systems Operator (MISO) approved $10 billion in upgrades across the Upper Midwest. Another round of approvals in 2024 brought the total projected price tag to roughly $32 billion. The upgrades are a core part of MISO’s effort to improve grid reliability and connect population centers to abundant electricity from renewable sources, especially from wind farms on the Great Plains.

Included in the buildout are a set of transmission lines and substations circling Milwaukee, stretching south to the Illinois border and north to Fond du Lac and Sheboygan. MISO originally expected the projects to enter service by 2033.

Decade-old federal rules require competitive bidding for multistate transmission projects, and utilities and developers from around the country lined up to compete for a share of the Midwest’s buildout. The winners gain a reliable source of revenue via a fixed “return on equity” — profit per dollar invested — approved by regulators and paid for by electricity customers. 

Supporters of the bidding requirement, including Wisconsin’s Citizens Utility Board, say it forces developers to compete on cost, thereby shielding ratepayers from cost overruns and excessive profits.

But investor-owned monopoly utilities have spent years seeking exemptions from competition, contending that the requirement hinders efficient grid development. 

Those lobbying efforts have paid dividends elsewhere in the Midwest: Minnesota and Michigan, for instance, enacted right-of-first-refusal (ROFR) laws giving local utilities first dibs on any transmission projects within their territory, including those planned by grid operators like MISO.

Utilities argue ROFR laws ensure projects go to the companies best-equipped to complete them: local monopolies with well-established relationships with local labor and regulators. The companies also argue that claims of cost savings from competitive bidding are overblown.

Wisconsin lawmakers have repeatedly rejected ROFR proposals, including one introduced in 2025 by Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, R-Rochester.

Data centers raise the stakes

With no Wisconsin law shielding it from competition, ATC has sought other means to control projects in its territory.

Two months after bidding on the eastern Wisconsin project last July, ATC asked the state Public Service Commission (PSC) for permission to build infrastructure for a planned data center campus in Ozaukee County. Port Washington’s city council approved the campus shortly after MISO signed off on the nearby transmission upgrades.

ATC, which manages the existing local transmission infrastructure, is responsible for ensuring the campus connects to the grid by December 2027. Three of the substations ATC proposed to state regulators would occupy roughly the same locations as MISO’s planned substations, though the data center would require higher-capacity infrastructure on a shorter timeline.

Winning the larger project would allow ATC to meet both needs with one set of substations, but if MISO chose another bidder, the utility said it would still seek state permission to build substations for the data center. 

Instead, MISO initially awarded the project to Chicago-based Viridon, a startup owned by private equity firm Blackstone. Viridon’s roughly $350 million bid was the lowest — just over half of MISO’s estimate and more than $100 million below the next-cheapest bid. In its January announcement, MISO acknowledged the budget “may not be achievable” but cited Viridon’s promises to limit cost overruns and profits as reasons to pick the company over its competitors.

ATC pressed the issue. MISO agreed in February to move up the eastern Wisconsin project deadline to 2027. A month later, the operator reassigned the three substations to ATC outright, citing uncertainty over whether Viridon could clear the administrative hurdles in time to meet the new deadline. 

Viridon kept only a fraction of the original eastern Wisconsin project, including a set of transmission lines and one substation, all still scheduled for completion by 2033.

ATC appeals to Washington

As ATC awaits PSC’s final approval of the eastern Wisconsin buildout, the utility has opened a new front in its fight against competition by asking FERC to step in.

In April, a group of utilities calling themselves the “Grid Acceleration Coalition” asked FERC to exempt at least some major grid upgrade projects from the competitive bidding requirement. The coalition argued that “bureaucratic red tape” can tack months onto project timelines and strain the country’s ability to “achieve dominance” in artificial intelligence. ATC is a member of the coalition, as is Xcel Energy, owner of Northern States Power Company-Wisconsin.

“This complaint is about whether our country will seize, or squander, a generational chance to own the next century,” the utilities wrote, pointing to the tug-of-war over MISO’s eastern Wisconsin project as an example of delays that could stymie AI development.

FERC has been flooded with similar requests as the nationwide data center boom strains grid capacity and spurs utilities to spend billions of dollars on new infrastructure. The fragmented U.S. energy system is poorly equipped to manage the scale of the buildout, and the five-person commission has begun weighing in on questions about speeding grid connections and shielding residential ratepayers from data-center-related costs. 

The Grid Acceleration Coalition’s April request specified that it did not seek to “claw back” projects already awarded via competitive bidding.

ATC’s June complaint goes further. The utility asked FERC last month to either “re-bid” or “reevaluate the existing bids” for MISO’s eastern Wisconsin project, arguing the grid operator botched its earlier review. If FERC agrees, Viridon could lose its remaining portions of the project.

Tom Content of the Citizens Utility Board told Wisconsin Watch that CUB will “support a full evaluation of the process and any concerns,” but said the timing of ATC’s request — months after MISO first awarded the project — was a surprise.

ATC said it brought the issue to FERC rather than appealing to MISO because the commission offers a more neutral venue. The company said it does not know when FERC will decide whether to take up the request. It remains unclear whether ATC’s effort to reopen bidding would delay construction of the substations needed to plug in the Port Washington data center to the grid. 

Correction: A previous version of the story incorrectly described the remedy American Transmission Company is seeking in its petition to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.

Fight over who expands Wisconsin’s power grid heads to Washington is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.