The federal government has turned on green energy projects. But improved technology and market realities make them competitive.

The post Despite cuts in federal incentives, green energy is growing in Wisconsin  appeared first on WPR.

Gov. Tony Evers and Wisconsin ratepayer advocates are calling on the Trump administration to stop extending the life of coal plants previously slated to come offline.

The post Gov. Evers calls on Trump administration to stop extending life of coal plants appeared first on WPR.

In a recent guest column, I argued that Wisconsin’s clean energy future is about affordability, jobs, manufacturing and economic competitiveness.

The next question is equally important:

How should we build that future?

Not one regulatory docket at a time.

Wisconsin stands at one of the most consequential energy crossroads in its history. Artificial intelligence, advanced manufacturing and electrification are driving electricity demand faster than anyone anticipated. The Public Service Commission’s draft Strategic Energy Assessment projects peak demand could increase by more than 40 percent by 2032, with more than 70 percent of that growth tied to just three proposed hyperscale data centers.

Those investments present tremendous economic opportunities. They also require smarter planning.

Today, the PSC is evaluating the Foundry Ridge and Red Oak Ridge methane gas plants alongside transmission projects, data center tariffs, utility investments, and other major infrastructure. Each proceeding examines a single project. None asks the broader question:

Taken together, are these investments the lowest-cost, lowest-risk path to Wisconsin’s energy future?

Without comprehensive resource planning, regulators have little opportunity to compare alternatives before committing customers to decades of infrastructure costs.

Affordable electricity is economic development.

The decisions made today will determine what Wisconsin families, businesses, manufacturers, and farmers pay for electricity for decades. They will also affect water resources, public health, and our state’s long-term competitiveness.

This is not an argument against growth. Wisconsin will continue to attract investment in advanced manufacturing, artificial intelligence, and data centers. The question is not whether growth occurs, but whether it is planned responsibly so that large energy users pay the costs they create rather than shifting risks onto everyone else.

Planning should begin by comparing complete portfolios of resources instead of evaluating projects in isolation.

Before approving new methane gas plants, regulators should determine whether expanded battery storage, demand response, distributed energy resources, energy efficiency, and additional wind and solar generation can provide the same reliability at lower long-term cost and lower financial risk.

The cleanest megawatt is often the one that never has to be generated.

Demand response is infrastructure. Every megawatt shifted away from peak demand reduces pressure on the grid and can delay or eliminate the need for costly new power plants. Large customers, including data centers, have enormous opportunities to shift demand through operational flexibility and advanced controls.

Battery storage also deserves greater attention. Increasingly, it competes directly with natural gas by providing reliability during periods of peak demand while avoiding decades of fuel costs and emissions.

Water belongs in this conversation as well.

Both data centers and methane gas plants can require substantial water for cooling. The proposed Red Oak Ridge facility alone could consume hundreds of thousands of gallons each day. In rural Wisconsin, where farms, private wells, trout streams, wetlands, and local economies depend on reliable water supplies, those impacts deserve careful scrutiny before permits are approved.

Natural gas will likely remain part of Wisconsin’s energy mix during the transition. But every new gas plant also commits customers to decades of fuel-price risk driven by commodity markets, pipeline constraints, extreme weather, LNG exports, and geopolitical uncertainty. Clean energy resources, by contrast, have no fuel costs and are often the lowest-cost, fastest-to-deploy options available.

Reliability and clean energy are not competing goals.

Modern planning can deliver both.

Wisconsin should also modernize its regulatory framework by evaluating the cumulative impacts of related infrastructure investments. Generation, transmission, data centers, water use, and utility planning are interconnected. They should be planned together, not approved one docket at a time.

Wisconsin has everything it needs to lead: world-class manufacturers, innovative businesses, skilled workers, abundant renewable resources, productive farmland, and a clean energy economy that already employs more than 75,000 people.

Wisconsin does not have an electricity shortage.

It has a planning challenge.

Planning reduces costs. It improves reliability. It protects water resources. It strengthens economic competitiveness.

Most importantly, it allows Wisconsin to build an energy system designed for 2050, rather than one modeled in 1990.

Instead of approving Wisconsin’s energy future one docket at a time, let’s build it through one comprehensive plan.

Reading Time: 3 minutes

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.

Reading Time: 4 minutes

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.

Consumers are unlikely to see any relief in gas and electric bills as utilities proposed more than $18 billion in rate hikes across the country over the first half of the year.

The consumer advocacy group PowerLines reported that utilities asked regulators for a record $9.2 billion in cumulative rate increases during the second quarter of this year. Those requested rate increases could affect more than 56 million U.S. customers.

Utilities in Southern states requested the largest increase in rates, totaling $4.5 billion across more than 26 million customers. 

Consumers in the Midwest face $2.7 billion in requested rate hikes across 14 million customers, while nearly the same amount of Western customers face $1.5 billion, PowerLines reported.

Most Americans get their electricity from utilities that must seek state consent for rate changes, with appointed or elected state boards approving price structures. 

The report, released Tuesday, comes as millions of Americans are already struggling to afford rising electricity bills: One in six American households are behind on utility bills, according to the National Energy Assistance Directors Association. 

Public outcry over rising utility prices has pushed state regulators and lawmakers to consider rate freezes, additional energy assistance funds or new rates targeting large energy users such as data centers. 

Regulators often approve increases at lower rates than requested by utilities, so state officials will determine what additional costs are passed onto consumers. But PowerLines notes regulators rarely outright reject rate requests. Its analysis of 2025 rate requests, for example, found just two of 83 requests were rejected, though half were still pending at the beginning of this year.

Since 2021, electric and gas utilities have accelerated the speed at which they ask regulators for new price increases, the report said. 

PowerLines found that electric company Oncor in Texas requested the largest rate increase of the quarter, with a $1.2 billion request, part of its 5-year investment plan to meet demand from oil and gas companies and data centers. 

Dominion Energy in Virginia sought $1.5 billion across three rate requests, including a $1.1 billion request in unrecovered fuel costs. In Michigan, DTE Energy and Consumers Energy have requested about $500 million each in rate increases. 

“With more than $18 billion in requests already on the table for 2026, regulators face mounting pressure to scrutinize utility spending plans while balancing the infrastructure investments that a modernizing grid genuinely requires,” the report concluded.  

The Edison Electric Institute, which represents the nation’s investor-owned electric utilities, says its members are focused on keeping energy reliable and affordable. Drew Maloney, president and CEO, pushed for permitting reforms at an energy summit last month, saying as much as a quarter of consumer bills are driven by “regulatory bureaucratic red tape.”

But Maloney acknowledged that energy costs are part of broader affordability concerns facing American consumers. 

“We understand that energy costs are a component of that,” he said, “and every one of our members has programs that help people that need different relief from their electrical bills.” 

Stateline reporter Kevin Hardy can be reached at khardy@stateline.org.

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, a Democrat, issued an executive order Tuesday that puts a moratorium on the construction of large-scale data centers.

The pause, which will last up to a year, is the nation’s first statewide ban on data centers, which have drawn increasing concern from lawmakers and citizens based on their impact on electricity prices and the energy grid.

“As data center development threatens to hike up utility bills, deplete our natural resources, and create uncertainty for New Yorkers, it’s my responsibility to take action and lead,” Hochul said in a statement.

Technology companies have invested billions of dollars to build data centers all across the country, driven in part by the computing demands from artificial intelligence.

In her executive order, Hochul directed the state Department of Public Service to issue no new permits for large-scale data centers for a  year. During that period, the agency will conduct an environmental analysis on the impacts of data centers, along with a proceeding to “require data centers to either pay more for their energy or supply their own.”

New York lawmakers passed a more extensive data center moratorium last month, but Hochul has not said whether she will sign the bill.

Maine Gov. Janet Mills, also a Democrat, vetoed a measure earlier this year that would have been the first statewide data center ban.

In a news release, Hochul also directed the state’s economic development agency to develop a framework that local communities can use to negotiate with tech companies that seek to construct data centers. That framework will focus on infrastructure improvements, child care investments, direct financial support and labor and wage standards.

She also announced plans for a fund that would require data centers to invest in New York’s grid infrastructure and clean energy supply. And she called on lawmakers to repeal the state’s sales tax exemptions for large data centers.

Across the country, data centers have drawn vocal opposition at local public meetings and in state capitols. Several cities and counties will vote on ballot measures this year to restrict the development of new data centers.

Stateline reporter Alex Brown can be reached at abrown@stateline.org. 

A pair of environmental groups filed a lawsuit Friday in Ozaukee County Circuit Court alleging that the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources skipped a required environmental review process at the request of the company that is building a massive data center in Port Washington. 

The lawsuit, filed by Midwest Environmental Advocates on behalf of the Sierra Club, alleges that the DNR backed off from requiring an environmental impact statement  after the company, Vantage, said it would “kill the project.” 

Communications between data center representatives and DNR staff, obtained by the groups through open records requests, showed Vantage complaining about the EIS requirement. The DNR ultimately conducted a more limited environmental analysis summary. 

Vantage, Oracle and OpenAI are currently constructing a $15 billion hyperscale data center in the community. The data center will cover 672 acres and in its first phase require 1.3 gigawatts of power. 

In the lawsuit, the groups argue that by not conducting the full environmental impact statement, the DNR ignored the potential impacts of the construction and operation of the massive data center on the local wetlands, water supply, air quality and energy demand. The lawsuit states that failing to conduct the full review before granting permits for the data center violates Wisconsin’s Environmental Policy Act.
“The Port Washington data center is unlike anything Wisconsin has seen before,” Elizabeth Ward, director of the Sierra Club’s Wisconsin chapter, said. “It will completely transform the local landscape, consume staggering amounts of electricity and water and significantly increase fossil fuel emissions. At a time when scientists warn that greenhouse gas emissions must be reduced to avoid the worst impacts of climate change, we cannot afford to be making long-term decisions that move us in exactly the opposite direction.”

The DNR permitting is not the only legal dispute the project is currently facing. Earlier this year, the state’s Public Service Commission instituted a tariff that outlines how data center companies must pay for the required energy use and compels them to put up a large amount of collateral for necessary infrastructure improvements. The tariff is designed to insulate regular Wisconsinites from seeing their energy bills increase or being left to cover the costs of massive upgrades to the grid if a company fails or abandons the project. 

Oracle has argued it doesn’t have enough funds to meet the collateral requirements and appealed to the PSC to reconsider. This week, the PSC declined that appeal, setting up a legal battle over the tariff. 

A DNR spokesperson said the agency couldn’t comment on active litigation.

Reading Time: 4 minutes

Wisconsin’s Public Service Commission (PSC) has no plans to reconsider We Energies’ request to loosen credit rating rules for data center developers. 

The commission voted in April to require data center developers with below-threshold credit ratings to provide financial guarantees before receiving electric service from We Energies. Ratepayer advocates say the requirement shields other customers from financial risk if a data center operator can’t afford to pay for infrastructure built on its behalf. 

That requirement could cost tech giant Oracle, the co-developer of a Port Washington data center campus, over $100 million per year. We Energies asked the PSC to reconsider the rule last month, arguing that the added cost could dissuade other companies from operating in Wisconsin.

The three-member commission has until Friday to act on the request. The commissioners did not include the request on Thursday’s meeting agenda, and, as of Thursday evening, had not scheduled a Friday meeting to consider it. State law requires the commission to notify the public of  scheduled meetings at least 24 hours in advance. 

The PSC will instead defend the credit rating requirements in Ozaukee County Circuit Court, where Oracle sued the agency last month.

Guardrails

Commissioners approved the credit rating rules as one of several guardrails in We Energies’ new “very large customer” rate structure to prevent cost shifts from data center developers to the utility’s other customers. 

The new rate structure requires We Energies to bill data center customers alone for power plants built to serve them. A single power plant can cost hundreds of millions of dollars — or, in the case of the proposed Red Oak Ridge plant in the town of Paris, more than a billion dollars. If a data center developer goes bankrupt, We Energies’ other customers could be on the hook for any remaining costs tied to the power plants. 

With that worst-case scenario in mind, the PSC set a credit rating threshold for data center developers seeking We Energies electric service. Credit ratings measure a company’s financial health and likelihood of repaying debts on time. Developers with credit ratings below A- must provide financial guarantees to receive service. Those financial guarantees would help cover costs if a developer runs into financial trouble. 

Wisconsin’s Citizens Utility Board and other ratepayer advocacy groups supported the “belt-and-suspender” approach to protecting smaller customers.

Exemption sought for Oracle

Oracle, a Texas-based cloud computing giant, currently holds a BBB credit rating — a tier below the A- threshold but still considered investment-grade by ratings agencies. The company’s aggressive borrowing in support of its artificial intelligence ventures pushed Oracle’s debt-to-equity ratio above 400% as of May, and its stock price has tumbled more than $50 in the past month alone.

The PSC-approved rate structure would require the Oracle subsidiary involved in the Port Washington project to provide more than $100 million a year in cash deposits or letters of credit to receive We Energies service.

“If the Commission does not reopen its decision on this issue, the implications for Wisconsin would be significant and limit the ability of numerous investment-grade companies to invest in Wisconsin,” We Energies wrote in its June 10 request that the PSC reconsider the credit rating rules. 

The utility urged the commission to exempt companies with “investment-grade” credit ratings, including BBB ratings, and to waive the Oracle subsidiary’s financial backing requirements. 

We Energies maintains that concerns about Oracle’s credit-worthiness are misplaced. 

“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 attorneys wrote in their petition.

Friday’s deadline is the commission’s last chance to act on the request, but We Energies doesn’t expect any last-minute action. 

“We are disappointed the commission chose not to revisit the financial support requirements under our Very Large Customer rate,” We Energies spokesperson Brendan Conway wrote in an email to Wisconsin Watch on Thursday. “We believe updating the financial support requirements will help ensure the policy meets the goal we all agree on: protecting customers while supporting jobs and economic growth in Wisconsin.

The environmental advocacy group Clean Wisconsin, on the other hand, applauded the commissioners.

“The Public Service Commission did the right thing when it created this special rate structure for AI data centers, and it’s doing the right thing now by rejecting the petition,” Brett Korte, the nonprofit’s attorney, wrote in a Thursday press release. “This is about protecting We Energies’ other customers — families, small businesses, schools, manufacturers — and shielding them from the risks associated with these enormous energy users.”  

Oracle is asking the Ozaukee County Circuit Court to intervene.

In its June 19 lawsuit, the company argues the commission acted outside its authority and without sufficient evidence to justify the rule. Oracle also maintains that the A- threshold isn’t “needed to prevent harm” to We Energies’ other customers or shareholders.

Microsoft’s questions

Also absent from the PSC’s agenda this week: a request from Microsoft to “clarify” parts of the data center rate structure.

Microsoft, the developer of the new data center campus in Mt. Pleasant, asked the PSC last month about the impact of potential changes to federal rules dictating how transmission utilities spread the construction costs of new infrastructure. 

The five-member Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) — not the Wisconsin PSC — has jurisdiction over how utilities allocate transmission costs.

The data center boom will require new transmission infrastructure, and FERC has yet to develop new rules to assign the cost of those projects to data center developers. The American Transmission Company, Wisconsin’s largest transmission utility, signaled this spring that it plans to ask FERC to approve a new cost allocation model.

In the meantime, Wisconsin’s PSC approved what commissioner Christi Nieto called a “temporary stopgap measure.” We Energies passes transmission costs to customers based on their electricity use, and the commission-approved rate structure sets a floor for data centers’ transmission bills based on projected electricity needs.

Microsoft argues that the possible federal rule changes create enough “ambiguity” to merit reconsidering how it will be billed for transmission costs after FERC considers new options.

The PSC also had until Friday to act on  Microsoft’s request.

This story was updated July 10 to include information about Microsoft’s We Energies rate structure.

Wisconsin regulators refuse to loosen data center credit rules, setting up Oracle court fight 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.

The typical We Energies customer using 660 kilowatt hours of energy per month is paying $144 each month for that power, according to Wisconsin Public Service Commission data. That bill is far higher than most other people in the state and has increased substantially in recent years. 

Frustration with rising energy bills, increasing skepticism about investor-owned utilities, anxiety over the growth of data centers and fears about the rising cost of living led Milwaukee city officials last month to hold a meeting aimed at kickstarting debate about municipalization — the process of a local government taking over utility services. 

In late June, Milwaukee’s Public Transportation, Utilities and Waterways Review Board held its first meeting since 2023 to discuss a city-owned electric utility. 

There are dozens of municipal-owned utilities across Wisconsin providing residents with their water and power. Up north, Superior is in the midst of its own debate over acquiring the local water utility. 

“The overarching concern and preference for municipalization is that there are no shareholders and hence no need for the elevated profits that the investor-owned utilities all receive,” Tom Content, executive director of the Citizens Utility Board of Wisconsin, said in an email, noting that We Energies’ profits range from 10-13% on its various plants and projects. “Municipal utilities by their nature are more responsive to their local customers, because those customers are also the voters who elect the local government, as in the mayor or village chair who appoint the utility commissions.”

State law allows municipal governments to acquire utilities’ property through eminent domain or a negotiated purchase agreement. 

Milwaukee is in the early stages of discussing the possibility. There are serious hurdles,  including the fact that We Energies power generation does not take place within city limits, complications over how Act 10 would affect unionized utility workers and the prospect of facing a well-funded and well-connected opponent. 

“The utilities have been generous donors to the incumbent party, whichever is in power, over the years,” Content said. “The reckoning and awakening of the public to affordability concerns and data centers is shifting the dynamic on this, which is why we see candidates of all stripes taking more pro-consumer positions like we are advocating for.”

He noted recent polling has shown Wisconsinites are against data center development and concerned about the cost of living.

“From CUB’s POV this all argues for an electorate that wants a reliable energy system that they can afford,” he continued. “And for We Energies customers that’s become more problematic because the typical [residential] bill has surged 30% since 2022, with another 14-15% in the offing for the next two years.” 

Milwaukee Ald. Robert Bauman, who along with Ald. Alex Brower led the June meeting to start exploring the issue, told the Examiner that the debate will come down to determining if municipalization will reduce rates while maintaining reliable service. 

“If someone can come forward and say I have a realistic way of structuring your rates so they’re not going up by as high a percentage and your power is just as reliable and there’s more accountability … that accountability is attractive,” Bauman said, noting he already gets calls complaining about the municipal water utility. 

Milwaukee isn’t the first community across the country to consider taking on this fight. Clearwater, Florida,  recently completed a feasibility study to take over its own electric utility.

Residents in Boulder, Colorado, began a fight to municipalize the local Xcel Energy in 2010, largely due to complaints that the company was dragging its feet on shifting to renewable sources of power. Several times over the next decade, local voters approved ballot measures affirming their desire to take control of the utility. 

Ultimately, Boulder’s effort didn’t get across the finish line. But Leslie Glustrom, a Boulder resident who was active in the fight, told the Wisconsin Examiner that it wasn’t a failure. The threat of losing such a large customer base, she said, put enough leverage on Xcel that locals were able to push for significant policy concessions and the company has shifted away from its earlier dependence on fossil fuels. Xcel now states it will retire its final coal plant by 2030. 

“You can achieve very important gains and make progress on very important objectives, independent of whether the municipalization effort succeeds or not,” she said. 

In Michigan, residents of Ann Arbor have had a harder time, mostly because state law gives the power utility a permanent agreement to operate within its boundary area so residents don’t have the same leverage point. 

But the effort to take over the utility has continued and resulted in the establishment of the city’s Sustainable Energy Utility. For now the SEU is running as a pilot in one neighborhood with plans to expand citywide next year. 

Under the program, the city operates a service in which homes are outfitted with solar panels and backup batteries to provide energy for home use. The city still owns and maintains the infrastructure. 

Brian Geiringer, executive director of Ann Arbor for Public Power, told the Examiner that the city’s lack of leverage, the power of the local utility and the poor reliability of the local service have made it attractive to push for full municipalization

“Our options are very limited, in a region where the [Investor-owned utility] has tons of power, both due to their monopoly status, the forever contract, but also in terms of the amount of lobbying they do of our state government,” he said. “We are left with very few options to sort of hold them accountable and really push back at all against their power.”

He added that the SEU was able to get off the ground because Ann Arbor had a well funded sustainability office, but that it offered a low-friction way to begin showing the benefits of public power. 

“In Ann Arbor, the benefits of public power are so massive, in part, because our [investor-owned utility] has done such a poor job.” It has become clear to citizens, he added, that the benefits of the sustainable energy pilot project  “really just start to scratch the surface of what we would be sort of leaving on the table if we don’t pursue full municipalization.”

PORTERVILLE, Calif. — Porterville Unified School District (PUSD) is set to develop a comprehensive solar, battery energy storage, microgrid, and electric vehicle (EV) fleet charging project to meet the District’s intersecting energy, transportation, and resilience needs with clean, renewable, lower-cost electricity.

To develop the project, PUSD has partnered with ForeFront Power, a leading developer and asset manager of commercial and industrial-scale renewable energy solutions, as well as The Mobility House (TMH), an independent charge management provider. The project is being funded in part via a U.S. EPA Clean School Bus (CSB) Program grant, which the district secured with support from CALSTART, a nonprofit organization that connects businesses, government agencies, and industry partners to accelerate the adoption of clean transportation technologies.

The PUSD Zero-Emission Transportation Infrastructure Project and Microgrid will include a 763 kW solar array mounted on existing shade structures at the District’s north and south parking lots, along with a 408 kW / 1632 kWh battery storage system to store solar energy, provide resiliency, and discharge power to shave peak demand. A microgrid controller will enable the facility to disconnect from Southern California Edison’s electrical grid when needed, drawing power directly from the District’s on-site solar energy and battery storage assets.

The solar-plus-storage system will support 35 DC fast charger ports to serve the District’s planned fleet of electric school buses. These fast chargers will be connected to The Mobility House’s charge management system, ChargePilot®, which will enable the fleet to draw power directly from PUSD’s on-site energy systems in tandem with grid electricity. The EV charging infrastructure will also include eight charging ports in the north parking lot that will serve the District’s “white fleet.” Two of the eight chargers will feature bi-directional charging capability, which enables an EV to function as a “battery on wheels,” storing and discharging power back to the grid with vehicle-to-grid services (V2G). V2G technology will help the District support grid resilience, offset energy expenses, and extend an additional clean energy resource to students, staff, and the broader community.

Both V2G and microgrid technologies are integral to Porterville’s resiliency strategy, which includes protecting the broader community in the event of emergencies and power outages, such as Public Safety Power Shutoff (PSPS) events.

“We are excited to advance this important infrastructure project, which supports the District’s long-term goals for sustainability, energy resiliency, and responsible stewardship of public resources,” said Brad Rohrbach, Assistant Superintendent of Business Services, Porterville Unified School District. “This project represents a significant investment in our students, schools, and community, while helping position the District for a more efficient and sustainable future. We are grateful to CALSTART for their critical support in helping the District secure this grant through the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. We also appreciate the partnership and expertise provided by ForeFront Power and The Mobility House.”

Upgrading the District Fleet, A Community Lifeline

Located in Tulare County in California’s Central Valley, the Porterville region experiences some of the nation’s worst air quality, which disproportionately affects student respiratory health. PUSD serves more than 14,000 TK–12 students across 22 campuses, 88.9% of whom are from socioeconomically disadvantaged households, making the District’s transportation fleet a critical lifeline for many students who rely on school buses for access to education and extracurricular activities. In response to these conditions and rising energy costs, the District launched its PUSD Energy & Sustainability Program in 2019, aiming to reduce energy costs and GHG emissions by 80% by 2030, and is pursuing this EV infrastructure project as a key pillar of the program.

Once complete, the 1,171‑kW solar, battery storage, and microgrid system is expected to produce nearly 1,425,000 kWh of clean, renewable electricity annually. This onsite generation, combined with smart dispatch of the battery and V2G resources, is designed to offset approximately 80% of the District facilities’ electricity consumption—including the anticipated annual SCE utility bill for electric bus charging—and avoid an estimated 21,000 metric tons of CO₂ emissions over the 30‑year project lifecycle. The District’s plan to transition all school buses to electric by 2035 will save an additional 15,000 metric tons in avoided CO₂ emissions from reduced tailpipe pollution, bringing their total expected CO₂ emissions reduction over the same 30-year period to approximately 37,000 metric tons. This is equivalent to the GHG emissions from over 3.6 million gallons of diesel fuel burned.

Public-Private Partnership Enables Long-Term Budget Certainty and Savings on Electricity and Fuel

Designed, engineered, and developed by ForeFront Power, the future project is designed for an expected lifetime of 30 years. During this period, PUSD will partner with ForeFront Power for ongoing Asset Management services. This project will provide PUSD with budget certainty while reducing its dependence on fossil fuels to power its fleet. The transition to electric buses will lower fuel and maintenance costs and provide long-term savings over the project’s lifetime, protecting PUSD’s budget from increasing diesel and utility rates.

“We applaud Porterville USD for pursuing this innovative project for zero-emission infrastructure,” said Dr. Ruben Fontes, CEO at ForeFront Power. “When complete, this clean energy portfolio will serve as a national model for how vulnerable communities can mitigate rising energy and fuel costs, improve public health, meet ambitious climate goals, and protect themselves from climate emergencies.”

“We are glad to be a part of such an innovative and ambitious project to benefit the school district and community of Porterville,” said Greg Hintler, CEO of The Mobility House North America. “Clean energy technologies such as solar microgrids, electric school buses, and V2G have enormous potential to provide clean and affordable energy and transportation solutions for school districts and communities across the country.”

U.S. EPA’s Clean School Bus Program Delivers for Porterville

The upcoming project is anchored by a major federal investment through the U.S. EPA’s Clean School Bus (CSB) Program. Porterville Unified School District has secured federal grant funding to replace diesel buses with zero‑emission buses and install fast charging and clean energy infrastructure. As part of this award, the EPA funds Porterville USD directly, and CALSTART serves as the District’s technical and project management partner—handling implementation support, monitoring and reporting, workforce and community programs, and positioning the District for future federal and state grant opportunities. PUSD has also pursued other funding opportunities including California Air Resources Board and California Energy Commission’s Zero Emission School Bus and Infrastructure (ZESBI) incentive project.

“PUSD’s commitment to decarbonize their fleet is transformational for the San Joaquin Valley, for the broader Porterville community, and for school districts that are navigating similar transitions. Funding programs that reduce capital costs are critical to make these school electrification projects possible.” said Valerie Thorsen, P.E., Regional Director at CALSTART. “PUSD is not only transitioning their fleet, but they have also provided EV internships in partnership with Climate Action Pathways for Schools and are actively enabling clean energy jobs through their Academy of Energy and Resource Occupations (AERO) Pathways Program.”

Procurement Assisted by Joint Power Authority SPURR and the PAVE Program

PUSD procured its Zero-Emission Transportation Infrastructure Project and Microgrid by leveraging the Procurement Assistance for Vehicle Electrification (“PAVE”) Program. The PAVE Program is managed by SPURR, a joint powers authority dedicated to helping the California public sector control and reduce utility expenses. PAVE is designed to help public agencies streamline the procurement process for electric vehicles and charging infrastructure through an easy infrastructure roadmap and a single source for planning, installation, and management of complicated multi-phase EV charging infrastructure projects. Through PAVE’s integrated RFP process, the District selected ForeFront Power to develop, finance, and construct its EV charging infrastructure project, and The Mobility House (TMH) as its charge management technology provider.

Advancing PUSD’s Climate Action Pathways for Schools (CAPS) Student Initiative

This upcoming project will also advance PUSD’s Climate Action Pathways for Schools (CAPS) initiative by linking classroom learning, career pathways, and real-world clean energy infrastructure. Through CAPS-aligned project-based units, energy audits, and analysis of the District’s solar, energy storage, and EV charging systems, students will use the campus as a living lab to build skills in renewable energy, sustainability, and conservation. Porterville USD, ForeFront Power, CALSTART, and The Mobility House have also developed a community outreach program to educate local residents on the clean transportation and air quality benefits of the microgrid and EV transportation infrastructure, along with hands-on CAPS internships that provide experience in zero-emission fleet operations while advancing district climate and sustainability goals.

About Porterville Unified School District

Porterville Unified School District (PUSD) is located in the heart of California’s Central Valley at the foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountains in Tulare County. Serving a diverse community of over 13,000 students, PUSD is dedicated to the mission of ‘Creating Opportunities: Changing Lives’. The district operates a comprehensive network of schools, including elementary, middle, and high school sites, and is a leader in regional Career Technical Education (CTE) and sustainability initiatives. PUSD serves a rich, multicultural population, with a deep commitment to supporting English Learners and providing equitable access to high-quality academic and vocational pathways for all students.

About ForeFront Power

ForeFront Power is a leading provider of energy solutions and advisory services. This includes commercial and industrial-scale (C&I) solar energy and battery storage projects in the U.S. and Mexico, as well as fleet electrification and asset management services. With over 15 years of experience, the ForeFront Power team has developed more than 1,900 behind-the-meter and community solar projects, totaling more than 1.6 gigawatt-DC of renewable electricity. In addition to project development and asset management, ForeFront Power provides strategic advisory services that help organizations navigate complex energy decisions—from sustainability and procurement planning to renewable project implementation. The company serves a wide array of business, government, education, healthcare, and community solar customers from its San Francisco headquarters and through teams based in New York, Mexico City, and across the U.S. For additional information, please visit www.forefrontpower.com.

About The Mobility House

The Mobility House is shaping the zero emissions future of energy and mobility. Our resilient charging technology makes EV charging reliable and flexible, and provides drivers the freedom of zero emissions, zero cost charging. We integrate flexible charging with energy systems to stabilize the electrical grid and free it from fossil fuels. Across Europe, Asia-Pacific, and North America, The Mobility House currently manages more than 2,700 EV fleet charging facilities, charges hundreds of thousands of electric vehicles, and trades power from more than 1 GWh of energy storage.

The post The Mobility House Powers Porterville Unified School District’s Fleet Electrification with Smart Charging and Vehicle-to-Grid Technology appeared first on School Transportation News.

The finding, part of a new draft report by state utility regulators, means the state will need to build significant infrastructure to meet rising energy needs.

The post Wisconsin energy demand to rise 40 percent by 2032, driven by data centers, draft report finds appeared first on WPR.

A bill allowing year-round sales of E15, a fuel blended with up to 15 percent corn-based ethanol, is being debated in the Senate. While the bill is hailed as a boon for corn growers, there are concerns that it could hurt soybean prices.

The post Efforts to get year-round E15 sales could hurt soybean farmers appeared first on WPR.

Demand for internet access and electronic storage has grown alongside digital technology itself. At the center of that growth are the energy infrastructure and data centers that governments and companies began developing in Northern Virginia in the late 20th century. Today, the region houses the world’s largest concentration of data centers, making Virginia the nation’s digital capital.

That growth has brought major economic benefits for local governments, but it has also divided communities increasingly weary of the facilities’ heavy demands on water and energy, among other impacts.

The commonwealth’s rise as a global digital leader did not happen overnight, said House Technology Committee Chair Cliff Hayes, D-Chesapeake. It was a result of years of persistence, long-term planning and problem-solving.

”This designation for the commonwealth to be the digital capital not only of this country but of the world has taken a lot of stamina, resilience and vision,” Hayes said.

Hayes said leadership also means adapting to new challenges. This year alone, lawmakers passed an entire package of bills aimed at further regulating the industry, while the fight over tax incentives remains largely unsolved.

AOL’s move 

Ashburn’s rise as one of the largest digital infrastructure hubs began in 1997 with the arrival of America Online, or AOL, then the primary internet gateway for many users. Soon after, UUNet/WorldCom and the relocation of the Metropolitan Area Ethernet East, a major internet exchange and traffic hub, helped create unmatched fiber connectivity, turning Loudoun County into a key internet crossroads and destination for other businesses.

Buddy Rizer, executive director for Loudoun County Economic Development, said AOL’s decision to locate in Loudoun helped make the internet mainstream for Americans and anchored the infrastructure that turned Loudoun and Virginia into the world’s leading internet hub.

“You can’t overstate the importance of AOL, right? AOL didn’t invent the internet, but they made it accessible to ordinary Americans at the moment that the commercial internet was starting to take off… by the late 1990s AOL had 20 million subscribers, and roughly half of U.S. homes that had internet were using AOL by 1997.”

Rizer said once Loudoun established core infrastructure and attracted a few anchor companies, growth became compounding: infrastructure drew companies, companies brought more infrastructure and the cycle continued for roughly 20 years.

Data storage and computing explodes 

While data centers have existed in Virginia for decades, the recent rise of artificial intelligence has accelerated demand for the warehouse-like facilities that store and process data around the world. 

Ali Mehrizi-Sani, a professor at Virginia Tech, said Northern Virginia had many of the right ingredients to attract the industry even before the state sales and use tax exemption passed in 2008.

“The fact is that we have a lot of customers of data, and that’s really the federal government and their contractors,” Mehrizi-Sani said. “They use a lot of data, so really just proximity to Washington, D.C. has been a main driver of honestly everything in Virginia, including data centers.”

The early development of the internet exchange points in Virginia, combined with large stretches of undeveloped land in Northern Virginia, also helped fuel the industry’s growth. Loudoun County, for example, was far more rural than it is today.

Loudoun recorded 71 operating data centers, the most of any locality in the commonwealth, according to a 2024 study by the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission. Statewide, 131 data centers were operating at the time. 

“That’s why you see data centers are coming further south, even to areas like where I live in Roanoke and Botetourt County, essentially in search of land,” Mehrizi-Sani said.

He said data centers have also remained in Virginia because electricity rates are comparatively lower than in other parts of the country. Another major factor is the state’s sales and use tax exemption.

Tax breaks and tax gains

In Loudoun, data center revenue has generated substantial tax income year after year, providing the county with more than $100 million annually to support schools and government services.

The revenue stream — estimated at about $1.3 billion in 2027 — has grown enough that the county has reduced real estate tax rates for homeowners every year for the past decade, according to county officials. 

Revenue from data centers has also allowed county leaders to propose reducing the personal property tax rate on vehicles beginning in tax year 2026 and eliminating the $25 vehicle license fee.

In 2008, the General Assembly approved a statewide incentive allowing data centers to avoid the state’s 5.3% sales and use tax, which at the time was estimated to save the industry about $1.5 million annually. Data centers routinely refresh computer equipment and software, the exemption can significantly reduce costs every few years. 

Now, however, the cost of the tax break has ballooned to about $1.9 billion annually in foregone state revenue. 

While the tax break had previously been extended, and former Gov. Glenn Youngkin sought to continue it through 2050 in his final budget proposal, debate over potentially ending the incentive led to months of negotiations and brought Virginia to the brink of a government shutdown after lawmakers failed to pass a budget until the final days of June.

Some lawmakers argued the industry had benefitted enough from the tax exemption. At the same time, concerns over rising energy costs and environmental impacts prompted legislators to look for ways to reclaim some revenue from the trillion dollar industry.

But Gov. Abigail Spanberger led the push to preserve the tax break, arguing Virginia had “made an agreement” and should not reverse course. The exemption is currently set to expire in 2035 unless lawmakers change it before then.

“We know technology is not bad,” Senate Finance Committee Chair Louise Lucas, D-Portsmouth, said last month. “We all can benefit from technology, but we, as a government, have not done a good job in managing the regulations and the impact on our communities, and that’s what we’ve got to rein in. But we’ve also got to rein in the fact that data centers – they’re some of the largest corporations on the face of the Earth, trillion dollar organizations – are getting tax exemptions right now.”

While the exemption ultimately remained in the budget, lawmakers approved a new energy consumption tax on data centers expected to bring in a total of $600 million annually, or $1.2 billion over the biennium. The industry will pay 1.1 cents per kilowatt-hour of electricity consumed up to the cap, with any excess refunded at the end of the fiscal year.

Dominion Energy and Mecklenburg, Northern Virginia, and Rappahannock electric cooperatives reported in 2023 that data centers used about 5,050 megawatts of power that year, based on peak-load forecasts, according to the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission.

“What I have found is that some of the businesses coming to our commonwealth, they want to make investments in our communities and in our workforce. The consumption tax, as we’ve conceived of it here in the commonwealth, is one that’s based on fairness,” Spanberger told The Mercury last month.


Lawmakers also approved new water use regulations for data centers in areas designated as water scarce and within the water management area east of Interstate 95.

Virginia has a new two-year budget. Here’s what lawmakers now require of data centers.

The changes aim to push facilities away from evaporative cooling systems that consume millions of gallons of water annually and toward more efficient technologies. Also, for the first time, the state will regulate data center noise levels. 

The General Assembly also passed bills requiring cleaner backup generators that emit fewer carbon emissions and measures intended to help localities better assess the residential and environmental impacts of proposed facilities.

Public policy 

In 2010, Virginia created a retail and sales tax exemption for data centers, a factor companies have consistently identified as important in site selection.

Loudoun designated large areas for industrial and employment uses where data centers could be built, helping reduce development timelines and support continued growth. 

Through successive comprehensive plans, Loudoun also reserved large tracts of land in eastern Loudoun — near Washington Dulles International Airport and the W&OD Trail — for industrial and employment uses close to existing fiber networks and electrical infrastructure. The move ensured a long-term supply of development-ready sites for large-scale data center campuses.

Opposition from residents has grown in recent years, with hundreds of community members attending local government meetings to oppose projects near homes, drinking water supplies and high-voltage transmission lines. Residents have urged lawmakers to impose stronger regulations and seek greater financial contributions from the industry for supporting infrastructure.

What’s next 

Last week, lawmakers ordered a work group to study how the data center tax exemption could be phased out or modified to generate additional state revenue. A report is due in November.

While Spanberger has described the new consumption tax as “fair,” the data center industry disagrees. After lawmakers approved the budget amendments last week, Data Center Coalition CEO Josh Levi said the new tax will “drive away investment and job creation, and tarnish Virginia’s reputation.”

“The message to businesses in all industries is clear — Virginia is no longer a reliable partner,” Levi said in a June statement.

Rizer argued that Loudoun’s and Virginia’s future depends on treating data centers as a foundation for broader technology growth while maintaining a stable and predictable business climate. 

“You can’t take success for granted … the principle that made us successful is a predictable, welcoming environment with predictable tax and policy issues,” Rizer said. “The only way that that success can go into the future is by staying grounded in those principles that brought us this far.”

As for federal involvement in an issue that has become a national flashpoint, Democratic U.S. Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia, who was governor when the tax exemption passed, said states should decide individually how to manage data center growth rather than adopt a one-size-fits-all approach.

“(Data centers are a) global phenomenon, and being a leader in this important area is good for America’s national security and for Virginia’s economy,” Kaine said. “But there are real challenges when it comes to water, power and land use, so local communities must get a say when it comes to how to handle them.”

Virginia has become the state that many others are watching as they weigh to and regulate the growing data center industry. Lawmakers now face balancing the promise of economic investment with mounting concerns from residents pushing back against continued expansion.

Editor’s note: This story has been updated to reflect the correct amount of data center revenue in Loudoun for fiscal year 2027, which was $1.3 billion, not $890 million as previously reported.

President Donald Trump has shown the immense power of the executive branch to stymie offshore wind development, as nearly all projects are in waters where federal agencies operate as the landlord.

Now, as the feds block new permits and dangle billion-dollar buyout offers to convince developers to walk away from their projects, state leaders are hoping some companies share their conviction that the industry can be revived after Trump leaves office.

“Any honest assessment of where we need to be to meet our climate goals depends on a thriving offshore wind sector,” said New York state Sen. Andrew Gounardes, a Democrat.

New York and many other East Coast states have set aggressive targets for offshore wind power, both to meet rising energy demands and transition to clean energy sources. But Trump’s attacks on the industry threaten to scare off companies from making the massive long-term investments required to pursue offshore wind projects.

“If there’s no business opportunity here, then they’re not going to stay here and invest here,” Gounardes said. “They’re not going to lay around with good intentions doing nothing, and we’re going to lose out because of that.”

Federal opposition

Last week, Trump’s Department of the Interior announced a $129 million deal with Duke Energy to relinquish its lease to build an offshore wind farm off the coast of North Carolina. The company pledged to reinvest the money into other forms of energy.

Since March, Trump officials have struck four such agreements totaling more than $2.5 billion to get developers to give up on their offshore wind plans. Some analysts say the federal government’s ability to blockade pending projects has caused some companies to reconsider their investments.

“If you have a lease that appears to be going nowhere for at least the next three years, you want to pivot to other options,” said Timothy Fox, managing director at ClearView Energy Partners LLC, an independent research firm. “There’s still a lot of leases out there, but the Trump administration has made this aggressive push, and we think there could be future similar announcements.”

According to Fox, developers hold leases for roughly two dozen other offshore wind areas, agreements that could be targeted for similar buyout deals.

While developers consider buyout offers from the federal government, state leaders say such deals are illegal. Seven states filed a lawsuit earlier this month saying the administration lacks the authority to cancel the leases and pay out funds, focused on a March deal with TotalEnergies to block a project off of New York.

The lawsuit challenges the administration’s use of a federal fund set aside to pay court judgments and settlements of lawsuits against the government. The deal, state attorneys general argue, “is not the result of a compromise settlement between adverse parties, but rather an agreement resulting from [federal officials’] pretextual national security concerns and TotalEnergies’ desire to receive unauthorized compensation for an expensive offshore wind lease.”

The state of California has also announced that it intends to file a lawsuit over another buyout targeting a lease area off the state’s Pacific coast.

Since taking office, Trump has halted permits and leases for other planned offshore wind projects, canceled hundreds of millions in funding to support manufacturing and ports and ended clean energy tax credits. His administration also issued stop-work orders for five offshore wind projects that were already under construction, but courts have overturned those orders and allowed work to resume.

Aside from the five wind farms currently being built, progress on dozens of other pending projects has ground to a halt.

“There’s little to be done if the federal government still controls the permits, leases and pace of development,” said Fox, the researcher.

State goals

The clash comes as many East Coast states have been counting heavily on the maturation of the offshore wind industry to meet their energy needs. Eight Atlantic states have committed to building more than 45 gigawatts of offshore wind by 2040 — enough to power more than 30 million homes. They’ve made major investments in ports, manufacturing facilities, transmission infrastructure and workforce training.

In addition to their climate goals, many states are facing surging energy demands, largely driven by data centers and artificial intelligence.

State leaders say that offshore wind farms can harness massive amounts of electricity, especially during nighttime and winter periods when solar power is in short supply. For heavily populated East Coast states, with limited areas to put sprawling energy projects on land, tapping into strong winds over the ocean has become a major part of their strategy.

“Offshore wind is key to a future that allows us to move off of fossil fuels,” said Maryland state Del. Lorig Charkoudian, a Democrat who has been a strong backer of offshore wind. “Every time the (Trump administration) makes these moves, it reminds me that their numbers show how much offshore (wind) would allow us to retire fossil fuel plants.”

Trump has long opposed offshore wind, falsely asserting that it harms whales, is unreliable and drives up energy costs. While offshore wind generation is intermittent, it has a much higher capacity factor than onshore renewables, meaning that it operates for longer periods at its maximum output level. New offshore wind projects have capacity factors that match some gas and coal-fired power plants, according to the International Energy Agency.

While still more expensive than onshore renewables, offshore wind projects globally produce electricity at a rate cheaper than natural gas and coal plants, according to Energy Solutions Intelligence, a digital consulting platform.

Backers and energy analysts say offshore wind in the U.S. should become cheaper over time as supply chains mature and investments in ports and other infrastructure pay off.

The Department of the Interior did not grant a Stateline interview request about its buyout deals for offshore wind projects, but the agency has claimed in statements that the deals will lower energy prices.

Changing plans

Many state leaders acknowledge that the delays caused by Trump’s opposition will cause them to miss their targets for building new projects over the next 5 to 10 years. But they say the industry is still essential for meeting their long-term climate goals and energy needs.

“I don’t think anyone is at the point of saying no offshore wind ever again,” said Gounardes, the New York lawmaker. “It might not be part of the alchemy in the near future, but it certainly must be part of the alchemy to meet our overall goals.”

For now, state leaders are hoping their ongoing commitments to offshore wind will convince developers to wait out the remainder of Trump’s term and stay in the U.S. market.

“[The buyouts] are a blow to the industry, but it’s not a death knell but there are other projects out there that are still in some stage of development,” said Sam Schacht, project director for offshore wind with the Clean Energy States Alliance, a nonprofit coalition of state energy agencies.

“There’s this bad news story happening about the attempts to erode these future projects, while at the same time there’s a very positive story about the projects that are under construction and producing power now and their ability to capably meet states’ power demands.”

While states play the waiting game with offshore wind, they’re making new plans to meet their energy needs in the near term. Lawmakers in Maryland have invested in battery storage, which Charkoudian described as a “no-regrets” option that can help meet energy needs today while complementing offshore wind once it comes online.

Other states, including New York and New Jersey, have looked at increasing subsidies for nuclear power.

“I wouldn’t say that they’re giving up on offshore wind, but states are pivoting to other carbon-free resources that  are favored by this administration, namely nuclear power,” said Fox, the energy researcher.

Stateline reporter Alex Brown can be reached at abrown@stateline.org.

Correction: The initial version of this story stated the plaintiffs in the lawsuit live in Mount Pleasant, when they actually live in Sturtevant.

Three Sturtevant residents have filed a class action lawsuit against Microsoft over the loud noises emitted by the company’s 1.2 million square foot Fairwater data center in Mount Pleasant. 

The lawsuit, filed Wednesday in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin, alleges that “on frequent, recurrent, and continuing occasions too numerous to list herein, Plaintiffs’ properties have been and continue to be physically invaded by excessive noise.” The three residents filing the suit, Garret Ostergaard, David Wade and Joy Wade, all live within 1.5 miles of the data center. 

The lawsuit states that the excessive noise from the data center has forced Ostergaard to change his work schedule from third to second shift because he couldn’t sleep. The Wades allege that the constant hum of the data center has made it difficult for them to enjoy their backyard. 

In the lawsuit, the source of the noise is attributed to the data center’s massive cooling fans. 

In filing a class action suit, the plaintiffs are arguing to represent anyone who lives within a 1.5-mile radius of the data center, which the lawsuit states includes more than 1,000 households. 

Microsoft refers to its Mount Pleasant data center as an “AI superfactory” and the “world’s most powerful AI datacenter.” An analysis conducted last year by Clean Wisconsin found that Microsoft’s data center in Mount Pleasant and Vantage’s currently under construction data center in Port Washington promise to use more energy than every household in the state.

A coalition of more than 200 business owners from throughout the Great Lakes region is calling on the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy to reject permits for Enbridge’s Line 5 tunnel pipeline, urging other business owners to sign on to a joint letter opposing the project.

Line 5 stretches from Superior, Wisconsin to Sarnia, Ontario, with a four-mile segment of dual pipelines located on the lakebed within the Straits of Mackinac, where Lake Michigan and Lake Huron meet. 

In its call for support, the Great Lakes Business Network pointed to a recent spill of up to 1,900 gallons of drilling fluid in Wisconsin as part of Enbridge’s effort to reroute Line 5. The project came after a federal judge found the company had trespassed on the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa’s reservation for more than a decade by continuing to operate the pipeline following the expiration of its easement.

Enbridge Spokesperson Ryan Duffy told Michigan Advance the company reported the release of the clay and water mixture used for drilling to the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources on Saturday, and that it had been contained using sandbags and silt fence and that the cleanup is well underway.  

“We will continue to work with the DNR on completion of the clean-up,” Duffy said in an emailed statement. 

Wisconsin Public Radio reported concerns from the Bad River Band and environmental advocates that the release violates Enbridge’s waterway and wetland permit, with one condition stating the company “shall not discharge drilling mud into wetlands, waterways or sensitive areas.”

The Bad River Band has also challenged the reroute, noting that the pipeline would still encircle the reservation and threaten waters, fish and wild rice, which are culturally sacred and economically critical to its members.

Tribal communities and environmental advocates have called for a shutdown of the more than 70-year-old pipeline for years, pointing to a series of anchor strikes which dented the pipeline, and the 2010 Kalamazoo River oil spill from Enbridge’s Line 6B as among their reasons for concern.

While Enbridge has agreed to replace the two segments of pipeline with a new segment housed within a tunnel embedded within the bedrock beneath the lakebed, opponents have raised their further concerns with the safety of the tunnel project, including unstable bedrock, high water pressure and the presence of gasses that could lead to an explosion.

Whitney Gravelle, president of the Bay Mills Indian Community previously told Michigan Advance the tunnel would bore through several cultural sites, archaeological resources and what Anishinaabe consider to be the site of creation.

In order to move forward, the tunnel project is in need of permits from the United States Army Corps of Engineers and EGLE. Another vital permit granted by the Michigan Public Service Commission is under review by the Michigan Supreme Court, following challenges from tribal communities and several environmental advocacy groups.

While Enbridge has touted support from businesses in the region, the Great Lakes Business Network has rejected that notion, calling all business owners and leaders who care about the Great Lakes to submit their signatures by the close of business on July 2.

“We cannot stand by while a Canadian oil company claims to speak for our business community,” Great Lakes Business Network Co-Chairs, Pete Laing and Travis Hixton said in a statement. “The Great Lakes are our economic engine supporting tourism, shipping, real estate, and countless jobs. A decade of destruction to our bottomlands for an unnecessary tunnel is bad for business and bad for our future.”

Following the Great Lakes Business Network’s call for signatures, Great Lakes Michigan Jobs, which says it represents more 75,000 Michigan businesses, issued its own statement calling on EGLE to renew Enbridge’s National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System permit.

If reissued, the permit would allow Enbridge to release roughly 6 million gallons of treated wastewater into the Great Lakes per day between two facilities located on the north and south sides of the straits.

“We strongly support Line 5 and the Great Lakes Tunnel and urge EGLE to renew the permit to allow tunnel builders to treat and clean wastewater,” Mike Witkowski, the director of environmental and regulatory policy at the Michigan Manufacturers Association, said in a statement.

A solar project in Dane County opened last year with the idea of combining green energy and farming — known as an “agrivoltaics” site. The Kegonsa Research Campus is one of the largest in the country. WPR’s “Wisconsin Today” visited the site to see it up close.

The post Can solar energy and farming share the same land? These Wisconsin researchers think so appeared first on WPR.

Crews spilled up to 1,900 gallons of drilling fluid on Saturday as they were working on Enbridge’s Line 5 reroute in northern Wisconsin.

The post Wisconsin regulators respond to drilling fluid spill on Enbridge’s Line 5 reroute appeared first on WPR.

As America prepares to celebrate its 250th birthday, my son and I recently spent a week driving across the country, visiting Rocky Mountain, Arches, Great Basin, and Yellowstone National Parks. The trip reminded me that despite our differences, Americans share a common responsibility: to leave our country stronger and more prosperous than we found it.

Wherever we traveled, people wanted many of the same things: good-paying jobs, thriving communities, affordable energy and opportunities for future generations.

Those hopes are shaped by many decisions, but few are more important than how we produce, deliver and pay for energy.

Most families are not thinking about climate policy. They are thinking about utility bills, housing costs, job opportunities and whether their communities can compete in a changing economy.

A recent Wisconsin Conservation Voters poll found that 84% of Wisconsin voters are concerned about rising electricity costs — ranking utility bills alongside groceries as a financial stress.

Wisconsin families want affordable energy, reliable electricity, good-paying jobs and a stronger future for their children. Clean energy helps deliver all four.

More than 75,000 Wisconsinites already work in clean energy. Wisconsin manufacturers supply components used across the country. Electricians, engineers, construction workers, and skilled tradespeople are modernizing our energy system while helping businesses and homeowners lower energy costs.

This is not tomorrow’s economy. It is today’s.

Clean energy is an economic development strategy, a manufacturing strategy, a workforce strategy and an affordability strategy. Communities embracing innovation are attracting investment, creating jobs, and becoming more competitive.

Unfortunately, federal policy is moving in the opposite direction.

The Trump administration recently announced a $700 million taxpayer-funded effort to keep aging coal plants operating, including one in Wisconsin. At the same time, it has proposed spending approximately $2.5 billion to buy out offshore wind leases representing roughly 13 gigawatts of generating capacity while redirecting support toward fossil fuel development.

These decisions matter because they directly affect affordability, health and our future.

Americans are increasingly being asked to support aging coal plants through both their electric bills and their tax dollars. Extending the life of outdated infrastructure delays investment in newer technologies that are often less expensive and more reliable.

We are already doing this with coal plants in Oak Creek, Sheboygan and Beloit. We cannot keep repeating that mistake.

Wisconsin also faces another challenge.

Artificial intelligence is creating unprecedented demand for electricity. Two proposed data centers alone could require nearly four gigawatts of power, more electricity than every Wisconsin household combined.

Data centers can create jobs and economic opportunity. But they also require new power plants, transmission lines and grid upgrades.

The question is simple: Who pays?

Wisconsin families, farmers and small businesses should not shoulder those costs.

Large energy users should pay the full cost of the infrastructure they require. Utilities should be transparent, regulators should protect ratepayers and communities deserve a meaningful voice before billions of dollars are committed.

This is not a choice between economic growth and environmental responsibility.

The strongest energy policies lower costs, strengthen energy independence, improve reliability, create jobs and protect the resources that make Wisconsin such a great place to live.

Wisconsin has everything it takes to lead: innovative businesses, talented workers, world-class manufacturers and practical problem-solvers.

As America approaches its 250th birthday, we should remember that every generation is called upon to build something lasting.

For ours, that means building an energy system that is affordable, reliable, resilient and capable of powering Wisconsin’s economy for decades to come.

The clean energy transition is not happening because it is partisan. It is happening because it works.

The question is whether Wisconsin will build it, power it and prosper from it.