The number worth carrying out of this week is not 55 tariffs or 264 filings — it is twelve. Large-load tariffs proposed since 2025 average twelve-year minimum terms, against a five-year average before it. That is US regulators deciding that a data centre’s promise to consume power is worth less than the capital it triggers, and that the risk of the promise evaporating belongs to the customer rather than the ratepayer. Anyone negotiating a connection in the US should now expect a contract shaped like a take-or-pay commodity deal.
The same reallocation shows up on the capital side from the opposite direction. Google is the offtaker behind both NextEra’s $1.9bn DOE-financed restart at Duane Arnold and MN8’s solar-plus-storage build on a West Virginia coal mine. Utilities are not building speculatively into demand growth; the demand signs first and the plant follows. Regulators and developers have independently concluded that the load, not the utility, should carry the project risk — and ERCOT’s summer, running 10% above last year’s best week, is why both moved now. The 2 September edition covered the supply-side constraint on that grid; this is the demand side of the same squeeze.
What would complicate the picture: the first large-load customer to walk away from a twelve-year term and test whether an exit fee is actually collectable.
Large-load tariffs now average 12-year minimum terms
Utility Dive · 8 September 2026 — Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the Brattle Group reviewed 55 of the 264 large-load tariff filings catalogued by 17 August. Post-2025 proposals average twelve-year minimums against five before; El Paso Electric has proposed twenty. Upfront study payments, ramp schedules and termination fees appear in up to two-thirds of recent filings.
Why it matters: A grid connection for a data centre is being repriced as a take-or-pay commitment, not a service.
NextEra takes a $1.9bn DOE loan to restart Duane Arnold
Utility Dive · 8 September 2026 — The 615 MW Iowa plant, shut in 2020 after storm damage, is targeted to restart in 2029 with Google as primary customer. It is the third nuclear restart the DOE has financed under the current administration. CEO John Ketchum: “It’s about delivering new power to meet new demand.”
Why it matters: Federal credit plus a hyperscaler offtake is now the working template for firm capacity.
Google backs 86 MW of solar on a West Virginia coal mine
Utility Dive · 8 September 2026 — MN8 Energy’s Mammoth project in Kanawha County pairs 86 MW of solar with 280 MWh of lithium-ion and 100 MWh of Eos zinc-based storage, inside PJM. Solar reaches commercial operation in 2028, the zinc tranche in 2030. Most zinc installations to date sit below 1 MW.
Why it matters: A 10 MW zinc deployment is that technology’s first real commercial-scale test.
ERCOT’s peak week ran 10% above anything last summer
Utility Dive · 8 September 2026 — Hourly average load hit 74.5 GW in the week of 22 August, 10% above the best week of summer 2025 and 6% above the 70 GW record set in 2023. July’s 91 GW peak was met with 48% gas and 32% solar. ERCOT’s long-term forecast reaches 154 GW by 2035.
Why it matters: Solar already carries a third of Texas at peak, and the forecast still nearly doubles the load.
OWGP splits £1m across seven UK offshore wind suppliers
reNEWS · 8 September 2026 — Acuity Robotics, Akselos, Crondall Energy, Fathom, Quoceant, Sperra Seaworks and T12 Engineering share the award, backed by the Offshore Wind Industry Council with industry input from Equinor and SSE. The focus is foundations, substructures, substations and electrical design.
Why it matters: UK supply-chain money is going to deeper water and larger turbines rather than cost-out on the installed base.
Watch for the first large-load customer to contest a twelve-year term in a rate case, and for whether Duane Arnold’s structure pulls a fourth DOE-financed restart into the queue.
Written by my AI assistant.
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