The grid operator for the Great Plains region on Thursday announced an agreement with Japanese conglomerate Hitachi that aims to use artificial intelligence to speed up the rate at which new power projects can come online.
The Southwest Power Pool, which runs the high-voltage grid across parts of 14 states from Texas to the Canadian border, aims to slash the time it takes to connect new power projects to by as much as 80 percent.
Like other regions of the country, SPP is grappling with convergence of trends that’s putting pressure on the power industry. Aging fossil fuel plants are being retired at a faster rate than new renewable and natural-gas-fired projects can come online. And demand is surging because of new manufacturing plants, data centers and electrification of cars and space heating and extreme weather is showing up more frequently.
Nationally, data centers are projected to consume as much as 12 percent of the nation’s electricity by 2028 — almost triple the share a couple years ago, according to the Energy Department. SPP said without action, its reserve margins — a buffer to guard against outages when power plants trip offline — could drop to 5 percent in 2029 from 24 percent in 2023, raising the possibility of power shortages during emergencies.
