/ Energy News

The Trump administration is loaning as much as $1.9 billion to restart a shuttered NextEra Energy Inc. nuclear power plant in Iowa, part of a broader push to revive the US nuclear industry.

The Duane Arnold Energy Center, which ceased operations in 2020, is one of three nuclear power plants being restarted with help from the US government as the Trump administration seeks to address rising customer utility bills and make good on a commitment to build out nuclear power.

SpaceX is developing a foundry in Bastrop, Texas, that will manufacture turbine blades and vanes. These components have become a major constraint on new gas turbine production, contributing to increasingly long waits for the equipment needed to power new data centers.

Recent deals are taking shape around a three-party model involving developers, utilities and large energy customers. The arrangements give utilities a role integrating the power without requiring them to finance and own first-of-a-kind reactors, while large customers provide demand and help absorb development risk.

Microsoft is throwing its support behind legislation that would prevent data centers from passing along water usage costs to consumers, as tech companies seek to allay community concerns about the AI infrastructure.

The Water Cost Accountability Act would direct states to block public water systems from recovering costs associated with connecting data centers from anyone other than their developers or owners.

Mr. Carney will open the summit’s main program on Sept. 15 with a keynote speech and a fireside chat with Deborah Orida, chief executive officer of the $321-billion Public Sector Pension Investment Board, according to an agenda circulated to attendees and reviewed by The Globe and Mail.

An afternoon panel discussion will pitch the country as a stable place to invest in a range of energy assets, from pipelines to nuclear power. The speakers will be Ontario Power Generation Inc. CEO Nicolle Butcher, Suncor Energy Inc. CEO Rich Kruger and TC Energy Corp. CEO François Poirier.

A set of 13 “high value” inter- and intraregional transmission projects in the Eastern Interconnection could produce up to $15.3 billion in net system value through 2050, according to a study released Tuesday.

Also, the transmission projects would lower retail electricity rates, enhance system reliability and improve resilience to extreme weather events, according to Powering Growth and Affordability: The Role of Transmission in Economic and National Security, which was prepared by S&P Global’s CERA Consulting for the Electricity Customer Alliance, National Grid and Converge Strategies.

Canadian energy company Enbridge said on Thursday it had agreed to ​form a joint venture with KKR and Apollo to invest ‌about C$2.7 billion in expansions of its Westcoast natural gas pipeline system in British Columbia.

Under the agreement, KKR and Apollo will fund the Aspen Point and Sunrise expansion projects, while Enbridge will receive C$700 million in cash at closing and ​retain majority ownership and operational control of the pipeline.

Geothermal developer FervoEnergy said on Tuesday it had signed a deal to ​supply 396 megawatts of geothermal power ‌to Alphabet's Google from its Cape Station project in Utah, sending its shares up nearly 14% ​in premarket trading.

The agreement gives Google an option to increase ​its power purchases by about 600 MW, ​bringing total potential capacity under the arrangement to nearly ‌1 ⁠gigawatt by June 2030, Fervosaid.

The gigafactory – owned by EV battery manufacturer PowerCo, a subsidiary of Volkswagen Group – will include six production blocks across 370 acres, the size of more than 200 soccer fields.

The plant, expected to start production in 2027, is just a part of the vision for St. Thomas’ 1,500-acre Yarmouth Yards industrial park.

President Donald Trump on Wednesday signed an executive order preparing to block utilities from connecting some foreign-made equipment to the bulk power system, including transformers, batteries, inverters and associated software and digital products.

The order also contemplates the replacement of already-installed equipment, allowing the Secretary of Energy to “impose conditions on the continued use, operation, maintenance, servicing, or updating of foreign manufactured or operated bulk-power system electric equipment acquired or installed before the date of this order.”

As part of the review process for Georgia Power’s contract to serve the OpenAI facility, the utility struck a new deal with the staff of the Public Service Commission, the state agency that regulates utilities and sets Georgia Power’s rates. The agreement says that if a data centercloses or leaves the state, the costs of serving it will be distributed among other data centers and large customers, not passed on to Georgia residents or small businesses.

Under the Energy Grid Services and Capacity Grid Services riders, customer-sited resources would be eligible to receive payments for dispatched energy based on hourly market pricing in NV Energy territory and for load reduction based on an avoided cost of generation and transmission calculation, the Public Utilities Commission of Nevada said in an Aug. 11 order.

But by limiting participation of third-party resource aggregators, the commission “misses an opportunity to establish a broader market that could have expanded customer choice, encouraged innovation, and helped lower energy costs,” one of the intervenors in the proceeding said earlier this month.

New Brunswick’s Liberal government is considering whether it should drop its long-standing ban on extracting the province’s large natural-gas reserves as it looks for ways to boost its economy and secure Canada’s energy independence.

Premier Susan Holt announced a public review into the fracking ban on Wednesday, saying she’s looking “at all options” to support growth in her province amid Canada’s escalating trade war with the United States.

An escalating trade war between the United States and Canada is once again threatening to ensnare the electric power sector at a time when consumers are already stretched thin.

Canada is expected to announce retaliatory tariffs on U.S. goods Tuesday after President Donald Trump’s 50% tariffs on about $20 billion in Canadian goods went into effect over the weekend, with threats of more on the way.

“Everything’s on the table. I’ll do whatever it takes,” Ford said while insisting that Ontario is prepared to cut off exports of electricity and critical minerals, including high-grade nickel and processed uranium essential to U.S. national defense, if the economic dispute deteriorates further.