Coal plants get a regulatory lifeline. Nuclear fuel gets strategic realignment. Transmission expands around data center load.

Coal-fired generators facing retirement just got breathing room, while the federal government is stirring the nuclear fuel chain to reduce foreign dependency. At the same time, regional grid planners and regulators are rewriting who pays for wires and where capacity flows. Reliability and cost allocation are emerging as the true grid battlegrounds of 2026.

The Environmental Protection Agency announced plans this week to formally loosen Mercury and Air Toxics Standards (MATS) for coal-fired power plants, following earlier two-year compliance exemptions granted to dozens of facilities. The revision would relax limits on mercury and other hazardous air pollutants, reducing expensive retrofit requirements that had been accelerating retirement decisions across portions of the coal fleet.

Under the current rule, aging coal units have faced costly pollution control upgrades or retirement, contributing to announced retirements and conversion plans in multiple regions. Coal still provides roughly 16–20% of U.S. electricity annually, and in several load pockets — particularly in **PJM and MISO winter peaks — it remains a critical dispatchable resource. By lowering compliance costs at the margin, the EPA’s move effectively improves the short-term economics of units that were being pushed toward retirement.

Why It Matters - Capacity margins in several organized markets have tightened as electrification, industrial growth, and data center buildouts push demand forecasts upward. Reducing regulatory costs changes retirement math and can defer the need for replacement capacity or costly transmission upgrades.

GridTake - Coal isn’t coming back as the growth story. It’s being preserved as reliability insurance. When policymakers worry about adequacy faster than interconnection queues can clear, the cheapest megawatt is often the one already built.

The Department of Energy announced plans to rebuild domestic uranium enrichment capacity, partnering in part with French nuclear fuel firm Orano, allocating roughly $900 million toward establishing new enrichment infrastructure in Tennessee. The initiative is aimed at reducing U.S. dependence on foreign enrichment services as global uranium markets tighten and geopolitical risk grows.

The U.S. operates nearly 30% of the world’s nuclear power capacity while controlling just ~1% of global uranium reserves. Historically, enrichment services and fuel imports have leaned heavily on foreign partners, including Russia and Kazakhstan. With a planned ban on Russian enriched uranium imports by 2028, federal planners see domestic enrichment as critical to long-term nuclear viability. Global production has lagged consumption for years, drawing down inventories and elevating contract prices.

Why It Matters - Nuclear provides roughly 18–19% of U.S. electricity and more than half of zero-carbon baseload generation. Fuel-cycle fragility has quietly become one of the largest strategic risks to the existing nuclear fleet.

GridTake - This isn’t about announcing new reactors. It’s about making sure the ones we already rely on can run without geopolitical choke points. In a world of rising demand and global friction, fuel sovereignty is grid strategy.

FERC approved a “Transmission Security Agreement” framework between Commonwealth Edison (ComEd) and large customers, including hyperscale data center operators. The structure allows ComEd to require upfront financial security to cover potential transmission upgrade costs associated with new large loads before upgrades are built.

Commissioners framed the agreements as protections for existing ratepayers in the event large customers withdraw or scale back after costly network investments. As utility and ISO planners know, large loads can trigger hundreds of millions in required upgrades to substation capacity, local reinforcements, and high-voltage lines.

Why It Matters - Large loads can trigger massive network investments, and cost allocation shapes whether those expenses fall on hyperscalers or residential ratepayers. As data center growth accelerates, the financial architecture of interconnection becomes as important as the engineering.

GridTake - Megawatts get headlines. Cost recovery mechanisms decide who pays. Reliability politics increasingly hinge on contract fine print.

The PJM Interconnection board approved an $11.8 billion transmission expansion plan as part of its Regional Transmission Expansion Plan (RTEP), including a major backbone concept designed to move roughly 3,000 MW into Northern Virginia’s Loudoun County — the center of U.S. data center density.

The plan consists of high-voltage reinforcement and new line segments to address reliability needs and load growth forecasts that have surged in recent years. Loudoun County and surrounding regions have become a global hub for hyperscale computing load, prompting multiple round of transmission upgrades and capacity planning revisions.

Why It Matters - Transmission has become the primary bottleneck between load growth and generation adequacy. Without new high-voltage capacity, even available generation can’t reliably reach demand centers.

GridTake - The grid is being redesigned around server racks. AI may be digital, but its footprint is steel towers and right-of-way fights.

Zeo Energy signed a memorandum of understanding to develop approximately 280 MW of generation capacity to support a Utah data center project. The plan includes solar plus battery storage expected to meet an estimated 60–80% of annual energy needs, alongside plans to secure 300+ MW of natural gas-fired generation by 2027.

This hybrid structure — renewables for the sustainability story paired with firm thermal backup for dispatchability — reflects an increasingly common approach among hyperscale facilities. Utah’s regulatory environment, land availability, and proximity to Western transmission corridors have made it a secondary hub for large-load development.

Why It Matters - Data centers require 24/7 power reliability that intermittent resources alone cannot guarantee without significant overbuild or storage depth. Hybrid procurement models are becoming the default architecture for large-load reliability.

GridTake - Solar signs the press release. Gas signs the insurance policy. The market keeps rediscovering physics.

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