NWPPA Morning Brief

NWPPA Morning Brief - Thursday, May 28, 2026

Share episode

Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.

0:00 | 13:48

NWPPA Morning Brief — Thursday, May 28, 2026

In today's brief:

Top Federal Developments

Top Regional / State Developments

AI and Large Load Demand Radar

Western Market Structure Signal

Advocacy and Legal Signal Scan

Pilot notice: AI-generated daily briefing. Verify before acting on it.

Feel free to reach out if you have comments or concerns.

SPEAKER_01

Before we begin, a quick note. The NWPPA morning brief is Generative AI, daily intelligence on the federal and Western developments shaping public power. It isn't human-reviewed before publication, so treat it like any AI tool and verify what you'll act on or cite. Sources are in the show notes. You're listening to the NWPPA morning brief. On today's brief, FERC Chair Sweat's June large load interconnection proposal moves closer as tech companies scramble to catch up on grid rules. All five NRC commissioners defend an $892 million budget built around advanced reactor licensing. DOE opens a pathway for surplus weapons plutonium as commercial reactor fuel. Oregon regulators reject Pacific Corps' interim rate increase, and NERC revises its ERCOT summer forecast downward on data center curtailability. Plus, a cybersecurity warning with direct implications for utility physical security teams. Today's briefing is brought to you by the Northwest Public Power Association. Stronger workforce, greater influence, informed decisions, serving community-owned electric utilities across the West since 1940.

SPEAKER_00

The story I'm watching most closely today is FERC's June Large Load Interconnection Proposal. Federal preemption of the connection process, shifting authority over interconnection sequencing, and cost allocation away from state regulators to the federal level is the option on the table that carries the most structural risk for Western public power. If that option advances, it could fundamentally alter who controls cost allocation decisions when a hyperscale load comes into your territory.

SPEAKER_01

And the fact that Google, OpenAI, and Microsoft spent two months in face-to-face meetings with the Commission after being told they don't understand how the grid works, that tells you the tech industry has decided this is a fight worth showing up for. Western public power utilities should be in those rooms too.

SPEAKER_00

Let's start with the NRC budget hearing. All five NRC commissioners testified before the House Energy and Commerce Energy Subcommittee this week, the first full commission appearance before that subcommittee in three years. The proposed fiscal year 2027 budget is $892.3 million, centered on advanced reactor licensing, workforce recruitment, and an internal review of agency rules. Chairman Latta framed the hearing around whether the regulatory system can move efficiently without compromising public health and safety, and NRC independence drew repeated questions from members.

SPEAKER_01

For utilities tracking small modular reactor pathways, particularly those watching UAMP's affiliated advanced reactor timelines, the two variables that matter here are the budget level and the pace of licensing reform. Both affect whether SMR project economics hold as currently modeled. The hearing didn't resolve either question, but putting all five commissioners in front of Congress simultaneously signals the political pressure on the agency to accelerate is real and it's intensifying.

SPEAKER_00

Shifting to the DOE plutonium story. DOE has moved to allow up to five companies to use surplus weapons-grade plutonium as fuel for commercial reactors. This is a significant departure from the disposal track that material was previously on. The relevance is fuel supply. Advanced reactor developers have been working around constraints in conventional, low-enriched uranium supply chains, and a domestic plutonium pathway could change the procurement picture.

SPEAKER_01

The question I'd be asking if I were running resource planning for a utility, considering an advanced reactor offtake, is whether this actually accelerates fuel availability or whether non-proliferation review and fabrication capacity become the new bottleneck. The DOE action opens a door. It doesn't guarantee anyone walks through it on a useful timeline.

SPEAKER_00

Moving to the FERC Pipeline Blanket Certificate proposal. FERC issued a notice of proposed rulemaking that would roughly double the cost thresholds under its blanket certificate program, the streamlined approval path that lets pipeline operators build smaller projects without case-by-case commission review. Larger pipeline expansions could now move under the faster process, responding to demand pressure from data center load and gas-fired generation buildout.

SPEAKER_01

For Western public power utilities that own gas-fired generation or depend on gas electric coordination, the practical read is that incremental pipeline capacity additions in your delivery footprint may move faster with less individual project scrutiny. Whether that's a benefit depends heavily on how your gas supply portfolio is structured and where you sit relative to constrained capacity corridors. This is a notice of proposed rulemaking. Comment period comes before any final rule.

SPEAKER_00

Over to Oregon, the Oregon Public Utility Commission rejected Pacific Corps' request for a temporary 2.8% rate increase that was scheduled to take effect June 4th. Pacific Corps had argued the interim increase was needed to address financial pressure and credit rating concerns, and that it would reduce the size of potential 2027 rate adjustments while pushing their effective date from April to July 2027. The Commission found no justification to approve it.

SPEAKER_01

That posture matters when your customers share a market boundary with Pacific Core.

SPEAKER_00

Turning to the Duke Energy Storage Program, South Carolina regulators approved Duke's PowerShare Storage Program, which lets non-residential customers earn bill credits for making their behind-the-meter battery systems available to the utility as flexible grid resources during peak periods. The structure is built around predictable participation incentives rather than performance-based dispatch payments.

SPEAKER_01

For Western public power utilities designing demand-response tariffs that incorporate customer-sided storage, this gives you a recent regulatory precedent on bill credit mechanics and eligible customer classes. The honest question to ask is whether the bill credit model generates enough enrollment to justify the program design and administrative overhead. That math varies significantly by service territory and customer mix.

SPEAKER_00

On the pricing front, Front Month Henry Hub Natural Gas Futures were trading at $3.16 per million BTU on May 28th, up from $2.96. NYMEX WTI Front Month Crude Futures were trading at $90.75 per barrel, up from $89.84.

SPEAKER_01

On the capital side, the 10-year Treasury yield was 4.50% on May 26th, down from 4.56%. COMEX Copper settled at $6.33 per pound on May 27th, up from $6.30.

SPEAKER_00

Next up, the NERC ERCOT forecast revision. NERC cut its 2026 Summer Net Internal Demand Forecast for ERCOT by 3.7 gigawatts, 4.6% compared to last summer, specifically because more data centers in Texas can now be curtailed during peak periods. NERC's broader demand response data shows availability up 172.3% in Cirque Central, up 54.9% in ERCOT, and up 25.8% in SPP, while New England dropped 13.3%.

SPEAKER_01

The planning signal here is direct. If your large load interconnection agreements don't clearly distinguish firm from curtailable demand, your resource adequacy modeling may be overstating capacity need, or understating it depending on how those contracts are written. NERC is also projecting 224 gigawatts of peak demand growth, or 24%, across North America over the next decade. The curtailability question is going to be central to every resource plan filed in the next few years.

SPEAKER_00

The other major story today is the FERC Large Load Interconnection proposal. FERC Chair Sweat told industry executives in March that hyperscalers don't speak FERC and that their complaints about utilities revealed a fundamental lack of understanding of how the grid functions. Since then, Google, OpenAI, Microsoft, and others have been in a two-month sprint of face-to-face meetings with the Commission ahead of FERC's June release of a formal proposal.

SPEAKER_01

The most contested option is federal preemption of the connection process, shifting authority over interconnection sequencing and cost allocation away from state PUCs to the federal level. State officials oppose it. For Western public power utilities, the central question is who ends up holding cost allocation authority for large load-driven transmission and distribution upgrades? If the answer is FERC rather than state regulators, the implications for how those costs flow to existing ratepayers are significant and not yet resolved.

SPEAKER_00

Shifting to the Dominion Next Era merger, Northern Virginia lawmakers are pressing affordability questions about Next Era's proposed $67 billion acquisition of Dominion Energy, a deal that would create the world's largest regulated electric utility. Next era is seeking FERC and Virginia State Corporation Commission approval on a 12 to 18 month closing timeline. As of May 26th, the Virginia SCC application had not yet been filed.

SPEAKER_01

For Western utilities, this is a precedent watch on how regulators evaluate scale efficiency claims against ratepayer protection arguments in a load environment dominated by data centers. How Virginia and FERC handle the affordability question here will shape how similar arguments get made and assessed in future Western proceedings.

SPEAKER_00

Moving to the Powder River Energy Wildfire Mitigation filing, Powder River Energy Corporation, a Wyoming electric cooperative, filed its 2025 Wildfire Mitigation Plan with the Wyoming Public Service Commission. The plan covers vegetation management standards, infrastructure inspection, public safety power shutoff protocols, procedures for de-energizing lines under elevated wildfire risk, and post-event restoration procedures. No rate review or cost recovery is requested in this filing.

SPEAKER_01

For Western public power utilities in wildfire-prone territory, the public comment record Powder River Energy is building here is a useful structural reference. How non-investor-owned utilities document and present wildfire mitigation plans for regulatory approval is still an evolving practice area. And this Wyoming process adds a concrete example to that body of work.

SPEAKER_00

On the cybersecurity front, a few items worth flagging for your security teams. The FBI issued a flash alert warning that the Russia-linked Silent Ransom Group is physically sending operatives into U.S. offices, targeting law firms most recently to insert USB drives and exfiltrate data after social engineering calls to employees. This is not ransomware deployment. They stage stolen files on cloud platforms and threaten publication. The physical intrusion vector is the new element.

SPEAKER_01

Also this week, CrowdStrike, Google, and Shadow Server disrupted the Glassworm botnet, which had compromised more than 300 open source GitHub repositories in a supply chain attack affecting developers globally. That's on the radar for any utility IT or OT team relying on open source components in monitoring or back office systems. And Charter Communications confirmed a breach after a threat group claimed 42 million customer records stolen. Worth tracking for utilities assessing telecom vendor and broadband partner exposure.

SPEAKER_00

The one to watch as we close today is the FERC June Large Load Interconnection proposal. What comes out of that release will determine the cost allocation framework for transmission and distribution upgrades driven by hyperscale demand for years. The federal preemption option is the one that could structurally shift decision-making authority away from the state and local level. If that provision survives into a final rule, the implications for how public power utilities manage large load negotiations and who ultimately bears upgrade costs are fundamental, not marginal.

SPEAKER_01

The two-month lobbying sprint by major tech companies before a single proposal has even been released tells you everything about the stakes. Western public power utilities should have formal positions ready before the comment window opens. The time to shape this rule is now, not after the proposal lands, and the tech industry has already defined the terms of the debate.

SPEAKER_00

Today's briefing was dense with federal structural questions. NRC licensing tempo, DOE fuel pathways, FERC pipeline permitting, and the large load interconnection proposal all moving simultaneously. The through line is that federal agencies are reshaping the operating environment for Western utilities across multiple dimensions at once.

SPEAKER_01

Keep the lights on.