Eolian in the News
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Meta, X, Microsoft sidestep climate goals as they sprint to power artificial intelligence with new natural gas plants.
February 23, 2025
By Evan Halper
Tech and energy companies are pushing their ambitious green-energy goals aside and rushing to build natural gas plants across the country, amid escalating demand for power and Washington’s changing political winds.
Clean energy pioneer Microsoft is looking to new gas generation to power a $3.3 billion data center project in Wisconsin. The giant power company NextEra, which during the Biden era unveiled “the most ambitious carbon-emissions-reduction goal ever set by an energy producer” has since the Jan. 20 inauguration been more eager to talk about its plans to expand natural gas generation.
Meta late last year announced a 4-million-square-foot data center in the Louisiana delta, which filings show will be powered by new natural gas turbines. Even the investment company that led a 2021 shareholder revolt at ExxonMobil over its sluggish embrace of cleaner energy, Engine No. 1, is doubling down on fossil fuel expansions to power the explosive growth of artificial intelligence.
GOP-led measure that passed the Senate this week could put needed solar and wind power at risk.
By Sara DiNatale
May 9, 2025
Republican-led legislation that barreled through the state Senate has the solar and wind industries tied in knots — and the Texas grid boss can see why.
During a discussion with reporters this week, Electric Reliability Council of Texas CEO Pablo Vegas said bills that call for costly back-up power requirements on renewables could push them out of the market and slow new development.
“It could cause certain resources not to be able to operate,” Vegas said. “That’s a risk.”
Senate Bill 715, which was approved Thursday by the Senate, could put a massive strain on wind and solar farms at a time the grid is facing an unprecedented demand spike, largely from data centers and AI computing firms flocking to Texas.
The legislation is the latest layer resulting from fundamental discrepancies between GOP lawmakers and energy experts over the role of renewables in Texas. Under the proposed law, solar and wind farms would have to pay gas-fired power plants or battery systems to “firm” up their power supply when the sun isn’t shining or the wind isn’t blowing.
READ THE REST OF THE STORY AT SAN ANTONIO EXPRESS-NEWS
Domestic battery manufacturing and deployments have been growing fast — but Trump’s tariff wars and looming budget cuts threaten to derail progress.
Companies making and deploying lithium-ion batteries in the U.S. recently gathered in Washington, D.C., to ask the federal government for the policy support they say they need. Their request came alongside a big promise: to cumulatively spend $100 billion by 2030 to build a self-sufficient, all-American grid battery industry.
“Within five years, and with $100 billion in investment, we can satisfy 100% of U.S. demand for battery storage,” said Jason Grumet, CEO of the American Clean Power Association, a trade group.
“This is unquestionably an ambitious commitment, but it is absolutely achievable if the private and public sectors work together,” he said. The $100 billion promise represents a major increase in the $10 billion to $15 billion that the American Clean Power Association estimates was invested in U.S. grid battery manufacturing and deployment last year.
As recently as a few months ago, industry analysts largely agreed that a domestic ramp-up on the scale of what Grumet proposes was at least possible, if not inevitable. Lucrative federal tax credits for companies that build and deploy clean energy technology within the nation’s borders have helped close the price gap between U.S.-made batteries and those made in China, the world’s main supplier of lithium-ion battery modules, cells, and materials.
By Claire Hao
May 13, 2025
The Texas power grid is expected to sail through the first major heat wave of the year without issue, largely thanks to its diverse and growing mix of power plants and renewable energy.
That’s an observation energy professionals closely following the Texas Legislature made with some irony, as state lawmakers have proposed numerous billsto constrain the very same renewable energy that's expected to help keep the power grid afloat this week.
"If there is not a crisis (this week), it's in part because of these resources that right now get considered to be not important or not having very much value,” said Aaron Zubaty, CEO of Eolian, a California-based company with battery storage projects in Texas.
An early Texas heat wave
Electricity demand increases during hot weather as Texans tend to crank up the air-conditioning when the heat arrives. And this week, extreme heat is expected to arrive unseasonably early: Temperatures are forecast in the mid-to-high 90s for the Houston area, while San Antonio and Austin could eclipse 100 degrees.
The administration blocked an electricity plant in Michigan from closing, overturning a plan by a utility and local officials.
June 1, 2025
By Evan Halper and Jake Spring
An emergency order last month from Washington rattled Michigan regulators: The Trump administration reversed the state’s plan to retire an aging power plant, forcing it to remain open and continue burning coal.
Michigan and the plant’s operator have mounds of evidence that closing the 63-year-old J.H. Campbell plant on the eastern shore of Lake Michigan won’t create a shortage of electricity. But the Trump administration adopted a different view, claiming the Midwest is overly dependent on intermittent wind and solar power. Energy Secretary Chris Wright exercised rarely used federal authority to block the closure, which had been scheduled for May 31. His order requires the plant to continue operating for three more months — and possibly longer.
The move will collectively increase electric bills for ratepayers in the Midwest by tens of millions of dollars, according to Michigan officials. More broadly, it was seen as an opening salvo in President Donald Trump’s effort to reverse America’s transition to clean energy and restore the nation’s dependence on burning fossil fuels. The administration’s strategy includes using federal power to overturn the plans of local utilities and regulators.
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