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This article was originally published by  E&E News.

By Nick Sobczyk

Power sector officials sounded alarms to the Energy and Commerce Committee on Wednesday about rising energy demand from AI and electrification.

• Democrats and Republicans still fundamentally disagree about the exact role of state and federal regulators in connecting projects to the grid; the definition of "dispatchable" power; and the IRA tax credits.

• "In the short term, wind and solar, because of supply chains and [other factors], we're going to need it. But we also need to make sure we don't disincentivize building power to win this battle," said full committee Chair Brett Guthrie.

• Balderson noted during the hearing that PJM has its own initiative, similar to his legislation, to expedite interconnection of "shovel-ready" projects that can boost reliability.
• But PJM official Asim Haque told the committee that the initiative includes storage and nuclear projects.
• "There's been a misnomer out there that these are going to be effectively fossil resources, and that is actually not true," Haque said.

• Todd Brickhouse, CEO of Basin Electric Power Cooperative, said the nonprofit is projecting 3.3% load growth over 10 years, but that "could nearly double" if new data centers and crypto operations come online as expected.

• Brickhouse told the panel that he supports repealing EPA's power plant greenhouse gas emissions rules — a President Trump priority — as well as the IRA's tech neutral energy tax credits and direct pay options.
• And here's something that could ring in GOP ears: "If there is a repeal of the IRA tech-neutral tax credit for nuclear, or any impact on the Loan Programs Office, there will not be a nuclear renaissance in the United States," Duke university grid researcher Tyler Norris told the panel.

• If anything takes a bite out of this issue during this Congress, it might be an environmental permitting overhaul.