Big Tech wants to plug data centers right into power plants. Utilities say it’s not fair

Looking for a quick fix for their fast-growing electricity diets, tech giants are increasingly looking to strike deals with power plant owners to plug in directly, avoiding a long and expensive process of hooking into a fraying electric grid that serves everyone else. It's raising questions over whether diverting power to higher-paying customers will leave enough for others and whether it's fair to excuse big power users from paying for the grid. Federal regulators are trying to figure out what to do about it, and quickly. Front and center is the data center that Amazon’s cloud computing subsidiary, Amazon Web Services (AWS), is building next to the Susquehanna nuclear plant in eastern Pennsylvania. The arrangement between the plant's owners and AWS is the first such to come before the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC). For now, FERC has rejected a deal that could eventually send 960 megawatts—about 40% of the plant's capacity—to the data center. That's enough to power more than a half-million homes. Big Tech also wants to stand up their centers fast. But tech's voracious appetite for energy comes at a time when the power supply is already strained by efforts to shift away from planet-warming fossil fuels. Plugging directly into a power plant would take years off their development timelines. The profit potential is one that other nuclear plant operators, in particular, are embracing after years of financial distress and frustration with how they are paid in the broader electricity markets. Many say they have been forced to compete in some markets against a flood of cheap natural gas as well as state-subsidized solar and wind energy. Power plant owners also say the arrangement benefits the wider public, by bypassing the costly buildout of long power lines and leaving more transmission capacity on the grid for everyone else. Susquehanna’s owners say the data center won't be on the grid and shouldn't have to pay to maintain it. But critics contend that the power plant itself is benefiting from taxpayer subsidies and ratepayer-subsidized services, and shouldn't be able to strike deals with private customers that could increase costs for others. This article was provided by The Associated Press.