Twitxy Saved

Jesse D. Jenkins

Verified account This account is verified. Learn more

@JesseJenkins

Professor of Energy Systems Engineering & Policy @EPrinceton & @AndlingerCenter. Co-founder Firma Power. Advisor to climate tech companies & investors.
Princeton, NJ linkedin.com/in/jessedjenki… Joined October 2008
11K Following 107K Followers 96K Posts

Latest posts 5

Pinned post

Jesse D. Jenkins Verified account @JesseJenkins
Utilities are rushing to add supply for an unprecedented wave of new large loads. Many now let large customers bring their own capacity, so new load connects sooner and existing customers are protected from rate impacts. Bring-your-own-capacity (BYOC) rules have rapidly gone from novelty to norm and are now the fastest path to reliable grid power.

Firma Power is the Bring Your Own Capacity company. We're the first company purpose-built to the deliver portfolios of clean, quiet, load-enabling power over the wires to meet utility BYOC requirements and get data centers connected faster, simpler and cheaper than alternatives like behind-the-meter gas.

And this week, we're featured in @FastCompany , in an excellent profile written by @adele_peters:

"The U.S. is on track to add a record 86 gigawatts of new wind, solar, and battery storage capacity this year—roughly the size of the U.K.’s entire grid. And there’s far more clean energy in the pipeline, with low-cost proposed projects that could help meet the surging demand from data centers. So why are data centers increasingly turning to polluting gas plants instead of clean energy?

A startup called Firma Power says that the issue isn’t cost, speed, or reliability, but the difficulty of assembling enough clean energy from a patchwork of projects—a problem that it is trying to solve.

Securing enough reliable, clean electricity for a massive new data center is complex. But Firma’s software calculates what a proposed data center needs, and then automatically searches through proposed clean energy projects to suggest a portfolio that could support it. An analysis that might otherwise take a team months can now take minutes. Firma then does the hard work of pulling all of the clean energy projects together, and data center developers can sign a single contract.

The company says that the process can get data centers power faster than building new gas-fired power plants—and it can compete on cost. And at a time when Americans really don’t like data centers, using clean power could make it more feasible for some projects to be greenlit by communities."
29 replies 15 reposts 79 likes 9.6K views View on X
Jesse D. Jenkins Verified account @JesseJenkins
At Firma Power, we have had two core theses about the future of the data center power market:

1) Bring your own (new) capacity (BYOC), where data centers contract bilaterally and pay directly for the new capacity needed to serve their load, is the best way to protect other electricity customers from rate impacts and ensure data centers pay their own way.

2) Clean, quiet power from wind, solar and storage, delivered over the wires offers better economics, reliability AND social acceptance than loud, polluting on-site gas generation.

Both were true before this week's historic election outcomes, and the evolving politics of data centers over coming years will continue to underscore the importance of both points.

Firma Power is the clean, quiet, BYOC solution the data center industry needs. Find out more and contact us at FirmaPower.com.
firmapower.com Firma Power | The fastest path to power Firma delivers portfolios of clean, quiet, load-enabling power over the wires to data centers. We identify the best mix of ready-to-build, grid-connected resources in minutes, not months, and supply...
Michael Thomas Verified account @curious_founder 5d
Tuesday's election results will have sweeping impacts on America's data center boom.

Our team at Cleanview analyzed the data and found that newly elected governors could pause 41% of America’s planned data centers.

Here are some more takeaways from last night's results:

On Tuesday, voters elected governors and passed local measures that will change the course of the AI infrastructure boom. But much of the early coverage has been misleading or wrong.

Tuesday’s results don’t signal the end of the data center boom. They will, however, likely bring a pause in some of the largest markets and new regulations across the country—even in traditionally laissez-faire states like Texas.

159 GW of planned data centers are in states where the new governor backs a pause. That's 41% of the country's planned data center pipeline.

Another 69.2 GW (18%) is in states where the winner wants to change tax breaks or other rules but hasn’t backed a pause.

This week’s elections will also impact the power projects that data centers depend on, likely bringing more clean energy in some states and fewer on-site gas plants in others.

On-site gas plants will likely face new rules and delays. To build an on-site gas plant, a developer needs an air permit. That approval often goes through offices controlled by the executive branch, which means new Democratic governors could delay or block those permits.

Developers may need to buy more clean energy. A number of candidates campaigned on a promise to make data centers buy more clean energy.

David Crowley in Wisconsin called for 100% renewable energy as a condition for communities that accept a project. Haaland’s plan calls for self-built renewables. Michigan Democrats have proposed a bill requiring 90% clean procurement.

Another takeaway from last night: Local elections went overwhelmingly against data centers.

Data centers were directly on the ballot in 41 local elections across the country. Some ballot initiatives proposed outright bans, while others proposed temporary pauses. All of the races that have been called went against data centers.

Many questions remain about how many newly elected officials will follow through with their pauses, how long they'll last, which projects will be affected, and what new guardrails would look like.

We're planning to continue to cover this over the coming months. If you're interested in reading our analysis subscribe to the Cleanview newsletter or follow along here.
View quoted post on X
12 replies 6 reposts 58 likes 6.8K views View on X
Jesse D. Jenkins Verified account @JesseJenkins
Gas power plants are not cheap. They're not going to help you win over the neighbors and community hosting a data center. Most of them are booked out until 2031 even if you wanted one. And as Anthropic noted in their S1, they leave you exposed to gas price volatility. There's a better way: firmapower.com
firmapower.com Firma Power | The fastest path to power Firma delivers portfolios of clean, quiet, load-enabling power over the wires to data centers. We identify the best mix of ready-to-build, grid-connected resources in minutes, not months, and supply...
Nat Bullard Verified account @NatBullard Oct 28
New pre-approval request for a combined cycle gas plant in Oklahoma.
$2,315/kW
Previous two units on the same site:
$738/kW
$1,038/kW
(@Halcyon clients got it first)
View quoted post on X
9 replies 20 reposts 102 likes 8.7K views View on X
Jesse D. Jenkins Verified account @JesseJenkins
Modeling permitting reform is devilishly hard. Take any models as indicative and uncertain. But the folks at @RFF are some of the most careful modelers and honest brokers out there.
Callie Patteson @CalliePatteson Oct 29
Resources For the Future has released its modeling on the Senate permitting bill.

Top findings:
- Increase transmission capacity by 30% by 2041
- Would facilitate 60GW of clean energy in 2028
- Reduce carbon emissions by 1.8 gigatonnes through 2041
rff.org/publications/i…
View quoted post on X