CEI’s Paige Lambermont testified this week before the House Science Subcommittee on policies driving U.S. AI growth
“Consumer Regulated Electricity (CRE) is an opportunity to create an alternative to the traditional grid pathway for new customers that are willing to pay for their own electricity. CRE would allow for privately financed, off-grid electric utilities to serve customers including data centers. These utilities would be physically islanded from the broader power grid.6This would allow companies who want power quickly to avoid the traditional utilities queue, while bearing the costs of their own infrastructure.
CRE provides flexibility and speed to companies working on innovative projects, while providing cost insulation for ratepayers. For this to be possible, individual states would need to pass legislation exempting islanded utilities from their definition of a public utility. This policy innovation has already become law in New Hampshire and related legislation has been introduced in several other states. At the Federal level, the DATA Act, S.3585, introduced by Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR) would enable CRE by clarifying that CRE utilities are exempt from federal regulation as public utilities.”
