Load Growth: What States Are Doing to Accommodate Increasing Electric Demand

After many years of relatively flat electricity demand, the U.S. is now anticipating dramatic load growth, largely due to rapid deployment of data centers, electrification, and large new industrial and manufacturing loads. Although load growth has quickly become a subject of concern in many states, there is significant geographic variation in its scale, timing, and sources. This is reflected in the variety of state actions to accommodate load growth.  

This Clean Energy States Alliance (CESA) report surveys the causes of electricity load growth and outlines what the states are doing to meet the challenge. State actions include increasing new generation, delaying retirement of legacy generators, exploring new generation technologies, building out transmission capacity, developing demand-side solutions, and taking steps to limit cost impacts on customers. Importantly, states that have established clean energy and decarbonization targets are looking to meet new, higher electricity peak demand while maintaining progress towards these goals.