Power, Energy and Water Reports

How Should Utilities Prioritize AI Investment?

April 2025

Teri Viswanath, CoBank’s lead economist for power, energy and water, recently interviewed Casey Werth, the global leader of the energy industry at IBM.

Made in America, Unless it’s Not — Tariffs and Transformers

April 2025

Even before COVID and the U.S.-China trade war, U.S. supply chains were already reshoring manufacturing. But that process hasn’t occurred fast enough to curb the dependency on imported critical components for transformers produced domestically.

How Co-ops Can Mitigate Their Risk from Data Center Growth Webinar Summary

February 2025

An abbreviated version of our webinar interview with Dr. Arman Shehabi and Andy Satchwell from the U.S. Department of Energy Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratories

The Co-Location Conundrum

January 2025

Data centers are the foundation of a digital economy but powering them is this decade’s challenge.

Assessing the Cost of Serving Data Center Load in Ohio

November 2024

All eyes in the utility and data center worlds are on Ohio, as a precedent-setting electricity rate proposal from AEP plays out in the next few weeks.

Could Data Centers be the Catalyst for Modernizing the U.S. Electric Grid?

September 2024

A new age of electricity growth is here. Data center demand growth is the most visible sign of the changing times, testing the ability of utility suppliers to keep pace.

Utilities Embrace Copiloting with Artificial Intelligence, Parachute-Free

April 2024

Generative artificial intelligence is having a “throw everything at the wall” moment, with the market’s current enthusiasm similar to the halcyon days of the dotcom era.

Net Zero Transportation, Charting a Course for Low Carbon Fuels

March 2024

From farm to fuel, decarbonization demands requires radical partnerships.

What Successful GRIP Funding Applications Have in Common

January 2024

To address the need for increased grid flexibility and resilience, the U.S. Department of Energy selected 58 projects across 44 states last October to receive $3.9 Billion through the Grid Resilience and Innovation Partnerships

Get Ready for Carbon Capture’s Second Act

October 2023

The largest climate policy contribution of the Inflation Reduction Act will likely be the market incentives tied to carbon capture for high-emitting industries. While competition, replacement and regulation will continue to decarbonize other segments of the economy, the hardest-to-abate industries would see little progress without the significant government support that this legislation provides.

Gasoline Demand Has Peaked, and That’s a Problem for Diesel Production

May 2023

AAA projects a whopping 37.1 million road-tripping Americans will journey 50 miles or more from their homes this Memorial Day weekend, the third most since 2000, when AAA started tracking holiday travel. However, despite upbeat signs like this, the nation’s peak gasoline demand is squarely in the rear-view mirror.

Is This the Beginning of the End for Cheap Shale Gas?

April 2023

Commodity traders often say that the cure for high prices is high prices. In other words, during periods of supply shortages or tight balances, sellers will increase their supply and buyers will cut back or adopt substitutes.

The Fix for the Electric Grid’s Mid-life Crisis Might be in the Garage

February 2023

Considered one of the greatest engineering feats of the 20th century, the U.S. electric grid is now experiencing something of a mid-life crisis in the early innings of the 21st century.

Fluctuating Electricity Supply and Demand Requires Distribution Co-ops be Steady but Agile

August 2022

The electricity sector no longer lives on a one-way street: U.S. consumers are fundamentally reshaping the electric power industry by demanding clean energy and widely adopting grid-edge technologies.

Webinar on Demand: The Future of the Power Grid Is Here

June 2022

Increased customer needs and operating risks are pushing aging electric transmission and distribution systems past their limits, often with painful results for communities. In fact, the average American home endured more than eight hours without power in 2021, more than double the outage time five years ago.

Garage of the Future: Supporting America’s New Re-Fueling Station

March 2022

The shift toward electric transportation will take more than just a dealership sale. Our research and discussions with electric cooperatives last year revealed a need for cooperation amongst co-ops and, more broadly, collaboration along the entire supply chain.

From Underdogs to Leaders: Co-ops in Energy Transition

January 2022

With the recent passage of the U.S. landmark $1.2 trillion federal infrastructure spending package to shore up the country’s roads, bridges, pipes, ports and transmission grid, now is an opportune time to reflect on the state of our rural electric infrastructure.

Co-op EVolution — A New Era of Mobile Energy, Off-Grid Access to Electricity

June 2021

Given promising signs of a return to normal for the country and the prospect of even more motorists hitting the road this year, it felt like the right time to celebrate a new CoBank initiative dedicated to electric vehicles. 

Co-op EVolution — Bridging the Rural-Urban Divide on EV Adoption

June 2021

Given new commitments by car manufacturers, expanded policy incentives, and ambitious build-out of charging infrastructure, electric vehicles could make up 10% of all new car sales by 2025 – a five-fold increase from current levels.

(Re)Considering (De)Regulation and Resiliency

May 2021

A different market design probably would not have averted the crisis in Texas.  But there is a clear need to protect consumers from these price spikes. 

Achieving Biden’s Climate Moonshot Requires Heavy Lifting by Electric Power Industry

May 2021

President Biden's new greenhouse gas emissions target for the U.S. could be viewed as the current generation’s moonshot opportunity for addressing climate change.

The Power Sector’s Tough Lessons Learned This Winter

April 2021

The February 2021 winter storm and widespread power outages have raised new concerns about the future of grid resilience.

Highlights from PowerXchange: Impact of the Pandemic on Electric Industry Transitions

March 2021

One of the more thought provoking sessions I attended at this year’s NRECA PowerXchange conference focused on how the events of 2020 will likely accelerate transformation for the U.S. electricity industry. 

The Economics of DER and the Rise of the U.S. Prosumer

February 2021

Over the past decade, retail electricity prices have continued to rise despite declining costs associated with generating electricity.