The United States Department of Energy (DOE) has awarded a $1.6-billion loan guarantee for projects by American Electric Power Co Inc (AEP) to upgrade nearly 5,000 miles of transmission lines across five states. The projects cover Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, Oklahoma, and West Virginia. “The upgrades supported by this financing will replace existing transmission lines in existing rights-of-way with new lines capable of carrying more energy”, AEP said in a press release. “Energy demand is increasing across AEP’s footprint. Customers have committed to business expansions or additions that will require an additional 24 gigawatts of electricity demand by the end of the decade”, the Columbus, Ohio-based company said. “The upgrades have primarily been identified to support data center, artificial intelligence and manufacturing development and represent generational load growth on the electric system. “Seeking federal funding opportunities and implementing rate structures that ensure new large customers are supporting infrastructure investment are some of the ways AEP is working to reduce rate impacts for customers”. It estimates the projects to save customers $275 million in financing costs over the life of the loan through lower bills. “Approximately 100 miles of transmission lines across Ohio and Oklahoma are the first projects to be supported by the loan guarantee”, AEP said. This is “the first closed loan guarantee under the Energy Dominance Financing (EDF) Program created by the Working Families Tax Cut, also known as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act”, DOE said separately. “All electric utilities receiving an EDF loan must provide assurance to DOE that financial benefits from the financing will be passed onto the customers of that utility”, DOE added. The AEP guarantee “was carefully evaluated under the new LPO [Loan Programs Office] guidance directed by Secretary Wright”, DOE added. Funding Cancelations Days earlier, DOE announced it had terminated nearly 350 financial

Brent crude is set to dip its feet into the high $50ies per barrel this week, Skandinaviska Enskilda Banken AB (SEB) Chief Commodities Analyst Bjarne Schieldrop warned in a SEB report sent to Rigzone on Monday.   “Brent crude fell 2.3 percent over the week to Friday,” Schieldrop highlighted in the report. “It closed the week at $61.29 per barrel, a slight gain on the day, but also traded to a low of $60.14 per barrel that same day and just barely avoided trading into the $50ies per barrel,” he added. “This week looks set for Brent crude to dip its feet in the $50ies per barrel,” he continued. In the report, Schieldrop said front-end backwardation has been on a weakening foot and warned that “it is now about to fully disappear”.  “The lowest point of the crude oil curve has also moved steadily lower and lower and its discount to the five year contract is now $6.8 per barrel – a solid contango,” he noted. “The Brent three month contract did actually dip into the $50ies per barrel intraday on Friday when it traded to a low point of $59.93 per barrel,” he added. Schieldrop went on to warn in the report that more weakness is to come “as lots of oil at sea comes to ports”. “Mid-East OPEC countries have boosted exports along with lower post summer consumption and higher production,” he said. “The result is highly visibly in oil at sea which increased by 17 million barrels to 1,311 million barrels over the week to Sunday. Up 185 million barrels since mid-August. On its way to discharge at a port somewhere over the coming month or two,” he added. Schieldrop noted in the report that the oil market path ahead “is all down to OPEC+”. “Remember that what is playing

A recent gathering of electric industry leaders in Washington, DC, hosted by the Edison Electric Institute (EEI), underscored a critical truth: artificial intelligence is no longer a futuristic concept but a present reality shaping the electric utility landscape. This includes everything from data center power needs to customer outreach efficiencies. As the issue of AI and its possibilities becomes more complex, electric utilities must cut through the competing applications and focus their AI investments on the most pressing challenges. To truly deliver on AI’s promise of enhanced reliability, efficiency and security, the industry can focus on three core areas: cybersecurity, climate-stressed grids due to extreme weather, and wildfire risk and customer load growth. These are the “Three C’s” that will determine the industry’s success in this new era of AI. AI as a Shield Against Growing Cyber Threats For electric utilities, cybersecurity is a foundational pillar of grid resilience, with threats surfacing from geopolitical adversaries to typical cybercrime found in other industries. As the grid becomes more interconnected, the attack surface expands exponentially. For electric utility security teams, AI is a force multiplier for adversaries and it must become a force multiplier for defense as well. It can help with everything from triaging vulnerabilities and prioritizing high-risk assets, to detecting sophisticated digital attacks on infrastructure. It can also enhance the physical security of critical infrastructure, using data to recognize and alert human operators to potential threats. The sheer volume of data involved in monitoring a modern utility grid is too great for humans alone to process effectively. By deploying AI as a vigilant and intelligent partner, electric utilities improve their anticipatory security posture, shrinking the time between threat detection and response and significantly reducing the potential for damage. Electric utilities that succeed start by identifying and protecting their highest-value assets

In the energy storage industry, we often see a race to pack more megawatt-hours into the same enclosure. The strategy of more battery capacity in fewer boxes seems like it would be efficient and less costly. But in practice, it’s a density trap. On paper, higher nameplate energy density makes promises of increased energy throughput and cost savings. But those metrics don’t always translate to operational value once systems are deployed in the field. Think of a battery storage system’s density like a car fuel tank. The size of the gas tank is important, but without an accurate gauge, you can’t be certain how many miles you can drive. You may never use the full capacity of the tank if you’re unsure when you will hit empty. The same is true of batteries. What matters isn’t simply how much energy you can store; it’s how much usable energy you know you have and can confidently, consistently deliver when it counts. That’s why usable energy is more critical than just energy density to generate revenue and support the grid. Higher density doesn’t guarantee a competitive advantage Asset owners often assume that higher energy density cells translate to fewer battery enclosures, smaller sites, and lower capital costs. In reality, that’s often not the case. Some ultra-dense units are too heavy or complex to transport easily, adding shipping and on-site integration challenges before the first kilowatt-hour is even dispatched. Combining multiple lower-weight, smaller units with those high density cells can complicate installation and raise integration costs. And once the system is online, performance doesn’t always match expectations. If batteries can’t reliably discharge at full-rated power, asset owners may need to oversize their installations just to meet contractual or expected energy commitments, erasing any cost or site density advantage. In other words, density is

In an era of rapid technological advancement and increasing reliance on renewable energy, battery energy storage systems (BESS) are emerging as pivotal players in enhancing grid reliability. They bridge the gap between energy supply and demand while addressing the intermittency challenges inherent in solar and wind power. By harnessing innovations such as long-duration storage solutions and advanced chemistries, emerging battery technologies are redefining energy management and paving the way for a more sustainable future. All about that BESS A battery energy storage system is an advanced technology designed to store and dispatch energy on demand. It functions much like a large rechargeable battery, capable of capturing excess energy generated during low-demand periods and releasing it when demand peaks.These systems currently play a critical role in balancing the grid by compensating for the variable nature of renewable energy sources like solar and wind, which do not produce a consistent power output. In practical terms, BESS can be deployed at various scales, from small residential setups to large utility-scale installations. They provide several valuable services to the grid, including peak shaving, load shifting, frequency regulation and backup power during outages. Despite their numerous benefits, these systems face certain inefficiencies that the industry is actively working to overcome. One major challenge is the limited storage duration for current solutions. Most existing systems commonly offer two to four hours of storage capacity, with renewable developers often pushing for six- to ten-hour systems. However, the high capital expenditure makes it difficult to justify the use case for ten-hour duration. This limits the ability of these systems to fully compensate for prolonged periods of low renewable generation or unexpected surges in demand. Additionally, the rapid growth of renewable energy sources causes transmission infrastructure to struggle to keep pace. This leads to congestion in areas with high

A Polish court declined to extradite to Germany a Ukrainian national suspected of helping sabotage the Nord Stream gas link, saying the destruction of the pipeline was justified by Russia’s attack on Ukraine.  The man, identified as Volodymyr Zhuravlov, is wanted under a European arrest warrant issued by a German court and has been in Polish police custody since Sept. 30. Germany’s foreign minister signaled the government in Berlin wouldn’t challenge the court ruling.  The former Ukrainian diving instructor is suspected of being part of a group that used explosives to blow up the Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 pipelines in the Baltic Sea in September 2022, months after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The pipelines carried Russian gas to Germany and were controlled by Moscow’s Gazprom PJSC. Judge Dariusz Lubowski said the sabotage was carried out during wartime, meaning it shouldn’t be treated as a terrorist act, regardless of whether Ukrainian authorities ordered it. Furthermore, it occurred in international waters, limiting the German court’s jurisdiction. “Blowing up critical infrastructure during a war – during a just, defensive war – is not sabotage but denotes a military action,” Lubowski said. “These actions were not illegal. On the contrary, they were justified, rational and just.” The judge ordered Zhuravlov released from custody. The decision can be appealed within three days, he said. The case is politically charged given Warsaw’s staunch support for Ukraine and prior criticism of German dependence on Russian energy. Prime Minister Donald Tusk said this month that it’s “not in the interest of the country, but also not in the interest of plain decency and justice” to charge or extradite the suspect. “It’s not the problem of Europe, Ukraine, Lithuania or Poland that Nord Stream 2 was blown up, but the fact that it was built,” Tusk said during a