Core Sector: Load Growth and Customers

Load Growth Resources for Regulators

The United States is facing a period of meaningful load growth due to electrification efforts, a significant increase in domestic manufacturing, and rapid growth in data centers. NERC’s 2025 Long-Term Reliability Assessment estimates that summer peak demand is forecast to rise by nearly 20 percent (224 GW) over the next 10 years. State utility regulators are tasked with the challenge of meeting a sharp increase in electricity demand while balancing residential customer impact.

NARUC provides commissions with timely and relevant resources and activities (available below), including reports, technical papers, and virtual trainings aimed at supporting utility regulators as they navigate these challenges. These efforts are coordinated with NARUC’s Committee on Electricity. Professional development opportunities also provide meaningful training related to load growth for both members and non-members. We also engage in thoughtful dialogues and correspondence on the federal level.

Use the tabs below to explore the breadth of NARUC's load growth activities and resources.  

  • Essential Guide to NARUC Load Growth and Large Loads Resources
    This guide connects commissioners and commission staff to essential load growth resources that NARUC has developed to support members increasingly facing challenges surrounding the demands that large load customers, particularly data centers, place on the grid. The guide includes reports, webinars, and trainings on foundational and topical resources covering electricity planning, load forecasting, tariffs, interconnection, and more.

  • NARUC-NASEO Comprehensive Electricity Planning in an Era of Load Growth Roadmaps, July 2026
    Three roadmaps produced by NARUC and NASEO members describe visions for best-in-class comprehensive electricity planning, shown in flowcharts and descriptive text. Each roadmap shows an ideal sequence of steps across combinations of distribution, resource, and transmission planning with descriptions of information flows and coordination points. The resulting flowcharts and roadmaps are intended to be accurate, practical, and reflective of current and emerging industry best practices that any state can use. The roadmaps available now are:

    • Emerald: Vision for integrated distribution system planning and connections with bulk power system planning for states with utilities in organized markets that do not own generation assets (restructured states)
    • Jasper: Vision for integrated distribution, generation, and transmission planning for states with utilities in organized markets that own generation assets (vertically integrated within RTOs/ISOs)
    • Topaz: Vision for fully integrated transmission, generation, and distribution planning for states with utilities outside of organized markets (vertically integrated)

  • Large Load Tariffs and Load Forecasting: Reducing Uncertainty in an Era of Load Growth, April 2026
    This paper examines how public utility commissions can translate large load tariff provisions into load forecast inputs, including via planning assumptions and sensitivity analyses.

  • 2026 Virtual Roundtable Series for Utility Regulators on Load Growth and Large Loads
    Due to the importance of quickly connecting new large loads, the impacts such loads may have on electric system resource adequacy, reliability, and affordability, and the challenges and opportunities this presents, NARUC facilitated a series of virtual roundtables for utility regulators during the first quarter of 2026. In contrast to the in-person roundtables in 2025, and to facilitate open and candid conversations, these discussions were open only to state utility commissioners.

  • 2025 NARUC Demand Roundtable Summaries
    The 2025 NARUC Demand Roundtables brought together a rotating group of seven Public Utility Commissioners, seven large electricity customers, and seven utility / regional transmission operators to discuss the critical issues surrounding increased energy demand over the next decade. The Roundtables aimed for open, transparent discussion to foster dialogue that allows state commissioners to better understand energy demand associated with re-shoring, electrification, and data center growth, and what that will mean for individual states. Summaries of the Demand Roundtable sessions are available:

  • Large Load Literature Review, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, July 2026
    This literature review summarizes recent publications focused on large loads, grouping the documents and resources thematically into 11 categories (listed below). LBNL will update the literature review monthly. For prior report summaries, please see the 2025 literature review which summarizes more than 90 resources.
    • Load forecasting 
    • Reliability and resource adequacy 
    • Large load interconnection
    • Demand flexibility
    • Generation
    • Co-location
    • Data center location/infrastructure
    • Large load tariffs
    • Policy options
    • Maps and tools
    • Design and operations 
  • Database of Emerging Large-Load Tariffs (DELTa)
    DELTa is a product of the Smart Electric Power Alliance (SEPA) and the NC Clean Energy Technology Center (NCCETC) and was developed as a public, user-friendly database of contemporary utility rates and contracts for large loads. NCCETC and SEPA track regulatory activity regularly and plan to update the catalog quarterly.

  • NCEP Framework for State Agency Collaboration on Load Growth Release Webinar, August 12, 2026 from 2:00 to 3:00 p.m. ET. Register now.
    Join the National Council on Electricity Policy (NCEP) webinar introducing a framework to help state agencies collaboratively manage rapid electricity demand growth driven by large loads such as data centers and advanced manufacturing.

  • Load Growth Resources Webinar, September 9, 2026 from 2:30 to 3:30 p.m. ET. Register now.
    Join the Center for Partnerships & Innovation for a webinar sharing new and recently-released resources designed to support state commissions' work on large load growth and data centers.

  • Webinar: NARUC-NASEO Initiative Roadmaps for Comprehensive Electricity Planning in the Era of Load Growth, September 14, 2026 at 4:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. ET. Register now.

Learn about three new electricity planning roadmaps developed by NASEO and NARUC members with input from utilities, national labs, and industry experts. These roadmaps outline best-in-class approaches to coordinate distribution, resource, and transmission planning in each of three market structures and regulatory environments. Designed to be practical and reflect industry best practices, the roadmaps provide implementable process steps that states can adapt to advance electricity planning in the current era. This webinar will include an overview of each roadmap, discussions of how state agencies are using–and can use–the roadmaps to enhance planning in their jurisdictions, and share additional resources developed by NARUC and NASEO to support members and stakeholders.

  • Virtual Roundtable Series for Utility Regulators: Load Growth and Large Loads, January-March 2026 

As a follow-up to the Demand Roundtables conducted during NARUC's three large conferences in 2025 (see below), this series of virtual convenings focused on specific topics related to large loads and load growth in more detail: forecasting growth in large loads, large load tariffs, and interconnection issues related to large loads. In contrast to the in-person roundtables in 2025, and to facilitate open and candid conversations, these discussions were open only to state utility commissioners. Learn more and review summaries of the discussions.

  • Google Data Center Site Visit, February 7, 2026

During the NARUC Winter Policy Summit, more than 30 NARUC commissioners and commission staff had the unique opportunity to visit a Google data center operating in Leesburg, Virginia. Google staff explained the planning, operations, types of computing loads handled, energy consumption, and supporting infrastructure necessary to operate the facility, including water consumption, cooling technologies, and backup generation. Visitors were then shown the backup generation systems, cooling plant, and server floor in person. Throughout the site visit, Google personnel answered dozens of questions from commissioners and staff about all facets of the operation.

In partnership with other state energy decision-makers through the National Council on Electricity Policy (NCEP), NARUC participated in a load growth webinar series designed to support NCEP member state agencies working together to identify the benefits and costs of expected loads, share examples of tools and strategies for managing risks and balancing speed and engagement, and look for opportunities to improve state agency processes around load growth. The four webinars in the series featured state agency speakers discussing Benefits and State Agency Roles; Managing Costs and Risks; Balancing Speed and Engagement; and State Agency Collaboration. More information, recordings. and presentations.

  • NASEO Powering Up Data Centers and NASEO-NARUC Grid-Interactive Efficient Buildings Working Group Webinar: Data Center and Large Load Flexibility to Meet Energy Demand Growth, August 7, 2025
    This webinar, moderated by Blaise Caudill (Deputy Director, Office of Resiliency, Arizona Executive Office of the Governor), featured Tyler Norris (Duke University, Nicholas Institute for Energy, Environment & Sustainability) presenting on Integrating Large Flexible Loads in US Power Systems based on a recent report and Aroon Vijaykar (Senior Vice President, Strategy and Commercial, Emerald AI) presented on Emerald AI’s demonstration of data center compute orchestration, delivering firm dispatchable load flexibility in Phoenix, Arizona. (Supplemental post from Tyler Norris, The Puzzle of Low Data Center Utilization Rates, and paper from Emerald AI, et al.)

  • NASEO-NARUC Grid-interactive Efficient Buildings Working Group webinar: Using Grid-Edge Resources (GERs) to Provide Distribution-level Services, July 24, 2025
    Paul De Martini (Newport Consulting Group) discussed the evolving role of GERs to provide grid services for managing local distribution needs affordably. Robert Cully from the New York Department of Public Service described his state’s programs and approaches to advance GERs, including demand flexibility, to provide distribution-level services.

  • 2025 Demand Roundtable
    The goal of the Demand Roundtables was to bring together a rotating group of seven Public Utility Commissioners, seven large electricity customers, and seven utility / regional transmission operators to discuss the critical issues surrounding increased energy demand over the next decade. The Roundtables aimed for open, transparent discussion to foster dialogue that would allow state commissioners to better understand energy demand associated with re-shoring, electrification, and data center growth, and what that will mean for individual states.

    • Annual Meeting Demand Roundtable, November 9, 2025 
      The third Demand Roundtable was convened during the NARUC Annual Meeting and Education Conference in Seattle, Washington.

    • Summer Policy Summit Demand Roundtable, July 27, 2025
      The second Demand Roundtable was convened during the NARUC Summer Policy Summit in Boston, Massachusetts.

    • Winter Policy Summit Demand Roundtable, February 23, 2025
      The inaugural Demand Roundtable was convened during the NARUC Winter Policy Summit in Washington, DC.

  • AI: Balancing Potential Benefits with Future Load Growth Expectations, September 19, 2024
    Over the past few years, American awareness of Artificial Intelligence and its potential to impact most facets of the national economy has grown considerably. AI could have a significant impact on states by unlocking new opportunities for optimization and efficiency in the energy sector. This computing renaissance will require substantial improvements in chip efficiency and growth in data centers to support greater computer processing needs for the large learning models that AI uses. This webinar explored AI use cases that can be leveraged to unlock grid capacity, flexibility, and resilience and consider some of the challenges states may face in meeting load growth expectations.

Funder:

NARUC is grateful to the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Electricity and Office of Critical Minerals and Energy Innovation for funding to support activities facilitated by the NARUC Center for Partnerships & Innovation.