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NERC's New Annual Assessment Shows Rapid Demand Growth Increasing Resource Adequacy Risks Across North America

LCG, January 30, 2026--The North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) yesterday issued its 2025 Long-Term Reliability Assessment (LTRA) and infographic that spotlight intensifying resource adequacy risks throughout the North American bulk power system (BPS) over the next 10 years.

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Sage Geosystems Announces Funding for Next-generation Geothermal Power Generation Project

LCG, January 21, 2026--Sage Geosystems, the company pioneering Pressure Geothermal, today announced that it closed over $97 million in Series B funding to advance its geothermal power generation and energy storage solutions, including its first commercial next-generation geothermal power generation facility. Ormat Technologies, a vertically integrated company engaged in geothermal and recovered energy generation ("REG"), and Carbon Direct Capital, a growth equity investment firm, co-led Sage’s Series B round, representing the full backing of Sage and Pressure Geothermal technology from leaders in geothermal energy and growth capital.

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Industry News

Energy Chief Orders U.S. Power Sent to California

LCG, Dec. 14, 2000--U.S. Energy Secretary Bill Richardson yesterday ordered federal power producers in the Northwest to sell electricity to California utilities at "a fair price" in order to ease a power shortage that has become chronic and last week threatened the state with rolling blackouts.

Chronic? The California Independent System Operator declared a "Stage 2" power emergency yesterday for the eighth straight day, at a time of the year when demand is customarily low. Cal-ISO said it was only a few megawatts away from calling its second Stage 3 emergency, under which utilities would be ordered to institute rolling blackouts.

At a news conference in Washington, D.C., Richardson said he was using his emergency powers to order power wholesalers to sell power to California at a fair price. His action had immediate results as the Bonneville Power Administration, operators of federal dams in the Northwest, diverted 1,500 megawatts to California.

There is, however, precious little power to spare in the Northwest. Big companies, especially aluminum refining firms, have been shutting down operations because of the scarcity of electricity and the high price of that they can get.

Richardson was joined at his news conference by California Gov. Gray Davis and Sen. Dianne Feinstein. The two Democrats blamed California's high electricity prices on "price gouging" by generators and called for the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to impose a price cap on wholesale power throughout the West.

"We have implored the FERC to respond to this crisis so that California's terrible dependence on spot prices can end," Feinstein said.

FERC, though, recommended that existing price caps in California be lifted and last Friday Cal-ISO did just that. The move put more power on the state's shaky grid, but at prices that yesterday reached a high of $1,407 per megawatt-hour. That's a buck-forty a kilowatt-hour, and would make the typical householder's monthly bill come to $700.

Those high prices exist for only a moment or two of highest demand, but overall the price of power in California is about five times higher than it should be. The fault is not the absence of price caps or a misguided attempt to deregulate the electric industry.

The cause is an insufficiency of power plants in the state, and the blame for that insufficiency can be laid directly at the feet of California regulators and politicians who are unwilling to allow a power plant to be built within miles of a voter who might be offended by its presence.

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