PUC official warns of planning challenges as data-center power demand grows

Mike Hoke, director of public engagement at the Public Utility Commission of Texas, told the Parker County Commissioners Court on June 9 that data centers are part of a wave of "large loads" that can outpace traditional transmission-planning timelines. He said ERCOT and regulators are moving toward six-month "batch" planning of interconnection requests and applying recent legislative tools to better allocate costs to the projects that cause new transmission needs.

Hoke explained that a "large load" is defined in statute as a customer likely to use more than 75 megawatts at any one time, described the open-access nature of the Texas grid, and said the PUC's implementing rules for Senate Bill 6 emphasize forecasting milestones and stronger financial-responsibility mechanisms so that ratepayers are not left with stranded costs. He said the PUC does not directly dictate where developers locate or force them to bring on-site generation but can require financial protections and participation in emergency demand-response programs.

During Q&A, commissioners pressed whether developers can be required to pay downstream costs and whether speculative multi-site applications can be managed in batch processing; Hoke said the rules now require developers to disclose broader project portfolios and that the batch process and milestone requirements are intended to reduce gamesmanship.