The June 2026 edition of our newsletter marks America’s 250th birthday by remembering that “net zero” isn’t anything new. It’s what energy looked like in 1776. Colonial Americans heated with wood, cooked over open fires, lit their homes with candles and whale oil, and ran mills with water wheels, windmills, and draft animals. Coal, oil, […]

Isaac Orr, Vice President of Research at Always On Energy Research, joined Fox 5’s Good Day D.C. to discuss whether the electric grid can keep up with AI-driven data center growth. Orr said data centers are currently winning the race against new power plant construction, and that the fastest fix is to stop retiring coal […]

When we started in the energy industry over a decade ago, it was very common to hear the claim that “renewables are the cheapest energy sources,” based on Levelized Cost of Energy (LCOE) metrics. Many advocates added, “even without subsidies!” These claims went largely uncontested for years, with journalists and the mainstream media seemingly eager to parrot common […]

The May 2026 edition of our monthly newsletter features our latest research, Introducing the Social Cost of Blackouts. Federal and state regulators already attach a dollar value to carbon emissions through the Social Cost of Carbon and rely on it to justify burdensome regulations and subsidies. Nothing equivalent prices the outages those same rules produce. […]

Always On Vice President of Research Isaac Orr joined Good Morning Liberty to explain why grid reliability went from a 2030s worry to a near-term one. AI data centers and electric vehicle mandates are piling new demand onto a system that keeps retiring coal and nuclear capacity, and Orr points to NERC warning of high […]

The AI hype machine is running at full steam, and the expectation of massive growth in data center load is causing a storm in the energy industry. As the narrative is currently told, data centers are going to devour gigawatts of power, leading to a massive increase in electricity usage and peak demand—with the costs […]

Always On energy policy analyst Sarah Montalbano joined the Steve Gruber Show to talk about why electricity bills keep climbing in Michigan and around the country. Montalbano explains that regulated utility monopolies recover costs through guaranteed rate increases, which is why wind and solar mandates and the infrastructure buildout they require add so much to […]

On Fox 5 Live Zone with Guy Lambert, Amy Cooke pushed back on the claim that AI data centers are driving up your electric bill. The affordability crisis dates back to resource and generation policies set 5 to 10 years ago, when states bet on expensive, unreliable power and still needed to maintain a second […]

Isaac Orr, vice president of research, and Sarah Montalbano, energy policy analyst at Always On Energy Research, were published in The Wall Street Journal on May 27, 2026. The Solar Energy Industries Association announced on May 11 that former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty will serve as its next CEO. He’s the latest recruit in an industry push to buy credibility as […]

Always On founder and President Amy Cooke joined Zach Cantu News Talk 710 KURV’s The 956 Drive Home to make the case that the AI data center boom doesn’t have to land on residential ratepayers. The hyperscaler buildout needs what the grid is shortest on, which is always-on dispatchable generation, but consumer-regulated electricity and bring-your-own-power […]