Trump's DOE apparently unable to function

The Department of Energy's Office of Clean Energy has lost the staff required to properly oversee about $27 billion in funded energy projects, according to a new assessment from the Government Accountability Office (GAO)

The loss of capacity is due to the Trump administration's deep cuts to the agency's federal workforce. The Office of Clean Energy lost more than 80 percent of its staff in 2025, including every person hired to independently assess and monitor the costs of big, government-funded projects.

Over the course of the last year, the agency canceled about 35 of the projects, or about a third of all funded developments. However, the GAO found that the agency still has not actually pulled the funding for any of those projects. It remains unclear what happens to the unspent money.

In summary, even though the DOE has canceled one-third of the federally funded renewable energy projects, this action may not actually save taxpayers any money - and they do not have the staff to monitor and administer the remaining projects that are still fully funded.

Data Centers going "behind-the-meter"

In recent years, the time to connect a data center to the power grid has grown significantly - sometimes taking as much as 5 years before the application is even reviewed. In response, many data center developers are choosing to build their own power plants and avoid the grid altogether —or perhaps connect later after the data center is operational.

Cleanview Capital, a finance company that specializes in leasing clean energy systems, last week released a report in which they identified 46 data centers with a combined capacity of 56 GW that plan to build their own power "behind-the-meter." That represents roughly 30 percent of all planned data center capacity in the United States.

In the last 12 months, the behind the meter trend has gathered momentum. Of the 46 projects indicated in the report, 90 percent of them were announced in 2025.

So how are they planning to power these centers? Well, at the moment the fuel of choice appears to be natural gas. But not traditional natural gas turbines, which have a supply-side lead time of about 5-7 years. According to CleanView, data center developers are using "anything they can get their hands on" - including Mobile gas generators strapped to semitrucks

EIA projects new load demand will be met by solar

As load demand soars, putting pressure on the existing electric grid, the new demand will be met mainly by increased solar generation, the Energy Information Administration said in its latest short-term energy outlook report released last week.

EIA expects solar, the fastest-growing source of electricity generation in the U.S., to be the main source meeting that demand growth.

"We expect a 17 percent increase in solar generation in 2026 and an additional 23 percent increase in 2027, and wind generation increases by 6 percent and 7 percent, respectively, over those years," EIA projected.

FERC's latest Energy Infrastructure Update, reflecting additions from January to November last year, found that new solar additions totaled 25.4 GW, while new natural gas totaled around 4 GW and new wind totaled around 5.5 GW.

According to EIA, Almost 70 gigawatts (GW) of new solar generating capacity projects are scheduled to come online in 2026 and 2027, which represents a 49 percent increase in U.S. solar operating capacity compared with the end of 2025."

Renewable jobs and investments fall in 2025

And while the EIA suggests 2026 will be a banner year for solar, the non-partisan thinktank (E2) reported that 2025 was a year of loss in investments, jobs, and manufacturing across the American renewable energy industry.

In a recent report, E2 noted that last year over 38,000 manufacturing jobs were eliminated throughout the renewable energy industry. Additionally, the manufacturing sector saw $30.2 billion in losses, and investments were canceled at triple the rate that they were announced.

The EV and battery businesses canceled more than $42 billion in projects, which counted for more cancellations than any other sector of the industry.

While the solar workforce remained steady, A total of 61 large federally supported projects were canceled, closed, or downsized during the year, which represented $34.8 billion in cancellations.

Faked public comments on solar farm

Solar Developer Open Road Renewables plans to invest roughly $98 million in the 94-megawatt Crossroads Solar Grazing Center, which would use land in three townships in Morrow County, located about an hour north of Columbus.

A public hearing was held last month before the Ohio Power Siting Board (OPSB), the state's central authority for energy permitting. The project must also undergo a review by the various townships affected by the development.

While the power siting board's staff had initially deemed Crossroads Solar to be in the public interest - meaning it would likely receive approval - it later changed its mind, citing township lawyer's claims of overwhelming opposition by local residents.

However a review of public comments filed with the power siting board found at least 34 instances in which people apparently gave false names or lied about their residence in Morrow County. Dozens were submitted anonymously, so could not be verified. All of these unverifyable comments were against the project.

After discarding the apparently false, anonymous, and duplicate comments from the same individuals, reporters found that more than 78 percent of those who filed comments that could be authenticated were in favor of the project.

Developers are now awaiting a final ruling from the OPSB, expected by March 19th.