It’s especially tiring for utility pros. Not only are they flooded with the deluge of headlines, but many of those stories confidently outline ways that AI is coming for their livelihoods. Preparing for the next great tech revolution, knowing it may leave you redundant, is unnerving to say the least.

To counter that, though, a key passage from the short story The Lifecycle of Software Objects by Ted Chiang, highlights where AI may still be lacking:

“Experience isn’t merely the best teacher; it’s the only teacher…there are no shortcuts; if you want to create the common sense that comes from twenty years of being in the world, you need to devote twenty years to the task. You can’t assemble an equivalent collection of heuristics in less time; experience is algorithmically incompressible.”

We’ve seen predictions that AI will take on all sorts of tasks in the energy world, managing the grid and interacting with customers. But how accurate are these forecasts in their outlook of a complete takeover?

I asked a host of leading voices in the energy industry the simple question:

Which task in the world of energy and utilities are you most confident can’t and won’t be replaced by AI or algorithms?

From the 14 experts I asked, their answers centered around 5 main areas of focus:

In the utility sector, AI won’t be able to replace….

Physical work like line repairs and equipment installation

This theme was the strongest consensus among the expert respondents. Seven different leaders independently pointed to this type of hands-on work in the field or in customers’ homes as the area least susceptible to AI disruption.

Former DOE Loan Programs Office and Co-Host of Energy Empire put it succinctly: “Physical hands-on repair work on live or damaged infrastructure” won’t be replaced any time soon by automation.

Bill Meehan, Former Director of Electric Utility Solutions at Esri, agreed that while robotics will continue advancing, specialized physical skills such as cable splicing and heavy equipment installation will still depend on experienced workers for many, many years to come.

Likewise, Patrick Hughes of NEMA emphasized that utility lineworkers rely not just on physical capabilities but also instincts to adapt to unpredictable field conditions.

Similar hesitations were shared by Ben Ettlinger (Professor at Touro University Graduate School of Technology), Paul DeCotis (Senior Partner of West Monroe), Peter Asmus, and Jen Szaro (President of AESP).

Making key management decisions under pressure

AI can generate options, but leaders make decisions. That decision-making process requires weighing of ever-changing priorities, factors, and nuance that is rather difficult for any non-human.

For example, David Ford of Southern California Edison (SCE) pointed out that utilities constantly balance competing priorities, from reliability to affordability to safety to equity to environmental goals to public expectations. AI can model scenarios, but someone has to make the final decision of where to make these tradeoffs. Paul DeCotis agreed, specifically calling out unique approaches humans must take on “C-Suite decision making on strategy, planning operations, and investor-calls.”

Similarly, (Founder and Principal of Luminary Strategies) argued that AI may dramatically improve planning calculus, but humans will be at the end of the line making the capital investment decisions because it takes more than a weighted algorithm to weigh impacts to customers, shareholders, and regulators.

Building upon lived experience and making appropriate judgments

A key area that humans bring to the table that, as Ted Chiang highlighted in the aforementioned short story, is actual, lived experience. No computational heuristic can really replace that in a shortened way.

Ahmed Mousa, Founder of Electric Bridge Consulting, put it thusly: “A utility professional is like a high-performance supercar. Knowledge is the engine, experience is the fuel, and AI is the turbocharger.” That’s not to say that AI lacks value, but rather it provides value when its use case is to inform the ultimate decisionmaker rather than replace them.

Tom Falcone, President of the Large Public Power Council, echoed that sentiment from another angle, arguing that while AI can model virtually any rate design, the underlying value judgments still belong to the people accountable to the communities paying the bills. That responsibility shown towards who decisions affect is a uniquely human quality.

Having true empathy for the customer

A deeper angle on the decision-making process that we know AI can never replace is the emotional weight that comes from empathy.

Paul Toscarelli, VP of Electric Operations at PSEG, argued that customers don’t simply need accurate calculations, they need compassion, accountability, and human understanding.

The question itself needs to be rethought!

Lastly, but just as importantly, not everyone accepted the question I posed at face value.

Mitchell Beer, Publisher and Managing Editor of , argued that before asking what AI can replace, we should first ask whether we’re even using AI for the right problems. He questioned how much projected AI demand represents genuine need versus hype and suggested investment may be better directed toward renewables, storage, efficiency, and electrification.

Alan Ross, Managing Editor of APC Media, likewise emphasized that AI is only one half of a much larger transformation occurring alongside the rapid evolution of power systems themselves.

Let me know in the comments– which of their themes resonate the most with you? Is there anything this superteam is overlooking, in your opinion?

When The Washington Post investigated an article testing whether today's leading AI chatbots show political bias (“Are ChatGPT and other AI chatbots politically biased? We tested them” by Kevin Schaul), I immediately had a different question.

𝗪𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝗶𝗳 𝘄𝗲 𝘁𝗲𝘀𝘁𝗲𝗱 𝗔𝗜 𝗯𝗼𝘁𝘀 𝗼𝗻 𝗵𝗼𝘁-𝗯𝘂𝘁𝘁𝗼𝗻 𝗲𝗻𝗲𝗿𝗴𝘆 𝗶𝘀𝘀𝘂𝗲𝘀?

Specifically, what if we prodded them on the debates utility professionals have daily from data centers to the generation mix?

Mirroring the WaPo methodology, I put six of today's most prominent AI models (ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Grok, DeepSeek, and Gab) through the same exercise of identical instructions and energy policy questions (detailed further below).

I expected to find six different AI personalities, influenced by different inherent biases by those tools.

And I did find some tendencies and biases, but instead of six personalities…this exercise identified three distinct ‘voting blocs’ among the tools.

𝗕𝗹𝗼𝗰 𝟭: 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗖𝗼𝗻𝘀𝗲𝗻𝘀𝘂𝘀 𝗠𝗮𝗻𝗮𝗴𝗲𝗿𝘀
The three members of this bloc – ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini– acted more or less like how you’d imagine a research tool to behave: presenting both sides arguments, listing pros and cons, and allowing the user to take that information and decide for themselves.

These tools tended to:
• Prefer balanced tradeoffs rather than supporting any particular ‘side’
• Support more incremental changes
• Offered nuance rather than extremes

𝗕𝗹𝗼𝗰 𝟮: 𝗥𝗲𝗹𝗶𝗮𝗯𝗶𝗹𝗶𝘁𝘆 𝗙𝗶𝗿𝘀𝘁
On the other hand, the Reliability First bloc – consisting of Grok and Gab – had an inherent focus on power reliability over any other factors. This perspective definitely reflects how many stakeholders in the energy world personally feel, and it manifests with some clear priorities:
• Comfort with natural gas to meet near-term power needs
• Willingness to override clean energy targets
• Preference for state regulation of transmission over federal

𝗕𝗹𝗼𝗰 𝟯: 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗦𝘄𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗩𝗼𝘁𝗲
The odd man out serving as tie breaker in some of these questions was DeepSeek. Seemingly, this AI tool didn’t seem to fit neatly with either of the above blocs:
• Consistently favored renewables as the strongest voice for them…
• But readily swapped sides when presented with the issue of clean energy targets sacrificing grid stability

Beyond being better prepared in knowing how each of these tools may ‘lean’ when it comes to energy questions, the real takeaway for me: these LLMs can weigh tradeoffs and even sometimes map nuance, but they still can’t make the hard calls for us. That comes from human judgment and an ability to subsequently 𝚘̲𝚠̲𝚗̲ those decisions.

I’m posting in the comments the 10 questions that were asked and the instructions given so you can replicate on your end. And if you'd like the complete dataset—including every response from every AI model—leave a comment and I'll send you the Google Sheet of answers.

Seven years ago, I bought my first EV. While I knew electric was the right choice for me, I found that the buying experience... left a lot to be desired.

Fast forward to this past month.

With my family growing, we needed a bigger boat (car) and wanted to stay electric. I ended up at the same dealership I bought the first one for an incidental apples-to-apples comparison. Much improved in that seven years:

• Battery tech is dramatically better. My first EV would need at least two charging pitstops to get from Orlando to Miami, this new one can do it with just one

• Charging interoperability is much more straightforward: with a simple adapter I can make those stops on dramatically more ports

• Instead of heading to a dealership to see the one or two EVs in stock, this time I was able to choose between models, colors, and trims

• Most notably, the salespeople now expected people to shop for EVs and could talk specifics (compared with 2019 when I found myself having to educate 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘮 when they tried to send me home with a car with the wrong charging port)

• Features that sounded futuristic in 2019—like vehicle-to-home backup power—are now real selling points

But perhaps the biggest change…owning an EV is no longer novel. In 2019, I was "the EV guy" in the neighborhood and in my family. Today, I find myself having to actually wait in the occasional line for an open charger!

Living through this transition with a ‘before’ and ‘after’ purchasing experience highlights that tech maturity isn't about a single breakthrough, rather it represents hundreds of small improvements that compound:

• Better products
• Better infrastructure
• Better pricing
• Better communication
• Better customer experiences

Applying that to the broader energy sector – whether we're talking about scaling DERs, demand response, virtual power plants, SMRs, long-duration storage, or whatever comes next – the same pattern will repeat.

That means that we can’t let the hype cycle fatigue get us down. Moving past breathless headlines, expectations that initially fall short, and a consumer market that may end up exasperated early on– it 𝘤𝘢𝘯 happen.

The key to doing so isn’t just the technology itself, it’s also everything surrounding it.

Energy stakeholders have to remember that: Be an expert not only of the tech but in 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘮𝘶𝘯𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘨 that tech.

Because making the technology work is only half the job. Making it easy for someone to buy, understand, trust, and use it is what ultimately moves it from "interesting" to "mainstream.

"

The event everyone’s been waiting for has finally arrived—and no, I’m not talking about the FERC show-cause orders.

Over the past month, teams and their fans from around the world have flocked to North America for the 23rd men’s FIFA World Cup. What makes this one special: It’s the first to feature 48 teams and three host countries.

As a New Yorker, I’ve noticed an endless stream of fans roaming sidewalks and subways throughout the city (if the jerseys weren’t a dead giveaway, the kilts definitely are). I can even hear the rowdy rumbles from soccer (er, football?) spectators at a nearby bar as I sit in my top-floor office.

I’m no sports person, admittedly, but I’m certainly a fan of energy analysis. So why not filter the tournament’s most promising contenders through a lens I understand far better than soccer?

With the help of some of my sports-loving colleagues, I’ve laid out the most hyped-up teams and paired them with spiritually equivalent energy sources. (If I’ve gotten the soccer analysis wrong, please direct your complaints to my coworkers.) Keep reading to find out how all those footballers and generation sources might fare in this year’s competition…and beyond.

Note: This is not a living document—after today, July 1, this article will not reflect current World Cup standings.

Promising up-and-comers

Morocco, which could become the first African nation to win the World Cup, is marking its seventh tournament appearance. The country has recently invested tons of resources into the sport, enabling top talent to reach the global stage. Norway, meanwhile, has returned to the World Cup after a nearly 30-year dry spell…and the fans are understandably rowdy.

Solar, as we know, has quickly climbed the US energy ranks over the past decade. In 2025, utility-scale solar generation reached 296K GWh (a 34% jump from 2024). Geothermal, meanwhile, has a ways to go: It only contributed about 0.4% of the country’s utility-scale electricity generation last year. But it’s receiving loads of investment from the private and public sectors alike, and it’s set to break into the once impossible Northeastern US market thanks to advanced geothermal tech.

The old guard

Spain, France, and Argentina have all appeared in the World Cup over a dozen times and racked up multiple wins. Of these competitors, Argentina has collected the most titles (three)—and took home the prize at the most recent tournament in 2022. The question now: Whether these teams still have what it takes. Will they rest on their laurels, shrink into the background, or remind the world why they’re dominant in the first place?

Coal served as the country’s main source of electricity for a century, but it offered just 15% of US supply last year. In fact, the domestic coal fleet has shrunk by 43% since its peak in 2010. Natural gas, meanwhile, is a far more recent heavy-hitter due to the shale revolution. Last year, natural gas ranked as the top source (roughly 41%) of US utility-scale electricity generation.

Major comebacks

While Brazil has won more World Cups than any other national team, it hasn’t notched a win since 2002. England, meanwhile, hasn’t reigned as champion since 1966…but it has come close several times since.

Nuclear had a great US run until the 1970s, when costs and construction delays began to pile up (along with high-profile accidents). But nuclear is now all the rage again, and the Trump administration is pushing fission to help satisfy mounting data center demand.

The underdogs

This week, Paraguay shocked the world by beating Germany—the men’s team with the second-most World Cup titles of all time (to celebrate, the country declared a national holiday). And the US qualified for every World Cup from 1990–2014, but it’s had a spotty record since.

Wind has had a tough year, to say the least, thanks to all those Trump administration-brokered lease buyouts (which have totaled over $2.5B) and stalled permitting reviews. But some projects have powered through the opposition, including the country’s largest of its kind: The 2.6-GW Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind project began spinning out power in March.

The wildcards

Switzerland has never won a World Cup, yet the team has now appeared in the championship six times in a row. (But the country hasn’t made it to the quarter-finals since 1954). And Colombia is returning for its seventh tournament after failing to qualify in 2022. Right now, the nation has somewhat decent odds of moving up the ranks.

Fusion and tidal power could both generate massive amounts of electricity. The former, if it pans out, might churn out nearly 4 million times more energy than burning oil or coal. Tidal power, which is already commercially proven at a few plants around the world, has the potential to generate 150 to 800 TWh per year. But it’s super costly and has a limited supply chain (for now, at least).

Which teams will win the World Cup?

This, of course, depends on who you ask. According to Ben Church, international sports writer at CNN, “It’s very unlikely for there to be an upset at the World Cup. There’s just too many quality teams for an underdog to go all the way.” Church’s bets are, unsurprisingly, on a top contender like France, Argentina, Spain, Brazil, or England.

At the time of writing this Substack, I noticed that The Athletic and ESPN (along with Polymarket and FanDuel) favored France.

Still, as with energy, you never know what might happen. We could see one of the favored teams suffer a sudden upset, as with Germany’s recent loss. An underdog could hold its own in the knockouts, which are now running through July 19, and end up in the final match. “That’s the beauty of a cup competition,” Church said.

Which energy sources will dominate the world’s electricity supply?

Unlike soccer tournaments, energy moves in decades—not weeks. So I decided to pit these sources against each other over two timeframes: by 2030 and 2050.

By 2030: Based on current trends, the IEA sees coal- and gas-derived power continuing to dominate globally. But at the same time, the agency expects wind and solar to contribute a growing chunk of the world’s electricity (this isn’t surprising, given the recent monthly records broken by solar and wind).

By 2050: It’s looking like more of a crapshoot—so many factors, including more stringent carbon laws in wealthy nations—could influence this outcome. In Enerdata’s business-as-usual scenario, for example, renewables dominate generation globally…but coal still clinches a 16% share.

The bottom line? I think the soccer and energy worlds have a few key similarities:

• A reliable reputation goes far.

• Investment and devoted fans are key to success.

• The tournament (and energy mix) of today could look completely different from a few decades ago.

• Sometimes, the world order gets shaken up when old favorites fall…and young talent rises up the ranks.

Now, I’m feeling especially psyched to see which teams conquer the world stage (literally and figuratively). I’ll keep cheering from the sidelines…and telling everyone where their favorite teams stand in the energy world.

Why am I writing about this on Energy Central’s Substack?

Anyone who’s followed my work won’t be surprised—I combined my sports and energy obsessions to form a Fantasy Energy League, after all. And as I watched the NFL schedule release morph into its own media event, naturally I couldn’t help but consider the lessons for utilities.

Specifically, I gathered inspiration from a Barrett Media article, which mentioned how “a bare minimum announcement isn’t cutting in anymore for teams trying to own the moment.”

I saw a parallel with power sector communications: Narrative matters, and utilities can (and must) do more to proactively lead the conversation—spanning everything from the grid buildout to energy rates to future tech.

Here are the specific lessons that I think utilities can take from the much-hyped NFL schedule release:

Be proactive and engaging

“What separates the brands that win this week from the ones that simply participate is preparation, creativity, and understanding what the moment is actually worth,” Jason Barrett wrote.

For NFL stakeholders, it’s key at this moment to get proactive and lead the conversation that impacts your fanbase. This also applies to utilities: too often they treat communication as a compliance exercise. But if something matters to the public, then the utility has to be out ahead of it. And to do so, they can’t be afraid to be engaging, thoughtful storytellers.

This messaging can even be lighthearted—when appropriate. As the schedule release ‘event’ has grown, individual NFL teams have started competing to make the most clever and viral content around it:

• The Raiders parodied ‘Step Brothers.” The lesson for utilities? Leverage established cultural references to deliver your message, especially when you know your audience.

• The Seahawks released faux fragrance ads. Utilities, too, can create a viral moment using in-jokes your community can enjoy. And why not incorporate cameos from local heroes to make those messages resonate?

• The Chargers generated a video game visual chock-full of Easter Eggs, showing that anything that makes people want to hit replay only makes the message stickier!

Is an internet parody video too frivolous for something as serious as utility messages? It’s understandable to be cautious there, but let’s be honest—we live in an era where the White House is among the most ardent memelord accounts on social media.

The goalposts have moved and we’ve seen (for better or worse) how nontraditional social media use can effectively widen reach as people feel compelled to share. So when it comes to messages urging people to conserve energy, prepare for weather events, or explaining power bills, creativity can be key.

Tailor messaging to your customers

Barrett’s take: “If you’re running..any other high performing sports radio brand, you already understand your audience’s emotional temperature better than anyone. Right now that temperature is complicated…Make it hyper-local and hyper-specific.”

Similarly, utilities already understand their customers’ emotional temperature better than anyone else, especially as they’re at a fever pitch today. We’ve all observed the angst toward utility bills—and fingerpointing at the purported causes.

People are seeing grid pressure points emerge, but these aren’t abstract national debates. Rather, they are intensely local. And utilities are often best positioned to understand where their customers are coming from, because they are typically part of the same communities.

Own the moment

“The NFL schedule release is one of the few offseason moments that generates genuine national appointment viewing. Build toward it all week. Discussion and debate drives ratings, and Thursday is the ultimate payoff,” Barrett explained.

Known as a drip release, some games get ‘leaked’ in bits and pieces ahead of the official schedule release.

The NFL shows what happens if you don’t wait until the last possible moment to start the buzz. Utilities should start sharing early as well! Obviously, this practice does not apply to emergency situations. But building hype can be impactful when announcing new incentive programs, asset buildouts, or other decisions that are additive and exciting to customers.

The NFL creates and owns a moment around its schedule release because people know it is coming, and anticipation creates attention. Utilities do not always get that kind of attention, at least not by choice. But increasingly, major utility issues are becoming appointment viewing—whether companies like it or not. Town halls fill up; local headlines break; rate cases become community talking points.

Utilities should recognize when attention is there and use it well. If people are showing up—even if they are frustrated—that is an opening. Meet them where they are. Ask for feedback. Take it seriously. Do not treat engagement as a nuisance. Treat it as an opportunity to build trust.

Bottom line: Focus on messaging that sticks

Utility announcements tend to be serious business, and I’m not suggesting that a meme should replace a formal filing or a town hall. But serious does not have to mean sterile and forgettable.

Whether communicating peak load warnings or emergency preparedness, PSAs can deliver customers serious news while also catching people’s attention. One of the most successful examples of all time (Dumb Ways to Die) went viral for silliness in Australia—but it has also saved lives.

NFL social media teams have shown how to lean into silliness to help information land. The take-away for utilities: if the message is important, make it memorable.

Vegetation management is often treated like routine maintenance, but for utilities it is really about keeping the grid safe under real operating conditions. And on the modern grid, clearance planning has become more complex than ever, while utilities can no longer rely on “blue sky” assumptions when assessing vegetation risk.

To dive deeper into the topic, host Kinsey Grant Baker is joined by Otto Lynch of Bentley Systems to discuss how myriad factors impact the engineering realities of keeping the grid constantly operational. Including considerations like conductor sag, high operating temperatures, wind blowout, ice, and structure deflection all change the real distance between a line and nearby vegetation. Too often, utilities underestimate risk and simply clearing an entire right-of-way is not always the smartest or safest answer. Instead, Otto makes the case for more selective, engineering-driven vegetation management that balances reliability, cost, and public trust.

The episode also takes a close look at compliance and standards, including what can go wrong when utilities ignore the finer details of wire movement, altitude, or “determined by designer” language in the rules. For utility leaders looking to reduce wildfire risk, improve reliability, and avoid unnecessary maintenance spend, this conversation offers a practical roadmap for building a more mature vegetation-management program over the next five years.

Thanks to Bentley Systems for making this episode possible. Bentley Systems is the infrastructure engineering software company delivering innovative solutions that advance and sustain the world’s infrastructure. Trusted globally, Bentley’s energy portfolio, including Power Line Systems, SPIDA, OpenUtilities, and EasyPower, empowers energy professionals to design, build, and operate smarter, more resilient systems.

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It’s the mythical future date that’s been circled on the calendar ever since I studied energy systems and entered the workforce in 2011. Back then, the big questions looked different: We were planning for (now commonplace) smart grid tech, while large-load discussions centered on EVs (rather than the data centers that dominate industry headlines today).

But as I sit here today, 2050 suddenly doesn’t feel as far off. Why is that?

Well, duh, 2050 is literally closer. When I graduated, 2050 was 39 years away (to a 22-year-old, that is forever). But today, mid-century is only 24 years away, which is far more tangible. I can remember what I was up to 24 years ago (even if that was Pokemon cards and middle school dances).

But the other major change that inspired this piece: the birth of my first child, expected in mere days. When talking about existential energy challenges, we often invoke the idea of future generations: Will they have fusion? How will they feel the impacts of climate change? But something changes when it gets personal. I’m thinking about the future through the lens of my own child and manifesting a thriving, survivable planet to pass on to him, so what was already urgent immediately feels even more so.

Generational Leaps

When we found out my wife was pregnant, my thinking about energy definitely shifted. For one, my typical insistence of going easy on the thermostat (perhaps the dad tendencies have always been in me) gave way to blasting the AC as low as she wanted to provide comfort and relief—even if our power bill suffered for it.

But I’m more so talking about the big-picture thinking. On Power Perspectives earlier this year, Silvio Marcacci of Energy Innovation Policy & Technology shared a view that’s stuck with me:

“When I first got into this line of work, I thought, wow, I’m going to be the generation that solves climate change. And as I’ve progressed, I realize that I’m just a link in the chain. I want the legacy of my career to be enabling the next generation of folks working on climate change to succeed and help them carry on the mission.”

But what about the next next generation—the one I’m about to raise (along with my millennial peers)?

Contextualizing 2050

To connect my son’s journey with that oft-cited 2050 goalpost, here’s a potential map of some of his major milestones:

• 2040: Eighth grade graduation

• 2044: High school graduation

• 2048: College graduation

The year 2050 isn’t an impossible-to-imagine date for him—it’s the beginning of his adult life.

So, what picture do US energy and climate outlooks paint for 20501?

When my son potentially reaches the above milestones, this is how the forecasts for energy and emissions look:

Load Demand & Sources

• Today: 4,069 billion kWh

• Eighth grade graduation: 22% higher than 2025 (4,961 billion kWh)

• High school graduation: 30% higher than 2025 (5,286 billion kWh)

• College graduation: 35% higher than 2025 (5,493 billion kWh)2

Generation Mix

• Today: Gas is the dominant power source at 40%, followed by renewables at 24%, nuclear at 18%, and coal at 17% gas

• By eighth grade graduation, renewables are predicted to take the top spot (46%) followed by gas (37%). Nuclear could hold relatively steady at 16%, while coal drops to 1%. And those trends continue…

• High school graduation: 46% renewables, 40% gas, 15% nuclear, and <1% coal

• College graduation: 45% renewables, 42% gas, 14% nuclear, and <1% coal

Energy-related CO2 Emissions

• Today: The US energy sector emits 4,865 million metric tons (MMT) of CO2 annually But with the changing grid mix highlighted above, we see that drop to…

• Eighth grade graduation: 3,671 MMT / year

• High school graduation: 3,685 MMT / year

• College graduation: 3,762 MMT / year3

Obviously, forecasts are inherently estimates that can (and will) change, for any number of factors. But as we get nearer to 2050, these forecasts become more certain.

Creating the Future

You likely know the old saying: The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago; the second-best time is today. Energy infrastructure operates on similar timelines. Transmission projects can take over a decade to build. Power plants last for generations. Workforce pipelines take years to develop. The decisions being made (or avoided) today are shaping the world of 2050.

So, I want to call on all of us working in energy to consider which trees we can plant today (the ones we’ll be thankful we didn’t put off for further decades). Because if we are honest with ourselves, many of today’s energy challenges are the accumulated result of decisions deferred, infrastructure underbuilt, and tradeoffs ignored.

We inherited systems designed by and for a different era, and now we are asking the next generation to modernize them, decarbonize them, secure them—oh, and make them affordable.

What does passing the baton responsibly look like in practice? In my opinion, it means:

• Building transmission before it becomes an emergency

• Optimizing regulatory structures before they become bottlenecks

• Investing in technologies that are resilient for tomorrow’s demands

• Strengthening critical mineral and equipment supply chains while expanding domestic manufacturing

• Supporting STEM education and workforce development

In short: investing today for the world we want the next generation to live in tomorrow.

Because by the time 2050 arrives, my son (and millions of others his age) will not be looking at these challenges as futuristic thought experiments. They will simply call it their world.

California has long been the proving ground for America’s energy transition, and it’s also where the politics, culture, and storytelling around that transition are being tested in real time. Messaging comes from all corners of the public landscape, including movies, sports, and video games, in addition to the institutions like utilities. Where is there potential to do more with that storytelling?

In this episode, host Kinsey Grant Baker sits down with Sammy Roth, former climate columnist at the Los Angeles Times and voice behind the Climate-Colored Goggles Substack, to explore how renewable industries are selling their story in a fraught political moment, why affordability and reliability are increasingly central to the climate conversation, and how rising demand is reshaping the debate around clean energy. Sammy argues that the energy transition is not just about economics, technology, and regulation, it’s also about culture.

The conversation digs into how utilities, policymakers, and clean energy advocates talk about tradeoffs, where messaging often falls short, and what successful storytelling looks like when the public is skeptical. From climate framing to the role of movies, sports, and media, the episode examines why clean energy progress may depend as much on narrative as on infrastructure. The discussion also looks at California as a case study for broader national politics. With energy and climate increasingly shaping elections and policy debates, Sammy shares what the state’s governor’s race reveals about voter priorities, how data centers are changing the conversation, and what lessons utilities and candidates should take into 2026.

Register for Energy Central’s live happy hour in DC on June 23

Climate-Colored Goggles

The obvious choice for California governor

Vattenfall commercial with Samuel L. Jackson

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Data centers are arriving faster than the grid can be built to serve them, creating real risk for developers, utilities, and customers alike. This won’t surprise anyone who’s been paying attention, but one potential solution that isn’t making the headlines is worth a deeper dive: bridge power.

In this episode, Kinsey Grant Baker chats with Jim Smith, President of PowerSecure, to explore how bridge power helps data centers come online while they wait for utility service and larger infrastructure buildouts to catch up. Jim explains why bridge power represents a timely market response,and how natural gas microgrids can provide continuous prime power for several years before transitioning into long-term resiliency and flexibility assets. The conversation also digs into why this model is different from traditional backup generation, where battery integration fits in, and how these systems can help manage load ramps and grid congestion during the interconnection process.

Jim shares what good coordination looks like between utilities, developers, and providers, what mistakes bridge power can help avoid, and why the post-bridge value of these assets matters. For utility leaders and data center developers alike, this episode offers a practical look at how to keep projects moving without waiting years for the grid to catch up.

Thanks to PowerSecure for making this episode possible. PowerSecure is the nation’s leading provider of microgrids and energy solutions. With over 25 years of experience, PowerSecure has developed, installed, and managed more than 3 Gigawatts of microgrid capacity and saved companies over $1 billion in energy efficiency upgrades. To learn more about PowerSecure and bridge power solutions, visit PowerSecure.com.

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Any business that continues with a practice simply because it’s familiar is already falling behind. This tendency leads to lazy thinking, uninspired problem-solving, and missed opportunities in the fast-changing modern energy landscape.

Observers have called out this tendency to stick to entrenched systems for years. When I talk to utility leaders, I often hear quiet acknowledgement that the sector practices a “race to second place”—they generally don’t want to be the ones breaking new ground. But once another utility crosses that new territory? They want in.

This approach to innovation is inherently limiting. This thought struck me as I recently watched the Artemis II mission take off my back porch (one of the benefits of living under an hour from the Kennedy Space Center).

Not only was I inspired by the space program’s ability to imagine the impossible and shoot for the (literal) stars, but my mind also gravitated towards energy systems. How will we sustain power systems on those eventual lunar settlements enabled by Artemis?

One thing is certain: Those systems will not be designed around the constraints of “this is how we’ve always done it.”

And that sparked a broader thought experiment: Where in the world (or universe) are energy generation and transmission systems being built without the baggage of legacy assumptions? And what can we learn from them?

Going from the least to most remote…

Non-electrified regions of Africa

Current practices:

Across Africa, 600 million people remain without access to electricity.Without power, these communities are held back from the next modernization leaps.

Efforts to power these regions have drawn significant international investment, and for years the default approach was replicating what works in modernized economies: Grid expansion and integration. But doing so creates economic, engineering, and regulatory challenges.

So developers are also integrating mini-grids and standalone systems. These tools are increasingly seen as complementary, each with its own role to play in a blend of solutions built around hyper-local realities.

What the legacy US grid can learn:

One-size-fits-all thinking does not match the diversity of energy needs across geographies and demographics, especially across the vast US grid. Today, localized generation mixes demonstrate this nature (i.e. hydropower dominating where it’s available in the Pacific Northwest vs. wind in the Midwest). But we still have room to go further and tailor grid tech and priorities based on regional characteristics like climate and natural resources.

Ocean-bound Infrastructure

Current practices:

Until someone confirms that Atlantis has a power grid, the most relevant sea-based frontier? Floating data centers.

This concept would place data centers in the middle of the ocean and power them with wave energy. Even more eyebrow-raising, they do the computing at sea and beam the results to satellites, no power or data tethers to land.

What the legacy US grid can learn:

The clear lesson: Use what’s around you! Why should we expect grid-tied power to run these floating data centers? In that same vein, why would we expect consistent energy solutions across Texas and Vermont? Different locations come with unique natural advantages—an efficient energy strategy reflects that fact.

What this project also demonstrates: reframing the actual problem. Rather than asking ‘How do we expand the grid to meet power needs?’ they ask ‘How do we power the computing load effectively?’ The more effective answer may be reimagining what’s actually needed!

Antarctica

Current practices:

The frosty continent’s research stations typically run via on-site generation, largely because building a costly grid across that vast, harsh environment isn’t worthwhile.

The majority of that power comes from diesel fuel, though more recently we’ve seen a push to add wind, solar, and storage. After all, transporting fuel to Antarctica is incredibly expensive and prone to interruptions.

What the legacy US grid can learn:

The lesson is simple: Diversify at the grid edge. By avoiding overreliance on a single fuel source, energy systems reduce risk. And by building more localized, islandable systems closer to end use, you improve resilience.

That’s not to say any US region should copy Antarctica’s hardware, but instead mimic its grid operating philosophy—small, modular, fuel-flexible, locally controlled, and built to fail gracefully.

The Moon…and beyond

Current practices:

The Artemis mission was meant to take a critical step toward establishing a permanent human presence on the moon, which requires energy. So, what is NASA planning?

In early 2026, DOE and NASA announced their aim to develop a nuclear fission system on the Moon, which would also include nuclear reactors in orbit. The appeal is obvious, as these systems are low-maintenance with minimal refueling and high energy density.

DOE has also been mapping out microgrid plans for the lunar surface, including solar arrays away from central hubs and even small robotic vehicles (CubeRovers) that can physical carry payload (including charged batteries) to where the energy is needed.

What the legacy US grid can learn:

The lesson for our terrestrial grid is straightforward: Once again, we can’t assume that the familiar answer is the best one. And we need to apply technology where it actually fits best.

For example, lunar engineers recognized the unique benefit of vertical-facing solar panels that can almost always be rotated to receive sunlight on the Moon, as well as the opportunity to move payload easier thanks to reduced gravity. But if these innovators were locked into “this is how a power system works,” they’d miss these creative solutions.

And looking ahead…

While the Moon is the proving ground, it’s not the final destination. Ultimate expansion to Mars will prove that there is always another frontier with different rules. Mars’ lower solar flux, higher gravity, and intense wind separate it notably from the lunar environment…emphasizing that the farther we go, scaled-up versions of what came before becomes less valuable than purpose-built responses to unique environments.

In Sum…

If we had a magic wand and could design the US grid from scratch, it would (of course) not look exactly like the one we have today. What currently exists is the result of decades of layered decisions that were perfectly rational for the time and place they were made.

But that does not mean we should stop questioning the baseline assumptions behind why “we’ve always done it that way.”

We still have a chance to pause, think differently, and plan for the future with a clean sheet of paper. So, don’t just think outside the box. It’s time to rethink the box itself, why it exists…and whether we need it at all.

A new Pew survey suggests the public is drawing some sharp conclusions about why electricity bills are rising, and not all of them are flattering to utilities. But does public perception match reality, and how much does it actually matter when trust is broken either way?

To dive into that survey and a subsequent poll of the Energy Central audience, this episode brings together the Energy Central team of Kinsey Grant Baker, Molly Glick, and Matt Chester to unpack the survey results, including the eye-opening finding that 64% of Americans say utility companies raising profits is the main reason their bills are going up. The conversation digs into what is actually driving rising bills, how utilities are responding, and why the public trust gap may be bigger than many leaders realize.

The team also breaks down the reactions from Energy Central readers and how utilities are balancing the need for massive capital investment with the challenge of serving both hyperscalers and everyday customers. This context naturally leads to a discussion on communication, strategy, and regulation. What does good messaging look like when utilities are trying to explain why they are spending more? Is this simply a communications problem, or something deeper in the structure of the business?

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Central Hudson Gas & Electric is in the middle of a major five-year transformation aimed at becoming what CEO Stephanie Raymond calls a “premium utility” — one that leads on performance, reliability, trust, customer focus, and innovation. But what exactly does that mean?

In this episode, host Kinsey Grant Baker chats with Stephanie Raymond of Central Hudson and Josh Eife, Managing Director at Greencastle, to unpack how Central Hudson 2.0 came together, what sparked the need for a sweeping reevaluation, and what happens when a utility decides the status quo is no longer enough. Stephanie walks us through the six pillars shaping the transformation: Growth, Organizational Effectiveness and Optimization, Workforce Engagement, Customer Excellence, Grid Resilience and Reliability, and Work Transformation. The conversation also gets into the practical reality of leading change while keeping day-to-day operations running.

Now about a year into execution, the conversation covers what has changed, what surprised leadership, and what lessons emerged early in the process. For utility leaders navigating their own change journeys, this episode offers a grounded look at what it takes to build a “premium utility” in practice, and what that future might mean for both customers and employees.

Thanks to Greencastle Consulting for making this episode possible. For nearly 30 years, Greencastle has implemented critical initiatives in highly regulated, high-stakes environments—like utilities—turning strategy into real, measurable results. 100% veteran-owned and operated and headquartered in Pennsylvania, Greencastle specializes in strategy execution: aligning leadership, strengthening governance, and ensuring critical initiatives actually deliver. Whether you’re navigating enterprise-level transformations, grid modernization, or other complex technology programs and regulatory demands, Greencastle embeds with your team to drive clarity, accountability, and real outcomes.

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With power prices reaching new heights, people are understandably looking for something (or someone) to blame: fat checks paid to utility CEOs, the data center boom, or even whichever politician one might consider most culpable.

A crucial thread in this narrative: The average consumer has long seen their power bill as a black box. They see their power consumption converted to a total cost they must pay, but to them it remains unclear how and why that translates into a given monthly bill. It’s especially perplexing if their consumption habits haven’t changed but their bill has.

In a world where we feel mired in shrinkflation (and even ensh*ttification), paying more for energy when those electrons are identical to what they used to be feels unfair (and we’re not even seeing a reduction in power outages). People feel like they’re being taken advantage of.

The reality is more complicated: Our simple power bills are the end result of a very complex economic (and engineering) machine. To shine a light on all those moving parts, I decided to employ some nifty AI tools.

What I did

I figured if people could see what their dollars are going toward, it might help inform the conversations around rising rates. Inspired by the types of tools that pop up every April to show where your taxes are going, I realized I had never seen such tools for electricity.

I have, however, seen plenty of hype around vibe coding, though I’d never tried it out myself—this felt like the perfect excuse! Thanks to the free-to-use Lovable vibe coding tool, I explained in plain language what I wanted to do:

I want to create a web app that allows someone to select what their power utility is, what their bill total is, and have the app estimate (based on public filings) how much of their money in dollars and cents is going towards each line item on the utility-wide expenses (executive pay, fuel for power plants, etc.)

After a little back-and-forth on which utilities I wanted to include (I landed on ConEd, PG&E, Xcel, Dominion, and ComEd), where to source data (publicly available SEC filings), and some visualization suggestions, we were off to the races.

I also wanted to include a nod to those top sources of customer frustrations we’ve been hearing about in 2026: CEO pay and data centers. I instructed the tool thusly:

I would love to add sections to highlight two hot button topics: 1) Executive Pay and 2) data center related costs. Can you please find a way to incorporate those and calculate relative numbers for them?

With that, Lovable incorporated public resources to estimate these figures, and I was ready to hit publish. The resultant, fully functional app can be found here:

Where does your power bill actually go?

To demonstrate, I grabbed the ConEd bill from an Energy Central colleague. Here’s their bill:

And here’s how my tool dissected that bill:

What does it all mean?

At the simplest level, I aimed to highlight how a power bill represents a web of costs across generation, transmission, taxes, financing, profit, and more. But when customers receive the bill, they typically just see that total—one that has likely been rising in recent years. They don’t see the decades of investment, the volatile supply chains and fuel costs, the regulatory evolutions, the storm hardening, and the future-proofing that sits underneath it all.

Such complexity is why a tool can be so helpful to educate ratepayers about what their utility bills are funding (one utilities would be well served to create themselves for transparency and trust-building with their customers). Even if such tools are imperfect and oversimplified, they create that starting point for education. If people are angry about bills rising, the harder but more honest question is not simply, “who can we blame?” It’s “which parts of the bill are actually changing, and why?”

Some of those answers are more straightforward than others. Generation costs are, at the end of the day, part of the unavoidable basic machinery of making electricity. Delivery and operations are similarly inevitable, but they also reflect many years over which maintenance, resilience, and modernization needs were too often deferred. Add in capital and financing costs, and you start to see how utilities today are often paying for investments that were postponed yesterday (or even decades ago).

And then there’s profit—always a controversial topic, especially when people are already feeling squeezed. But it’s an inherent feature of these large, investor-owned utilities.

The point is not to pretend those dollars do not matter. The point is to put them in context. A line item that sounds enormous in the abstract can look a lot different when you remember the scale of the utility’s entire system.

What do we do with this information?

I did not dive into the micro-breakdown of every subsidiary, filing nuance, or utility-specific wrinkle. But these types of tools are increasingly within reach of ordinary people who want to better understand the systems around them.

Is this instrument perfect? No. I have plenty of functionalities I’d still want to build out, test, and improve. Plus, we should take the accuracy of these numbers (along with AI-generated content in general) with a grain of salt. But is it educational? Absolutely. And honestly, I would encourage others to do the same.

And that means I’ll put out a call to action for the utilities.

Because the bigger point here is not just about bills. It is about narrative. If people don’t fully understand what they’re paying for, then the loudest, simplest explanation will usually win by default.

That’s part of a broader problem in the power sector, where trust has become fragile and hostility is growing. What’s the solution? Sometimes this requires correcting false narratives. Other times it means owning the narrative…before someone else does.

And in some cases, it’s crucial to make the invisible visible (even if the first beta version comes from a third-party vibe-coding schmuck like me). And apologies to those who are concerned that this exercise meant sucking up some data center capacity—I owe you all a couple of cents toward your power bills!

China’s energy buildout has become one of the defining stories of the global energy transition. And the impacts aren’t constrained just to what happens in China, but the impacts are felt globally and are critical for U.S. utilities and policymakers to understand.

In this episode, host Kinsey Grant Baker sits down with Henry Sanderson, journalist, author, and founder of the Volt Insight newsletter, to explore how China became the world’s largest energy infrastructure builder and what that means for everything from renewables to AI to global competitiveness. Henry explains how China’s power system differs from those in the U.S. and Europe, why the country has been able to scale clean energy technologies so quickly, and how its state-directed investment model has enabled massive buildout in generation, transmission, batteries, and grid modernization.

Henry also zooms out to the global implications, discussing China’s dominance in supply chains for solar, batteries, and other clean energy technologies, how that gives the country economic and geopolitical leverage, and whether the U.S. can still compete in an energy system increasingly shaped by electrification and AI. For utility leaders trying to understand where the future of energy power, manufacturing, and grid investment is heading, this conversation offers a clear and sobering look at the scale of China’s advantage.

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Hydroelectric utilities face a different kind of risk than most other power operators: when a dam is involved, the consequences of failure are not just operational, but they are deeply tied to emergency planning, evacuation, and public safety. That means planning is even more important, and the statistical methods behind that planning must be regularly examined.

To get into this critical topic, Kinsey Grant Baker speaks with Chris Goodell of Kleinschmidt Associates, along with Priya Jain and Eric Toth of East Bay Municipal Utility District, about how a pioneering probabilistic approach to dam-breach inundation mapping is changing the way utilities think about uncertainty, response, and communication. Their conversation walks through how inundation maps are used by planners, first responders, and downstream communities when every minute matters. The episode also explores how the team managed tens of thousands of scenarios, how outputs were translated into actionable information, and why this approach can give emergency managers and utility teams a much more complete picture of risk.

By diving into a real world case study, these experts highlight what the probabilistic work can reveal, and how it reshapes next steps for the project team. For utility decisionmakers, this timely discussion shows how embracing uncertainty — rather than simplifying it away — can lead to stronger planning, clearer communication, and better outcomes when infrastructure risk is on the line.

Thanks to this episode’s sponsor, Kleinschmidt Associates. Kleinschmidt Associates provides engineering, regulatory, and environmental consulting to energy companies and government agencies across North America. For over half a century, we have delivered innovative, practical solutions to complex challenges and sensitive issues. Working at the intersection of science, policy, and engineering, we provide practical solutions for complex renewable energy, water, and environmental projects.

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Nuclear is back!

Geothermal is hot!

Coal is killing you!

But how much of these stories are actually rooted in true developments? Grid planners can’t keep the lights on based on what stories happen to be trending.

I’m often surprised when a friend who isn’t in energy reaches out to ask about an exciting-sounding (but not entirely relevant) tech they just read about (Can’t hydrogen solve this all? What about gravitational energy storage?). But it makes sense: Those not entrenched in the daily developments are much more likely to open a push notification on shiny new tech than they are, say, to engage with the fact that a run-of-the-mill gas plant is being built in their state.

To measure this apparent gap between popular media coverage and reality, I’m donning my engineer hat and busting out the energy drink that got me through college statistics classes. Specifically, I decided to compare Google Trends results against plant capacity changes over time (with the help of EIA’s monthly electric generator inventory) for eight key power sources. Does popular attention coincide with the opening and closing of power plants?

What does the data say?

The investigation comes with a lot of variables to map: Eight different power sources over 16 years, tracking a) capacity added, b) capacity closed, and c) relative Google Trend rating for each of those combinations. My fellow data nerds can see the table of exact numbers here. Everyone else can just check out the resultant graph below.

This chart has much to digest, but some compelling trends pop out:

Solar was hyped up for much of the coverage period, but capacity only really ramped up in the latter years.

The 2010s was a huge decade for solar reaching maturity, and that piqued our collective search interest. But these developments didn’t translate to massive installations until the 2020s, once falling costs were boosted by favorable policies.

Wind is the silent needle-mover, adding consistently high capacity without dominating search,

Google searches represent an inherent ‘how does this affect me’ mindset, with rooftop solar and large power plants often at the forefront. But people don’t often encounter wind farms due to their typically remote locations, so relatively fewer people feel compelled to learn more. And while we hear a lot about high-profile wind projects announcements (or cancellations), it doesn’t appear to reach the same fever-pitch hype.

Nuclear is rarely added to the grid, and attention thus remains lower than expected.

We only see three individual years with new nuclear capacity. So while the industry is buzzing about nuclear possibilities, the public attention is evidently as slow as the additions to the power mix. The one year that saw a relative spike in nuclear attention was 2011 in the wake of the Fukushima disaster (not a reason the nuclear industry wants to drive traffic).

Geothermal only added a fraction of nuclear’s capacity, but attention was comparable between the two.

Nuclear actually ends up with comparable search interest to geothermal energy, though geothermal only added a third of the capacity. Perhaps geothermal is seen as the most agreeable renewable: no fuel; highly dispatchable; no critical minerals needed (all reasons geothermal is seeing a surge of interest under the Trump Administration, the rare support of a renewable energy tech).

The two least-searched sources: hydropower and biomass, though not equally ignored.

Civilizations have run on some form of hydropower and biomass for centuries or more. But why does hydropower register slightly on the scale, while biomass is largely ignored? I’d posit that biomass is just less sexy: landfill- and sewer waste-fueled projects are great sustainability solutions, but they’re…not appealing to think about.

Powering the grid today vs. the future

Of course, capacity added doesn’t directly correlate with what’s powering the grid (I’ve previously covered this). But the main sources of electricity generation today (gas, nuclear, coal) aren’t exactly turning heads—people aren’t as likely to search out that nuclear power plant that’s been operating safely for 30 years. They’re far more interested in what might come next.

What does this all mean?

A couple main takeaways:

Public perception is valuable, but it has its limits: People get excited by possibility—but it can take years for hype to translate into real grid impacts. Reading past the headline is important: We need to look at what the data is actually saying, which should inform our worldview and decision-making. (Also: Never underestimate the special interest groups pushing narratives or the power of clickbait in dictating headlines).

Sometimes the hype is real, but early: Take nuclear—a lot of today’s attention is tied up in technologies like SMRs or even fusion, both of which are still years away. That doesn’t mean the excitement is misplaced, but it does mean we’re often talking about future potential rather than present-day impact.

Boring =/= not valuable: On the flip side, when something like wind is steadily adding capacity without dominating the conversation, it’s a reminder that some of the most important parts of the grid keep on building without the same level of fanfare.

Disconnect between hype and action could warrant analysis: We want to resist the temptation to evaluate the energy transition based on vibes alone. But if the numbers don’t line up with the narrative, that’s where things get interesting. Take the early 2010s hype on solar that was slow to translate to capacity figures. Is it a policy bottleneck? A funding gap? A public awareness issue? Or just the natural lag between innovation and infrastructure? Those are the questions worth asking.

Tech maturity isn’t what drives attention: Sure, we’re still talking about natural gas and nuclear—long-established pillars of the grid. But solar has managed to sustain attention both before and after its major growth phase, all suggesting that buzz isn’t just about what’s new versus what’s proven. It’s about what captures the narrative.

Because in the end, narrative matters. It shapes what people care about, what policymakers prioritize, and where capital flows. It doesn’t always align with reality—but it absolutely influences it. If we want to understand where the energy industry is going, we can’t just track what’s being built. We also have to pay attention to what’s being talked about…and remain clear-eyed about the gap between the two.

How does a major utility plan for an energy future that is growing more complex by the day? From data centers to an aging grid to an affordability crisis and more, utility leaders are staring down challenges that are more intertwined and urgent than ever, and managing them all is no small feat.

In this episode, host Kinsey Grant Baker chats with Gil Quiniones, CEO of ComEd, to unpack the utility’s latest four-year plan and how it addresses some of the biggest pressures reshaping the grid: explosive data center demand, aging infrastructure, affordability concerns, and reliability expectations that keep rising every year. Gil walks us through what makes northern Illinois such a magnet for hyperscale growth, how ComEd is planning for concentrated load without overbuilding or shifting costs to other customers, and what it means to operate a transmission-and-distribution utility without owning generation.

Listen in to get the inside scoop about how ComEd is thinking about affordability, equity, and near-term energy efficiency solutions while still making the long-term investments needed to strengthen the grid.

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Utilities depend on accurate field data to keep maps current, manage vegetation, and respond quickly when the grid is under stress, but that gets much harder when the global navigation satellite system (GNSS) isn’t reliable, access is restricted, or conditions make it unsafe for crews to get close.

In this episode of Power Perspectives, host Kinsey Grant Baker chats with Laser Tech’s Derrick Reish, Steve Colburn, and Joe Cronn to explore how utilities collect critical measurements in urban, forested, and GNSS-denied environments without sacrificing speed, safety, or data quality. The conversation digs into the real-world consequences of measurement gaps across utility workflows, from planning and compliance to emergency response and outage recovery.

To explore how laser rangefinders can help fill those gaps in the field, Derrick, Steve, and Joe walk through how the tools work, when utilities realize they need them, what a pilot or deployment typically looks like, and what best practices help teams get the most value from them. For utility leaders looking to maintain reliable data in difficult conditions, this episodes offers a practical look at how to measure what matters when the usual tools fall short.

Thanks to Laser Tech for sponsoring this episode. Collect accurate asset positions in GNSS-impaired environments with LaserGIS. Using offset laser measurement methods, field crews can maximize productivity while working more efficiently in the field. When crews can collect GIS data faster, staying under budget becomes much more likely. And with laser offset workflows, teams can save time while still capturing critical measurement data—all from safe locations.

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