Post: Rising energy demand threatens grid stability in the USA, says report

Rising energy demand threatens grid stability in the USA, says report

Rising energy demand threatens grid stability in the USA, says report

GridBeyond launches Global Energy Trends 2026, USA Regional Outlook. The research explores how in the USA the energy system has been affected by extreme weather, the rise of digital load, grid efficiency and political intervention resulting in changes of priorities and directions.

In 2025, the USA has been affected by extreme weather conditions that have put enormous pressure on the energy system causing several challenges for the public health, infrastructure and agriculture. In addition to the pressure posed to the grid by the weather, the USA market has also registered a growth in energy demand which is expected to continue to grow 25% by 2030 and 78% by 2050. It also expects the USA peak electricity demand to grow 14% by 2030 and 54% through 2050 with data centers been accounted for nearly half of electricity demand growth between now and 2030.

The rise is pushing many markets to adopt new and smarter solutions. Rising electricity demand and the changing energy mix have brought grid efficiency to the forefront, says the report, as connecting new energy projects to the grid has become a major bottleneck, slowing the deployment of new renewables and large loads. These backlogs have doubled project wait times to five years or more with solar representing the largest share of new generation capacity awaiting interconnection across the US.

Finally, the report looks at the role of politics in the advancement of the energy transition noticing that since taking office, the new administration has taken a series of actions that significantly alter federal policy toward renewable energy, climate regulation, and environmental protection. As a result of these actions, the Climate Action Tracker (an independent scientific project that tracks government climate action and measures it against the globally agreed Paris Agreement aim of “holding warming well below 2°C, and pursuing efforts to limit warming to 1.5°C) downgraded the country’s rating from “insufficient” to “critically insufficient”. However, state-level action on energy and climate has largely moved in the opposite direction of federal policy, with many states expanding renewable energy targets, strengthening emissions standards, and investing in clean technologies.