Power & Sites · United States

Engie, LS Power land 2.1 GW in fast-track interconnection approval from PJM

Credited to Utility Dive · utilitydive.com · 9h ago

Photograph · Utility Dive

The PJM Interconnection expects Engie’s two storage projects totaling nearly 1.7 GW and LS Power’s 455-MW gas-fired uprate will be online by mid-2029.

The PJM Interconnection has approved three initial projects totaling 2.1 GW — two storage projects planned by Engie IR Holdings and a gas-fired uprate proposed by an LS Power unit — in its Expedited Interconnection Track process, the grid operator said Thursday.

PJM expects the projects will come online in mid-2029.

With the approvals in hand, Engie plans to build an 860-MW storage project in Crawford, Pennsylvania, and an 800-MW storage project in Morrow, Ohio, according to PJM.

LS Power intends to add 455 MW to its 810-MW combined cycle Hunterstown power plant in Adams, Pennsylvania, PJM said. LS Power bought the power plant from Platinum Equity in 2024.

The projects’ advancement through PJM’s review process comes as the grid operator is facing tight supply conditions with little generation coming online in recent years while data centers are driving the grid operator’s demand forecasts higher. That dynamic has led to a sharp spike in PJM’s capacity costs, driving up electric utility bills in some areas.

After the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission approved the Expedited Interconnection Track process in June, PJM opened the application window for the process on July 31. The fast-track interconnection review process is for projects larger than 250 MW that are backed by a primary siting authority and can begin operating within three years, PJM said.

Under the process, PJM will consider up to 10 interconnection requests a year for new or uprated capacity resources that meet the eligibility requirements. The process is set to expire at the end of 2027.

The temporary interconnection process is one part of PJM’s efforts to bring new generation online to meet rising demand, mainly driven by planned data centers, the grid operator noted. Those efforts include a pending reliability backstop procurement for new generation, updates to the grid operator’s surplus interconnection service rules that could allow new generation to use existing interconnection capacity and a reformed generator interconnection process.

Asia's data center boom hits speed bumps

Credited to Light Reading · lightreading.com9h ago

Useful

Firmus and PLDT pulled data center IPOs this week while governments pressed pause on development in latest hurdles to Asia's data center boom.

Asia-Pacific's hectic data center rollout has hit a series of speed bumps. The most dramatic by far was the collapse Friday of Australian-based Firmus’ planned AU$7.1 billion (US$4.97 billion) IPO, which had been expected to be the biggest ASX debut since Telstra’s 1997 IPO.

Firmus, a neocloud company whose shareholders include Blackstone, Jane Street and Nvidia, withdrew its ASX listing application Friday and said it would seek up to $3 billion through private fund-raising, the Financial Times has reported.

It had struggled to win market support at its target price of around AU$11 ($7.67), but even after it offered to cut the price, investors did not have the appetite.

Trading in Maas Group, one of Firmus' shareholders, was halted Friday after the stock dropped 27% in two days. Maas Group has a 3.2% stake in the company as well as outstanding contracts with Firmus worth AU$727 million ($507 million).

Two days earlier, Firmus had been dumped by CDC Data Centers from their joint AI infrastructure project in Australia after CDC had become troubled by Firmus’ southeast Asian expansion, which had not been a part of the original partnership.

Firmus' wasn't the only IPO to go south this week. Philippine telco PLDT put its data center REIT listing on hold until 2027, blaming the decision on higher interest rates. The REIT, Vitro, was expected to generate as much as 24.2 billion Philippine pesos (US$385.1 million) on the Manila bourse.

PLDT said in an exchange filing it had decided to delay the IPO until 2027 due to "current market conditions and rising interest rates." But it said it was committed to the IPO as an important part of its asset monetization and deleveraging plans.

The Philippines' central bank last month hiked interest rates by 25 basis points and is widely expected to announce two more rate rises by the year's end.

Southeast Asian governments have also been forced to press pause on the AI boom. Last week, Indonesia's West Java province halted a 640MW project by Singapore–based BDX, claiming it had not received key approvals, including an environmental assessment.

A month ago, Thailand suspended 166 data center projects – of which 49 were under construction and 117 awaited approval – to allow government committees to write new industry rules that would set standards and maximize the economic benefit to Thailand.

In Malaysia, the center of Asia's data center boom, officials are anxious about soaring the new digital infrastructure's power consumption. Electricity demand growth has gone from 1.5%-2% annually to nearly 10% due to data centers, Siti Safinah Salleh, head of the Malaysian Energy Commission, is reported to have said.

Salleh warned that recovering energy costs from data center operators is difficult because many are on short-term contracts and have refused to make long-term commitments.

About the Author

Robert Clark is an independent technology editor and researcher based in Hong Kong.

Want more Light Reading stories in your Google search results?

Popular whitepapers in 5G

Our Latest Videos

More change for Verizon's tech team as network exec heads for exit

Adam Koeppe, chief network officer for core engineering and operations, announced he is leaving at the end of this year to 'move on to the next chapter.'

Original · Light Reading

Front Method

Power & Sites · United States

When noise ordinances can't keep up with data centers

Credited to Data Center Dynamics · datacenterdynamics.com · 9h ago

Photograph · Data Center Dynamics

Alex Hornecker is Acoustic Consultant and Associate Vice President, Salas O'Brien

And why the issue around noise shouldn't be ignored

Noise has always been part of data center development, but the regulatory environment around it is changing faster than most developers realize. For years, it was reasonable to treat a local noise ordinance as a fixed target, a number developers designed against and moved past. But that assumption is breaking down because ordinances vary from town to town, with no statewide consistency.

Many ordinances haven't been touched in decades and don't reflect current technology for measuring sound. Others are moving in the opposite direction, tightening in real time as communities push back. The result is that developers are starting from zero on every project, since what satisfies one jurisdiction may not carry over to the next town, let alone the next state.

Two ordinances, two different problems

Ordinance inconsistency is most evident in how different jurisdictions define acceptable noise limits. Some ordinances set a fixed decibel ceiling that never changes. Others tie the limit to ambient conditions, most commonly using a measure called Leq, which ties allowable sound to the average sound, and occasionally L90, which caps allowable sound based on the quietest 10 percent of the day. Developers often assume a fixed limit is easier to meet, but proximity to sensitive receptors can matter more than which type of ordinance applies.

Two projects illustrate these contrasting noise regulations. One is governed by an ambient-referenced ordinance that permits no more than five decibels above the measured L90, translating to a limit of roughly 34 dBA at receptors about 1,500 feet from the site. The second, located only 300 feet from single-family homes, operates under a fixed limit of 60 dBA, a considerably more permissive number on paper. Yet because the second site sits much closer to sensitive receptors, it requires many of the same mitigation measures as the first: enclosure ratings, perimeter barrier walls, earthen berms, and sound attenuators.

The comparison highlights a point that's easy to miss when developers evaluate an ordinance in isolation. A generous decibel limit doesn't guarantee an easier project, and a strict ambient standard doesn't automatically mean the most expensive one. Distance to receptors, the type of equipment on-site, and the ordinance's structure all interact, and none of them can be assessed independently of the others.

The tonal penalty problem

Volume alone isn't the only variable that jurisdictions regulate. Transformer hum and certain fan frequencies produce tonal noise, a sound with an identifiable pitch. Tonal noise draws complaints at lower decibel levels than broadband noise of the same intensity. A growing number of localities have begun codifying that difference by imposing tonal penalties and stricter limits when a facility produces a detectable tone.

That regulatory shift changes what counts as adequate mitigation. On the 1,500-foot ambient-standard project, tonal sound from step-down transformers was significant enough that standard equipment couldn't meet the ordinance's requirements. The solution required sourcing transformers with acoustic performance beyond the default NEMA ratings. On the 300-foot fixed-limit project, the tonal component is addressed differently, incorporated into the sound attenuators already required for other equipment rather than solved through specialized procurement.

Both approaches work, but they stem from different constraints. As tonal penalties become more common, the frequency profile of what leaves a site needs to be evaluated as part of equipment selection from the outset, rather than treated as a problem to solve after a facility is already built and audible.

Scale compounds the problem

Distance and ordinance type aren't the only variables. Scale introduces its own complications, and one of the least anticipated is generator testing. Because data centers are critical infrastructure, each backup generator must be tested periodically, usually once a month, and each test typically lasts about an hour. On a small site with four or five generators, that's a brief, manageable disruption.

However, on a large campus with hundreds of generators, the cumulative testing window can consume most or all of the allowable daytime noise period under a typical ordinance. What starts as routine maintenance can approach the facility's normal daytime operating condition, and it's exactly the kind of noise nearby residents are most likely to notice, regardless of whether the facility remains technically compliant.

The broader issue is that at hyperscale, the standard approach of keeping noisy equipment away from the property line runs out of room, both physically and in terms of what mitigation alone can achieve. Acoustic modeling and CFD (or thermal and airflow) modeling are often run as sequential processes, with acoustic treatment addressed only after the equipment layout has already been set for airflow.

Adjusting equipment positioning to improve airflow can undermine a barrier's effectiveness, and vice versa. At the density of modern hyperscale facilities, solving these problems in sequence rather than together creates conflicts that are far more expensive to resolve once construction is underway.

Designing for a moving target

The regulatory environment around data center noise is tightening in some jurisdictions and fragmenting across all of them. A facility engineered against a fixed limit, an ambient standard, or a tonal penalty is really being engineered against three different definitions of acceptable noise, often within the same region.

Meeting whichever definition applies is necessary, but it isn't the same as being protected. Ordinance compliance doesn't prevent a nuisance claim, and these disputes don't always turn on technical measurements. A neighbor's attorney can play a recording of the facility for a jury, and a jury that finds it objectionable isn't bound by a decibel reading showing the site is within its limits. That exposure isn't separate from the design choices discussed here — the same decisions that determine how easily a facility can adapt to a future ordinance change also determine how much legal and reputational risk it carries in the meantime.

The facilities being designed today will operate for decades under ordinances that may look very different in five years. That flexibility, and the exposure that comes with the lack of it, depends on decisions made now: how equipment is selected, how a site is laid out, and whether acoustic and thermal modeling are treated as one design problem or two. That's a design decision, not a compliance afterthought.