How Texas plans to serve ‘infinite demand’
From Energy Capital Podcast by Doug Lewin
May 20, 2026 · 43 min
About this episode
The episode discusses Texas's energy infrastructure challenges in accommodating the growing demand from data centers and the adaptations being made within ERCOT governance.
Texas has spent decades building transmission to serve load growth. The pattern worked when growth rose steadily with new homes, oil and gas operations, and the gradual expansion of the state’s industrial base. It is being tested by a different kind of customer: data centers requesting interconnection at a scale that exceeds what the grid can physically deliver. Eric Goff, founder of Goff Policy and a long-time participant in the ERCOT stakeholder process, walks through how the system is adapting. The current large load queue sits above 400 gigawatts, a number Goff describes as effectively infinite because the constraint is infrastructure, not demand. In an interview with host Joshua Rhodes, Eric covers a lot of ground, including: * How the batch zero policy, now working its way through ERCOT governance, would replace one-off utility studies with a single, system-wide study and a constructable transmission plan. * How the decision to build 765 kV transmission compares to the 138 and 345 kV shifts of past generations. * How Senate Bill 6 gave ERCOT and utilities multiple tools to disconnect large loads before emergencies. * Why artificial intelligence hyperscalers behave…
People in this episode
Host: Doug Lewin
Guest: Eric Goff
Topics covered
- Texas energy infrastructure
- data centers
- ERCOT governance
- transmission planning
- load growth
- artificial intelligence
- energy policy
Keywords
- Texas
- data centers
- ERCOT
- transmission
- load growth
- infrastructure
- Senate Bill 6
- artificial intelligence
- energy policy
Mentioned in this episode
Organizations: ERCOT, Goff Policy, Senate Bill 6
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