Senate Permitting Deal Hands Data Centers the Full Grid Bill; OpenAI Signs for 8 GW in Pike County — October 04, 2026

A bipartisan Senate permitting package would make data centers pay both incremental and embedded transmission costs, while OpenAI takes a 20-year, roughly 8-gigawatt lease at SB Energy's Ohio campus backed by more than 9 gigawatts of planned gas. Plus TVA's Clinch River SMR permit and two fights over who gives up land for data center transmission lines in Louisiana and Indiana.

In this episode:

1. The Senate Permitting Deal Contains a Data Center Double Tap - Heatmap News — Heatmap News

https://heatmap.news/daily/data-center-permitting-deal

2. OpenAI signs 20-year, 8GW lease at Ohio's Pike… · Slicast — Slicast

https://slicast.com/article/qlxv8l

3. NRC Approves Construction for First U.S. Commercial SMR at Clinch River — Power Still Years Away - CRBC News — Annemarije de Boer

https://www.crbcnews.com/articles/6abea6433f9131b3e0d2b737

4. Louisiana landowners oppose transmission line meant to support Meta’s data center — Rob LaPerle

https://www.kalb.com/2026/10/03/louisiana-landowners-oppose-transmission-line-meant-support-metas-data-center-entergy-attempts-quell-concerns/

5. IURC Lets Blackstone-Backed JV Take Land for 100 Miles of Lines Serving LEAP | Hoosier Enquirer — Hoosier Enquirer Team

https://www.hoosierenquirer.com/post/iurc-lets-blackstone-backed-jv-take-land-for-100-miles-of-lines-serving-leap