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Is the Golden Pacific Powerlink an AI Infrastructure Project in Disguise?

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  Investigative Analysis  |  Golden Pacific Powerlink  /  AI Data Centers  /  Ratepayer Risk  |  May 2026 Follow the Load — Investigative Analysis SDG&E flatly denies any connection between its proposed $2.3 billion Imperial Valley–to–Orange County transmission line and the flood of AI data center proposals now targeting Imperial Valley. The facts on the ground tell a more complicated story — and California's own regulators are sounding alarms. May 2026 Sources: CAISO, CEC, Little Hoover Commission, KPBS, inewsource, CalMatters, CPUC Public Advocates Office When Imperial Valley residents pressed SDG&E at its May 2026 open houses about whether the Golden Pacific Powerlink was designed to power AI data centers, project director Erica Martin gave a response that was technically accurate and strategically incomplete: "There's no particular source that's driving the need for th...
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Power Without End: Geothermal Co-Location Changes Everything

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  Weakens the Case for the Powerlink Strategic Analysis — Energy Infrastructure ⟳ Revised: Geothermal Co-Location Reframes the Analysis May 2026 Follow the Power — Revised Analysis The prior analysis led with natural gas as the "honest answer" for AI data center baseload power. That was wrong for Imperial Valley specifically. The honest answer there is geothermal co-location — a model that is actively being built, requires no grid connection, bypasses CAISO entirely, and in doing so significantly undermines one of the primary justifications for the Golden Pacific Powerlink. REVISION NOTICE: This article replaces an earlier version that understated geothermal's role and failed to address the co-location model and IID's independence from CAISO. Both omissions were substantive analytical errors.   May 2026 — Sources: CTR/Baker Hughes, CalEthos/TerraVolt, Rhodium Group, DOE, IID, KPBS, Data Center Frontier, CAISO, IEA ...
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Power Without End: Where AI Gets Its Electricity —

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  Strategic Analysis — Energy Infrastructure Part III: Power Sources & Bubble Risk  |  May 2026 Follow the Power — Investigative Analysis Who Pays If the Bubble Bursts AI data centers demand 24/7 firm power that solar and wind cannot reliably deliver alone. The honest answer — natural gas — collides head-on with California's climate commitments. Meanwhile, credible voices from hedge funds to Harvard Law are warning that the infrastructure being built to serve the AI boom may become the next great stranded-asset disaster, with utility ratepayers left holding the bill. May 2026  |  Sources: IEA, Brookings, Man Group, KKR, Lawrence Berkeley Lab, Harvard Law, CalMatters, Fortune, CAISO, S&P Global The most important engineering fact about AI data centers is one their proponents prefer to soft-pedal: they cannot run on solar panels. Not primarily. Not reliably. A single large-scale AI training facility re...
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