The Daily Baseload Brief

The EIA's August 2026 Short-Term Energy Outlook, released 11 August, has cut its Texas electricity load growth forecast for 2027 from 14% to 6%, directly attributing the revision to Governor Abbott's 3 August directive pausing new data center grid connections pending a statewide audit^[1].

ERCOT Batch Zero heads to PUCT on 20 August. ERCOT suspended the Batch Zero Large Load classification notices that had been scheduled for 7 August and will seek a good-cause exception from the Public Utility Commission of Texas at its 20 August open meeting. ERCOT is considering approximately 474 GW of interconnection requests, more than five times the grid's record peak demand, with data centers accounting for roughly 90% of that total. The delay also pushes back ERCOT's Long-Term Load Forecast and could defer the December 2026 Capacity, Demand, and Reserves Report. The 20 August PUCT meeting will set the revised Batch Zero timeline - or leave it open-ended, which would allow some developers to seek withdrawal and security-deposit returns.

EIA August STEO: solar up 21%, coal down 11% in 1H26. U.S. solar generation rose 21% in the first half of 2026 compared with the same period in 2025, while coal-fired generation fell 11%, or 39 billion kWh. Natural gas-fired generation increased 2% over the same period and is forecast to rise further in 2027 as prices remain low. EIA forecasts U.S. marketed natural gas production will average 122.5 Bcf/d in 2026, surpassing the previous record of 118.5 Bcf/d set in 2025. The Henry Hub spot price is forecast at $2.87 per million Btu in 3Q26, 50 cents below the prior month's forecast, driven by reduced LNG feedgas demand after maintenance began at Freeport LNG on 10 July. EIA projects U.S. energy-related CO₂ emissions will fall 1.8% in 2026, driven primarily by declining coal consumption.

Latin America: storage still at demonstration scale. Across the region, energy storage deployment remains concentrated in demonstration projects, small-scale grid-support applications, and remote-area microgrids, with a large-scale market yet to take shape, held back by gaps in transmission and distribution infrastructure and underdeveloped market mechanisms^[1]. Chile remains the regional outlier - curtailment passed 6 TWh in 2024, creating a commercial pull for co-located BESS - but the regulatory and financing frameworks needed to replicate that dynamic elsewhere in the region are not yet in place^[1].

Strait of Hormuz disruption lifts LNG prices. EIA notes that international LNG prices rose to levels last seen in early April after vessel strikes resumed on 7 July and traffic through the Strait of Hormuz slowed considerably. The agency assumes disruptions of roughly 0.6 million barrels per day of crude oil production persist through end-2027, with most Middle East output returning to near pre-conflict averages in early 2027.