The Trump administration’s Department of Energy warned that retiring 104 gigawatts of power capacity by 2030—paired with delays in new energy projects—could sharply increase blackouts.
Annual outage hours could jump from single digits to over 800. While 209 GW of new capacity is planned, only 22 GW comes from reliable baseload sources. Even without retirements, some regions could see outage risks triple.
“This report affirms what we already know: The United States cannot afford to continue down the unstable and dangerous path of energy subtraction previous leaders pursued, forcing the closure of baseload power sources like coal and natural gas,” Secretary Chris Wright said in a statement. “In the coming years, America’s reindustrialization and the AI race will require a significantly larger supply of around-the-clock, reliable, and uninterrupted power. President Trump’s administration is committed to advancing a strategy of energy addition, and supporting all forms of energy that are affordable, reliable, and secure. If we are going to keep the lights on, win the AI race, and keep electricity prices from skyrocketing, the United States must unleash American energy.”
Overall, the report links rising electricity demand to energy-hungry AI data centers and advanced manufacturing. The DOE stated that previous peak-hour tests don’t fully account for the growing reliance on neighboring power grids and called for updated methods that consider the frequency, size, and duration of outages, not just peak demand. The DOE report also outlines a method for identifying at-risk regions and guiding federal reliability efforts.
