Experts Focus on What's Around the Corner for Commercial and Industrial Energy Customers

A new world is emerging, one where most public-facing companies want to be seen as environmentally responsible, but they realize days of virtual renewable power and offsets are not enough. The commercial and industrial energy customer sectors are faced with a stark choice of waiting on the grid to catch up or taking control of energy resiliency themselves.

No one can truly understand the future just ahead, but they can ill afford not to try and see what’s around the corner to survive energy evolution.

And what is around the corner? It depends on who you talk to, but all agree that bending to the will of economic and resource realities will be critical.

“What I see coming is a shift where commercial and industrial companies are forced to become energy-literate,” Ralph Rodriguez, business development and industrial sales lead with Houston-based Legend Energy Advisors, told EnergyTech.com via a LinkedIn response. “Reliability, speed to power, and volatility are now business risks, not utility problems.”

Gone are the days of thinking about energy transition simply as clean energy technology and environmental responsibility. The world requires unknowable terawatt hours of new generation to meet the AI future, so the large-scale C&I customer shifts more into control over operations and optionality when it comes to energy connection.

This likely necessitates the biggest change in the power grid since the 1950s, and yet a grid which is not yet adapted to the new order. Reducing greenhouse gas emissions should remain a priority, but the only one in a world where corporate extinction is becoming a more relevant threat here and now.

“The next phase of the C&I energy transition is less about new ideas and more about operational reality,” Aaron Gold, marketing manager for new energy solutions at power generation equipment maker Cummins Inc., told EnergyTech.com.

“We’re moving out of the era where sustainability was primarily a procurement or ESG exercise—which was often just about hitting a metric—and into an era where energy becomes a core operating constraint again,” Gold pointed out. “Load growth, volatility, resilience, interconnection timelines, and price exposure are now board‑level issues, not just facilities or sustainability problems. What’s coming is a transition from ‘energy as a commodity’ to ‘energy as infrastructure.’ C&I customers will increasingly think like mini‑utilities.”

Big money is banking on big power at the edges

If you doubt it just look at the recent headlines at EnergyTech and other publications covering the energy transition. Private equity giants such as BlackRock, Blackstone and EQT are investing big in acquiring utility and conventional power generation assets, while Magnificent Seven tech firms such as Google, Microsoft, Meta and Amazon are exploring next-gen PPAs around baseload resources such as nuclear, natural gas and even geothermal.

Everything is on the table, and yet everyone is racing the clock. The pressure is to win the global AI race, as Trump Administration energy officials call it. Meanwhile, U.S. and European utility interconnection queues are sometimes causing projects to languish for multiple years, if not kill them completely. The pace of AI adoption, both by companies and solitary humans online, is creating a bit of resource adequacy panic in the outside world.

“North America’s electric grid is operating near its practice limits for both generation and load,” noted Sally Jacquemin, vice president-digital grid management at Aspen Technology, which was acquired by energy management firm Emerson in a deal closed last year.

“The grid that was intentionally ‘overbuilt’ in the 1960s and 1970s to support decades of growth has now reached those margins,” she said. “The surge of power demand from AI-driven data centers is arriving faster than traditional planning cycles can accommodate, forcing utilities and grid planners to evaluate all viable options for accelerating capacity.”

The old track wasn’t meant to run this fast

And while the spotlight on new generation load intensifies, it perhaps overshadows a deeper, darker issue. In the U.S. at least, the ability of the power grid to deliver that additional capacity is seen as lagging behind the growth needs of its customers, whether they are data centers or energy parks for industrials or new transportation electrification charging infrastructure.

The energy infrastructure which the American Society of Civil Engineers graded as a lowly D+ only a year ago is years and billions of dollars behind in critical capital investment and modernization.

“Much of the North American T&D (electric transmission and distribution) system is aging and was not designed for the scale, speed, or bidirectional power flows of today’s grid,” Jacquemin pointed out. “While there is significant activity and investment targeted toward T&D, it is not yet keeping pace with the rate at which new generation and new load are emerging. The grid is the bottleneck.”

The poor, oft-derided power grid. Perhaps that’s not a fair description: Let us not forget it was one of the 20^th century’s greatest marvels. Electrifying and enlightening America from coast to coast as one big machine—for the most part—it has revolutionized modern life in commerce and comfort.

So, show a little respect, not in passing but for the good that remains and can be even improved. It’s not going away even if its role morphs dramatically and becomes more dispersed.

“It’s hard to imagine a shift completely away from the grid in the next 10 years,” Cummins’ Gold said. “The grid still matters. A lot. But it’s no longer sufficient on its own.”

Co-located and on-site generation such as solar-storage, microgrids and gen-sets are less about decarbonization going forward and more about “time-to-power,” he added.

Surging demand comes from more economic engines than AI alone

The consensus is that demand is growing by double-digit percentage points in those key digital and industrial compute sectors, a pace agreed to by research as disparate as Goldman Sachs, McKinsey and the National Electrical Manufacturers Association (NEMA)—the latter as noted by Paul Ryan, vice president and general manager for energy transition at power management technology firm Eaton Corp.

“Analysis from NEMA indicates 300% growth in data center energy consumption over the next decade, 9,000% project growth in e-mobility power consumption by 2050, and substantial increases in industrial power consumption,” Ryan said in his exclusive response to EnergyTech.com.

“That kind of surging demand will require an all-of-the-above approach,” Ryan added.

Eaton is not tackling this challenge alone. The global firm is partnering with companies in multiple disciplines, from EV charging infrastructure firm ChargePoint to microgrid modeling software designer Xendee. In addition, Eaton has joined chipmaker colossus NVIDIA on power infrastructure for AI data computing, invested $50 million on expanding its manufacturing footprint in the U.S., as well as acquired solid state transformer firm Resilient Power Systems last year.

A flexible, modular and cross-sector approach is the best way to accelerate next-gen energy projects for the Industrial Compute Age, these experts predict.

“And we’re doing so through breakout collaborations with like-minded industry leaders and investments in innovation, our business capabilities, manufacturing footprint and upskilling people,” Eaton’s Ryan said. 

“As global electricity demand continues to surge, the need for greater efficiency, reduced energy waste and faster access to power has never been more urgent,” he said. “Direct current (DC) power is increasingly shaping the way the world works today and innovation advancing DC power distribution will yield substantial benefits across industries. It’ll enable substantial energy efficiency gains by reducing energy losses, removing the need for components needed in the conversion process (between AC and DC power) and material savings. This is important as it enables us to more effectively use power from EVs, batteries, solar and other DC sources.”

Speed to power cannot undermine rational, long-term strategies

So, what’s around the corner is not a destination, but more corners. Put the pedal to the metal but don’t let go of the steering wheel.

It’s no surprise nor condemnation that so few of us saw it coming, but it’s no acquittal if we don’t take the corners with haste. Don’t waste time and don’t stop thinking ahead is the mantra for the age.

“Even in the face of wild policy swings there are strategies organizations can follow to navigate shifting trends,” Phil Jones, director, AI data centers and microgrid sales at Emerson, said.

“Instead of planning for the next year, or even full four years of a political term, commercial and industrial energy companies should work to set 10+ year agendas of incremental change focused on consumer and constituent sentiments on power generation—a much more effective indicator of success,” Jones advised. “This will allow some organizations to focus on renewables while others focus on more traditional generation types based on the populations they serve. Ultimately, longer term strategies enable incremental changes that will prove more successful even as four-year policy terms shift.”

The value proposition for energy consumption, thus, doesn’t depend solely on the man or woman who is elected, to paraphrase a song by the Avett Brothers. Industrial and commercial energy customers are singing for their seat at the energy table and are harmonizing around an impending reality of trying to merge not only sustainability with resiliency, but resource adequacy with affordability for all. Four corners in all.

“That means on-site generation becomes a planning tool, microgrids become economic assets, and real-time load control matters as much as procurement,” Legend Energy Advisors’ Ralph Rodriguez said.

Control and pace must work in tandem when taking the corner, and yet it won’t matter if you run out of energy on the journey.