Podcast Summary: Open Circuit – "The natural gas ‘bridge’ becomes a highway"
Latitude Media | April 10, 2026

Episode Overview

This episode of Open Circuit unpacks the dramatic shifts underway in the US electricity sector, as natural gas—long touted as the "bridge" fuel to a cleaner future—has rapidly become a central pillar of new generation, particularly to meet the needs of hyperscale data centers powering AI. Host Stephen Lacy, Caroline Golan (NRG), and Jigar Shah (Multiplier/Energy Empire) dig into megawatt-scale deals by tech titans Meta, Microsoft, Google, and Amazon, asking: Why is the industry suddenly betting so big on new gas plants? What are the economic, environmental, and market implications? What does a future "off ramp" from gas look like, and is battery/storage innovation lagging? Through examples, candid expertise, and some lively back-and-forth, the trio provides an insider’s guide to the new electricity buildout—raising tough questions about grid planning, cost allocation, climate promises, and who really steers the future energy mix.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

The Shift: From Gas "Bridge" to "Highway"

• Until recently, natural gas was pitched as a transitional "bridge fuel" away from coal. Now, with hyperscale data centers demanding massive new load, gas is rapidly becoming the default choice for new capacity.
• Meta, Microsoft, Google, Amazon, and independent power producers (IPPs) are all making multi-gigawatt gas deals—an unprecedented scale and pace.

Quote:
"This, once called bridge fuel, is suddenly looking like a four lane highway." (Host, 00:45)

Case Study: Meta's Louisiana Gas Megadeal

(06:29-11:44)

• Meta’s Data Center: Tripled its gas commitment to 7.5 GW across 10 new plants—enough to power South Dakota, at a cost of ~$11 billion.
• Deal Structure: Not a traditional Power Purchase Agreement; involved a third-party developer financing generation, transmission, and storage for Meta's exclusive use.
• Why So Much Gas?
  • Utilities and regulators all converged on gas as the fastest, least risky path to “keep the lights on” for data centers.
  • Load was too large for existing grid capacity; new generation had to be built.

Quote:
"It's just what's shocking is how much new had to be built because we couldn't eat up existing capacity on the grid." — Caroline Golan (08:27)

• Risk & Cost Allocation: Jigar Shah questions the cost assumptions, risk of stranded assets, and whether costs will be unfairly spread to residential customers if plants run at lower capacity.

Quote:
"They're not giving people enough information to actually have a robust conversation at, you know, the regulator." — Jigar Shah (14:05)

Grid Planning, Equity, & Inefficiency Concerns

(11:44-19:45)

• Louisiana has lagged in renewables but now plans to ramp up solar—yet the big capacity coming online is gas.
• Shah fears a "least optimized grid"—building many gas plants now, then running them less as renewables catch up, raising rates for everyone.
• Distributional impacts: Industrial users may escape costs; residential customers could bear the burden, especially as market rules lag behind actual system changes.

Quote:
"What Jigar is getting at is... you have to integrate this with a more robust understanding of where your grid is going and where load is going. If load doesn't materialize, everyone's at risk." — Golan (14:56)

The Role of Batteries, Flexibility, and Modern Grid Needs

(19:45-22:58)

• Tech innovation is making storage and flexible resources more valuable—for reliability, shaping load, and meeting erratic demand (especially for AI-training data centers).
• Utilities are slower on deploying batteries as peaking/generation assets, still seeing them more for transmission constraints.
• Both Shah and Golan express surprise at the limited battery/storage deployment in some data center projects.

Quote:
"Everything's going to get more micro... the signal you actually need is flexibility." — Golan (17:10)

Microsoft & the Permian Basin: Stranded Gas & Responsible Supply?

(25:40-29:13)

• Microsoft, Chevron, and private equity are planning a massive gas plant in the Texas Permian, using "stranded" gas (which often trades at negative prices due to pipeline constraints).
• Chevron has invested in cleaning up methane leaks; responsible "low-leak" gas procurement is raised as an evolving best practice.

Quote:
"Chevron's certainly done a lot in that area... saved like 1 bcf of gas leaks or something in just a short amount of time." — Shah (26:59)

Google, Crusoe, and the Myth of Carbon-Free Clouds

(29:28-32:43)

• Google's partnership for a nearly 1 GW behind-the-meter gas plant with Crusoe surprises some, given its 24/7 carbon-free energy commitments.
• Golan notes that all data centers have always depended on grid gas for reliability, but Google has historically pushed harder for renewables than peers.
• The biggest risk: poorly planned, uncoordinated behind-the-meter gas deployments could result in stranded assets and system inefficiency.

Quote:
"Anyone who understands the way that a grid works... our stability was based on whatever was creating stability on the grid and in large part that was gas." — Golan (30:04)

Proliferation of Gas Deals: Public Perception vs. Market Reality

(32:43-37:36)

• ERCOT (Texas grid) load projections are extremely high, but many queued projects may never get built—the actual buildout will be much less dramatic.
• Industry and policy discourse is muddied by a lack of transparency around which gas plants are real, needed, and funded—and by misleading aggregate “pipeline” numbers.

Memorable moment:
"There is not a single person building a merchant natural gas plant. Not one person. So if you're not building a merchant power plant, then there is a buyer, a seller, an equipment provider. This should be something you can be precise about." — Shah (35:47)

Tech Company Planning Shortfalls; Who Should Be Responsible?

(37:36-45:39)

• Tech companies’ load planning is short-cycle and conservative; they overbook because their own forecasts are so uncertain, while new power plants have multi-year lead times.
• Costs from rushed, oversized and sometimes under-utilized gas builds risk being "peanut-buttered" across all ratepayers, not just the hyperscalers.
• There's a steep learning curve: few commercial teams at tech companies historically had experience with building and running proper power plants.

Quote:
"We were able to set the narrative of who's responsible and who's not responsible... But we were able to set the bar for everyone, regardless of our real capabilities to deliver." — Golan (58:17)

Aggregate Signal & Market Impacts

(45:22-53:01)

• Actual new operating gas capacity is likely to grow slower than the headlines suggest, but the flurry of deals reflects genuine shock at underestimated load growth (especially from AI) and the system’s lack of alternatives.
• A significant chunk of reported new gas is for reliability/back-up (low utilization), not year-round baseload.
• Global turbine supply chains are maxed out; lead times are years, costs are up—further constraining practical buildout.

The NRG Perspective

(55:12-57:30)

• NRG (per Golan) is committed to a "bring your own power" bilateral approach, with an eye to balancing affordability for residential customers with responsible, tailored portfolio development (gas, storage, renewables).

Responsibility & The Path Forward

(57:30-62:30)

• There’s real tension between two narratives: the market/engineering inevitability of gas, and the apparent climate backsliding by the very companies who promised more.
• Tech companies, without energy sector experience, have perhaps set themselves (and the broader market) up for disappointment—relying on "off-the-shelf" solutions rather than market innovation.
• Fundamentally, utilities (and, in turn, regulators) remain the entities with both the capability and responsibility to drive optimal system planning and integration.

Quote:
"They also, in my opinion, shouldn't be the ones that are held first accountable. We should be holding the utilities and the suppliers accountable." — Golan (59:04)
"We are deliberately choosing to do things based on a Secretary of Energy who basically is like, natural gas or bust... there's a whole body of work that shows that that is not the cheapest way to provide generation or transmission or distribution. And so we will just have to wait for sanity to reemerge." — Shah (62:10)

Notable Quotes & Moments (with Timestamps)

• "This, once called bridge fuel, is suddenly looking like a four lane highway." — Host, 00:45
• "It's just what's shocking is how much new had to be built because we couldn't eat up existing capacity on the grid." — Golan, 08:27
• "My thing is that... the cost of the turbines right now everyone knows are in the 2000s per kilowatt. That is not the number that they reported. And I don't know how energy got a good deal." — Shah, 13:24
• "If you have extra turbines, you'll find a buyer." — Golan, 14:05
• "Everything's going to get more micro... the signal you actually need is flexibility." — Golan, 17:10
• "There is not a single person building a merchant natural gas plant. Not one person." — Shah, 35:47
• "We were able to set the narrative... But we were able to set the bar for everyone, regardless of our real capabilities to deliver." — Golan, 58:17
• "We are in this weird spot where we are deliberately choosing to do things based on a Secretary of Energy who basically is like, natural gas or bust... so we will just have to wait for sanity to reemerge." — Shah, 62:10

Timeline of Major Segments

• 00:45 - 04:00: Introduction; framing of gas as "bridge" vs. "highway"
• 06:29 - 19:45: Meta’s Louisiana gas deal; utility/tech perspectives, grid planning
• 19:45 - 22:58: Storage, flexibility, batteries vs. gas
• 25:40 - 29:13: Microsoft in the Permian Basin; responsible gas supply
• 29:28 - 32:43: Google & Crusoe’s gas projects; myth of carbon-free clouds
• 32:43 - 37:36: Real vs. speculative gas projects, confusion in market signals
• 37:36 - 45:39: Tech-company planning cycles, rate impacts, skill gaps
• 45:22 - 53:01: Aggregate signals, project pipelines, bottlenecks
• 55:12 - 57:30: The NRG approach and philosophy
• 57:30 - 62:30: Who bears responsibility—and what comes next?

Conclusion: The Big Picture

The rush to build gas plants, especially for data centers, underscores deeper structural issues: lags in grid modernization, planning misalignments between utilities and hyperscalers, and a daunting learning curve for both tech and energy incumbents. While natural gas provides reliability, the hosts are united in warning against overbuilding, passing costs to vulnerable ratepayers, or letting accusations of "backsliding" obscure the root failures in market design and planning. The hosts challenge industry and policymakers to realign incentives—not simply to build more, but to build smarter—and to transparently account for both climate and affordability risks.

This episode is a must-listen for anyone interested in the energy transformation and how it’s colliding—sometimes awkwardly—with the surging digital economy. It’s also a candid look inside the sausage-making of modern grid development, offering financial, engineering, and policy insights rarely heard in mainstream coverage.