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Jigar Shah Profile picture
Jigar Shah
@JigarShahDC
husband, dad, serial entrepreneur, podcaster, democratizing the electrostate by deploying at scale. It's simple, not easy.
4 subscribers
Mar 17 • 10 tweets • 2 min read
Residential solar is one of the fastest-growing asset classes in America. But the dirty secret? O&M is broken. Expensive crews. Fragmented vendors. Zero data. Here's how we're fixing it. 🧵 Most solar O&M today looks like this:
→ A routine inspection ticket gets created
→ A Level 3 specialist drives 90 minutes to clean panels
→ You pay premium labor rates for commodity work
→ The homeowner hears nothing

This is the status quo. It's insane.
Mar 8 • 11 tweets • 4 min read
If you want to cut oil demand fast, you have to think about oil burned in machines, not for power plants.
Governments wanting the fastest path to reduce oil demand are focused on electrifying those machines with clean energy. Passenger vehicles. Gasoline cars are the single biggest oil products consumer on earth. Electric vehicles are already cheaper to operate per mile than gasoline cars. EVs are already manufactured at scale.
Feb 23 • 10 tweets • 2 min read
We have been talking about peak electricity demand for several years. There is a smart way to solve it and a "vibes" way to solve it.

We won't have a lack of annual energy, we have a lack of peak electricity capacity around 300 hours per year.

Electricity rates went up 5% last year. Rates are expecting to skyrocket even faster this year with Utilities choosing the most expensive solutions they can possible find. Everyone wants to answer to be natural gas plants. The vibes are so strong that @CaterpillarInc stock has double on the back of 20-30MW natural gas units.

Electricity trading regions like the PJM have raised electricity so quickly that electricity prices became a political issue.

Existing combustion engines that are already paid for are fast and reliable.

But new ones are simply no longer cheap.
Feb 22 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
If something like this happens one response is to implement "infrastructure solutions" paid for by the AI data center companies. Something like the Apollo Alliance If you just focus on energy efficiency measures that feature a 5 year payback or less would be $200B of investment per year. Mostly in HVAC/insulation.
mordorintelligence.com/industry-repor…
Feb 22 • 10 tweets • 2 min read
The grid debate isn’t “clean energy vs gas.” No one cares.

It’s about achieving system cost and reliability without 9% rate increases every year and hopefully avoiding natural gas price volatility.

Let’s break down the arguments. 🧵 First principle: There is no such thing as "backup" on the grid. The "grid" is a diversity of resources that are expertly managed by professionals without political bias.

Thermal plants go offline for maintenance (often spring/fall). Nuclear refueling lasts weeks to months. Unexpected boiler issues happen.

AI tools are used to predict wind and solar output.
Feb 21 • 6 tweets • 1 min read
Just read several embargoed reports coming out this week.

We are no longer in a “data center growth” cycle.

We are in a power procurement arms race. Hyperscalers are trying "off-grid" but it isn't really working so they are going "hybrid"

-Co-locating with generation
-Pursuing direct interconnection
-Backstopping with on-site gas
-Signing massive renewable + storage portfolios for capacity
Feb 18 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
The dumbest thing is that the data center companies are combining the need for training and inference and assuming that all it needs to be in 1,000MW increments. They don't. Here are some estimates... For US frontier AI training specifically, demands could reach 20-25 GW total by 2028 across multiple companies, with single-model clusters needing 2-5 GW.
@AnthropicAI
anthropic.com/news/build-ai-…
Feb 13 • 11 tweets • 3 min read
The real question isn’t, “How do we build more power plants?”

It’s “How do we add power system capacity — fast?”

That’s a fundamentally different problem. And it leads to a different answer: load flexibility — especially distributed batteries — aggregated into reliable, enforceable resources that can speed interconnection, shave peaks, and strengthen the grid for everyone. This is from the great @timothyhade.

He then points out the physical lead times for large power transformers, distribution transformers, and of course new CCGT turbines.
Jan 26 • 12 tweets • 2 min read
The U.S. grid isn’t “full.”

It’s underutilized.

Less than half of existing grid capacity is used on average—yet we keep planning like every new MW requires new steel in the ground.

That’s a trillion-dollar mistake. 🧵
@SpanbergerForVA
@GovSherrillNJ We have the ability to reduce electricity rates while demand is surging (data centers, EVs, manufacturing).

The default response:
➡️ Build more infrastructure
➡️ Raise rates

There’s a better option: use what we already have, better. While we build a smarter grid.
Oct 5, 2025 • 7 tweets • 2 min read
I have been digging into why NJ lost six large electricity generating stations since 2018. I get the partisan talking points, but as an investor, I wanted to understand why the owners shut down these plants. Let's start with the Oyster Creek Nuclear —its closure in 2018 was mainly due to economic unviability. NY and IL passed a law to keep them open, but NJ and PA did not. The Inflation Reduction Act passed subsidies to keep these plants open, but this plant shut down in 2018 during Trump1. .energy.gov/ne/articles/in…
Sep 28, 2025 • 10 tweets • 2 min read
Smart meters were all the rage in 2009 (aka Advanced Metering Infrastructure, AMI) and even then most of us knew they were unlikely to bring any real benefits for residential customers. Little did we know it would create a crisis. 🧵 They have saved money on meter readings and enable more frequent energy readings (15-min, hourly, real time). Some states, like Texas, have unlocked this data, but most utilities have not. They can't, because their systems rooted in @Oracle and @SAP aren't too rickety.
Jun 17, 2025 • 22 tweets • 4 min read
The vast majority of rate increases comes from the dramatic overbuilding of Distribution grids. Most are built to old norms to meet peak demand for 50 hours a year. Using Virtual Power Plants, batteries, grid enhancing technologies are 90% cheaper. This is the moment for the VPP industry to lead. With 150 GW of new load expected in the next five years, the grid needs scalable, clean, and flexible capacity fast. Virtual power plants (VPPs) must be positioned as core infrastructure along side expensive new NG
May 30, 2024 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
Such a great summit at the @WhiteHouse yesterday.
As we celebrate Vogtle Units 3&4 coming online it is important to take stock on our existing nuclear fleet.

Many existing nuclear sites have room for more large reactors, e.g., the Harris Nuclear Plant in North Carolina was designed for four reactors, but currently only has one. Across the US, 19 sites have only one reactor, 31 have two reactors, 3 have three reactors, and only Vogtle (1) has four reactors, so we have room to add more reactors at existing #nuclear sites.

12 operating nuclear sites and one decommissioned nuclear site are located within these eligible jurisdictions and are likely to be eligible for the ITC energy communities bonus
May 18, 2024 • 8 tweets • 4 min read
I like this episode but ⁦@EmilyRPeck⁩ and ⁦@felixsalmon⁩ really lost the narrative on this one. I think there is a mistaken notion that $10k EVs and low cost #solar is a Chinese phenomenon. It is not, it is technical innovation from the USA. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/sla… The cost of #solar came down because innovation brought conversion efficiency from 12% to over 21% today. Manufacturing and automation was largely invented by German and American companies in 2005-2010. China scaled it up and brought down costs faster.
May 1, 2024 • 8 tweets • 3 min read
When you look at dynamic line rating, advanced power flow control, reconductoring and advanced transformers they are not at early stages from a technical standpoint – exactly the opposite. They are technically more mature, but deployment has been lagging in the U.S.

Time to get more out of the grid we have already paid for! Many of these solutions are already broadly deployed overseas – including in Europe, parts of Asia, Australia. The US needs to catch up – this will take utilities, regulators, and policymakers prioritizing these solutions.

And many of these solutions were developed in the US. The DOE made important early investments into the R&D of DLR decades ago. It’s time for deployment in the US to catch up.
Apr 16, 2024 • 11 tweets • 4 min read
DOE just released our new Innovative Grid Deployment Liftoff report today – finding we can increase our grid’s capacity to support well above the 2.5% annual growth in the next few years with commercially available advanced grid solutions like #advancedconductors #GETs #VPPs #storage 🧵
liftoff.energy.gov/innovative-gri… This report covers twenty technologies across the transmission and distribution system. There’s a solution for energy challenge here – no excuses not to start looking at how to #deploydeploydeploy today. Image
Apr 11, 2024 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
We have the tools to use what we have paid for more efficiently. The key is reliably shaving peaks. We have 30 years of pilots in #VirtualPowerPlants and #GridModernization. It is time to choose a path that is 90% cheaper than business-as-usual. We have 2.6TW of projects sitting in transmission queues (14% are pretty solid projects). For about $10B of investment we can unlock 30% more capacity from the existing grid to unlock 300GW+ projects quickly. These GETs/conductor/flexibility investments can help reduce overall system costs for ratepayers + improve grid outcomes if they’re pursued, and they can be paid for w/new cost allocation or financing mechanisms. Should not just accept the norm that all grid investment costs are socialized.
Mar 2, 2024 • 13 tweets • 5 min read
We have returned to load growth. Today, we have the lowest asset utilization of the assets we have already paid for. Why? Because the entire system is built for the peak demand. Loads that increase that peak are expensive, loads that are flexible are less expensive
Image Right now, NG combined cycle gas turbines/peakers are the "easy" button for utilities. Why? Because you can build them quickly and you can place them in poor neighborhoods on distribution grids -- terrible for #Justice. There are better ways to enhance our existing system...
Aug 10, 2023 • 13 tweets • 3 min read
Great conversation as usual. My stance on all technologies (incl #nuclear) is that I am optimistic and recognize that we need at least 15-20 of them to get down the cost curve to reliably meet our decarbonization curve while meeting resiliency, labor, community and other goals. Today we have over $15b of loan requests in the Loan Programs Office. So as a result we have down some substantial digging on it would take for the industry to succeed. Part of that was self-confidence and investor interest so we have tried to generate that.
Jun 30, 2023 • 8 tweets • 3 min read
Great article — you are only 31 years old?!? Amazing!

We are on track to putting in place 30 GW of new #solar this year

https://t.co/OFaMpIDM50eia.gov/todayinenergy/…
“In 2022, solar photovoltaics made up 4.7% of U.S. electricity generation”

Right now we are on track to building ~30GW per year of #solar. So Solar goes up by about 1% every year - amazing! Rooftop solar could accelerate things, but development…

pv-magazine-usa.com/2023/02/27/sol…
Jun 21, 2023 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
Tesla operates this company as a small pilot to improve their product. Their main business is to use this data for markets that are unlocking this feature at scale like CA and PR. Their expertise and continuous improvement of the software is the goal for thousands of Powerwalls. #PuertoRico has over 75,000 Powerwalls deployed that can provide 300MWs if properly compensated. As a comparison the entire island has less than 100MWs of reserves today. The market has been installing 3,500 systems per month.