Prediction Open · timeframe Mar 2028
McAvoy: ERCOT battery storage prices will rebound within two years
“And so we see cyclically in another couple of years, the prices will start to come back in ERCOT and people will start to make money again.”
Opinion
McAvoy: Sustainability is no longer top priority for US energy buyers
“Like, sustainability was number one on everyone's list. In the U.S., it is not anymore.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
McAvoy: LLM training data centers can easily curtail power, unlike inference centers
“They are doing large language model training.
They're doing batch processing.
They're not real-time
Critical.
They're not doing inferencing AI in those data centers, and you can curtail those data centers, like, very very easily, but when you're talking about,…”
Opinion
McAvoy: Solar and storage alone cannot fully power data centers
“They're not the answer. They are supplemental energy that can help, and they're kind of filling a gap until, you know, more jet generation comes online, and depends on what form of that jet generation can be.”
Assertion Supported
McAvoy: Data centers are funding off-site batteries to speed up grid interconnection
“We are seeing data centers like, you know, and even retail Energy providers who are coming to a utility hand in hand and saying, look, we want to put a data center here. I'm the retail energy provider. I'm going to provide this data center with energy. I neede…”
Prediction Not checkable as stated
McAvoy: Scramble to power data centers will probably last three years
“So you were going through this kind of like chaotic phase at the moment, and it'll last for like probably like three years where whatever you can put together to get yourself online, you are going to do it.”
Insight
McAvoy: Grid response requires site-level inferencing for sub-50ms latency
“The goal right now, I think for a lot of people, it's like sub-fifty millisecond response, and so you want to reduce latency everywhere, so you start doing your inferencing and decision making, like, locally, very locally, on the ground, like, at the site leve…”
Assertion Supported
McAvoy: Texas battery storage pricing peaked in 2023 then fell sharply
“And I think the last really good year of battery pricing, for example, in Texas was probably around, like, twenty-twenty-three. And then it started to really drop in 24. And then, like, we saw it further in twenty-twenty-five.”
Opinion
McAvoy: Firm baseload power will always be data centers' top priority
“Like data centers need firm baseload power wherever they can get it. That is Is number one on their list. It'll always be number one because reliability is their number one concern for data centers.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Data center operators refuse curtailment to maximize expensive GPU uptime
“I spoke to quite a number of kind of data center developers data center owners and basically they don't want to curtail full stop. I mean, they have fitted out their data center with the best infrastructure. They've paid a lot of money for GPUs and CPUs, extre…”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
McAvoy: Crypto data centers are by far the most flexible for curtailment
“The ones that are the most flexible
by far are the crypto data centers, and there's lots of them in Texas, and they're the ones that have, like, flexibility in terms of, well, if the prices are super high, ah, I don't need to curtail.”
Assertion Supported
McAvoy: Tokyo FCR battery capacity prices reach $200,000 per megawatt
“Like in some areas, it is like 200,000 dollars, like per megawatt, with a service called FCR in Tokyo.”
Assertion Supported
McAvoy: PJM base residual auction capacity prices are at all-time highs
“If you look at like PJM and you see what's happening at PJM right now, the prices are going sky high, capacity prices in the
The base residual auctions are at an all-time high”
Assertion Supported
McAvoy: Gas turbines have a three-year waiting list and build time
“It takes three years to build them out, and there's a waiting list for three years to even get them.”
Assertion Partly supported
McAvoy: Texas Senate Bill 6 Mandates Curtailment Capacity for 70MW+ Facilities
“Senate bill six in Texas is kind of like an example of that, where if you're kind of 70 megawatts and over, you need to have the ability to curtail and other states are adopting like similar measures as well.”
Assertion Supported
McAvoy: Meta, Oracle, and Microsoft are building in-house energy teams
“And especially, like, you know, even the likes of, like, Meta and, you know, you have your Oracles of the World and your Microsofts and, you know, everyone else who are trying to build, build, build, build these out. They're investing even in their own teams. …”
