Energy Department picks 31 grid projects for $1.9 billion; recipients pay the other $3.35 billion

The Energy Department said on Thursday it intends to help fund 31 grid projects in 26 states, putting $1.9 billion of federal money toward upgrades that it says will make more than 23 gigawatts of extra electricity capacity available. The recipients will add $3.35 billion of their own, for $5.25 billion in total, according to the department's release.

The program is called SPARK. It pays to reconductor or rebuild more than 1,500 miles of transmission lines, which means replacing the wire with higher-capacity conductors, and to fit sensors and control equipment known as grid-enhancing technologies across nearly 21,000 miles. The department said the work will improve reliability and lower electricity costs for about 100 million Americans. Energy Secretary Chris Wright was set to announce it in Allentown, Pennsylvania, the Associated Press reported. The money comes from the Grid Resilience and Innovation Partnerships program, which was funded by the 2021 bipartisan infrastructure law.

What the headline number is, and is not

News coverage described the 23 gigawatts as enough to power 16 million homes. That is a useful sense of scale, but it is not new power. None of these projects generates electricity. They let existing lines carry more of it, clearing bottlenecks where power plants already exist but the wires between them and customers are full. That matters in the data center fight, because the tightest constraint in many regions is getting power to where it is needed.

Three other things in the release are worth reading closely:

• Most of the money is not federal. Recipients are paying $3.35 billion of the $5.25 billion, about 64%. Where the recipients are utilities, they usually recover capital spending through the rates customers pay, subject to state regulators, so ratepayers are likely to carry much of that share over time.
• The cost per unit of capacity. $5.25 billion for more than 23 gigawatts is at most about $228 per kilowatt of capacity made available. The department's case is that upgrading existing corridors is far cheaper and faster than building new lines, which can take decades.
• There is no savings figure. The release says bills will be lower. It does not say by how much or when. It also calls these selections, not signed awards, and gives no in-service dates. The AP reported that projects were chosen for how quickly they could be put into operation.

Where power prices are now

Business owners are not waiting on this program. They are paying more already. The EIA's latest state price table puts the average U.S. commercial electricity price at 14.19 cents a kilowatt-hour in June 2026, up from 13.54 cents a year earlier, a 4.8% rise. Residential power averaged 18.34 cents, up from 17.47.

The arithmetic for a business using 10,000 kilowatt-hours a month: 0.65 cents more per kilowatt-hour is about $65 a month, or $780 a year, compared with last June. Energy-heavy trades feel this first.

30,325 independent laundromats and dry cleaning are listed on CheckThisBiz, a directory of 7,704,724 independent US businesses, including 4,172 in CA, 3,073 in NY, 2,865 in TX. Chains and franchises are excluded from that count, so these are the owner-operated businesses that actually apply for funding.

The same squeeze hits restaurants running walk-in coolers and fryers all day, and any shop running compressors.

What to do with this

For now, nothing different. Nothing in the release will change a utility bill this year, and there is no timetable for when it might. If your utility or region is on the project list the department published with the release, that is worth knowing. The practical step is the same one it was yesterday: look at your rate class and demand charges, since those often decide a commercial bill more than the per-kilowatt-hour price.

More on energy costs: natural gas storage heading into winter, and the economy section.

Sources: U.S. Department of Energy; Associated Press via Fortune; U.S. Energy Information Administration, Electric Power Monthly, Table 5.6.A (preliminary June 2026 data); CheckThisBiz business counts. This is market information, not investment advice.