Update scope and source note
This section covers Maryland energy, utility, and grid developments affecting data centers from February 1 through July 17, 2026. It distinguishes enacted statutes and final orders from proposed regulations, pending complaints, forecasts, and company development pipelines.
1. Electric market structure and data center load
Maryland is a retail-choice state in the PJM Interconnection footprint. Customers may choose licensed competitive suppliers, local utilities deliver power, the Maryland Public Service Commission (PSC) regulates retail utility service, and PJM operates the regional wholesale and transmission system (Maryland PSC, accessed 2026-07-17; PJM interconnection reform page, accessed 2026-07-17). Large data centers therefore implicate utility service-extension terms, collateral and exit risk, retail tariffs, state siting and registration, PJM load forecasting, generation and transmission adequacy, and regional cost allocation.
PJM’s 2026 load report included explicit data center adjustments in the BGE and Pepco zone forecasts (PJM 2026 Load Report, 2026-01-14). FirstEnergy’s June investor update provided a separate company-territory view for Maryland: contracted data center demand of 825 MW in 2026, 1,980 MW in 2031, and 2,830 MW in 2035, with its broader contracted-plus-pipeline totals reaching 3,435 MW in 2031 and 5,365 MW in 2035. These are FirstEnergy portfolio figures, not a statewide Maryland forecast and not all committed load (FirstEnergy SEC investor update, 2026-06-01).
2. Maryland large-load statute, rulemaking, and tariffs
HB 1532, the Utility RELIEF Act, became Chapter 353 on May 12. It generally defines a large-load customer as one with at least 25 MW of peak demand and a load factor above 60%, replacing the 2025 law’s 100-MW and greater-than-80% thresholds. It requires the PSC to establish a large-load registry by July 1, 2027, requires interconnection and operating disclosures, and creates a fee of at least $1,000 per MW of peak demand (Maryland Laws, Chapter 353, 2026-05-12).
The registry disclosures include duplicate requests in or outside Maryland; existing and planned generation or capacity supply; backup generation; monthly water demand and source; required permits; site control; peak load, load factor, annual use, ramp schedule and profile; expected operation date; and point of interconnection. After July 1, 2027, a utility may not submit a large-load adjustment request to PJM without a completed registration (Maryland Laws, Chapter 353, 2026-05-12).
Chapter 353 also requires a voluntary data center clean-capacity rating program by December 15, 2027. For data centers locating on or after July 1, 2026, it states the General Assembly’s intent that they maximize Maryland labor, add capacity through storage, carbon-free resources or demand response, engage communities, and publish a written plan; it does not make the future rating program operational before the PSC completes implementation (Maryland Laws, Chapter 353, 2026-05-12).
The law directs the PSC to consider wholesale-market cost increases or savings and other direct and indirect costs attributable to large loads when implementing large-load rates. It also requires an order or regulation establishing a voluntary interruptible-interconnection process with compliance mechanisms, keeping behind-the-meter storage from being studied as additional load, and governing storage charging and discharging during peak demand; none of those implementation steps was final by July 17 (Maryland Laws, Chapter 353, 2026-05-12; Maryland Department of Legislative Services fiscal and policy note, 2026-05-21).
The PSC continued Public Conference 72 and Rulemaking 93 to implement the 2025 large-load law (Maryland PSC PC 72 docket, accessed 2026-07-17). Proposed COMAR 20.96.01 was published in the June 26 Maryland Register, with comments due July 27. It would require a utility to assess application completeness in 30 calendar days, give customers 10 business days to cure defects, complete an initial load study within 18 months subject to extensions, require notice before certain capacity changes or termination, and accept specified collateral forms including a letter of credit, performance bond, parent guarantee, or cash. It remained proposed rather than final on July 17 (Maryland Register, 2026-06-26).
On July 13 the PSC directed utilities to respond by August 10 about large loads embedded in PJM’s capacity-auction and proposed Reliability Backstop Procurement forecasts. The request asks for each load’s MW, zone and expected service date, materialization and duplicate-request risk, customer-class cost allocation, assurances that large loads will pay capacity costs, and possible interim rules before the September tariffs; it did not decide those questions (Maryland PSC PC 72 request for comments, 2026-07-13).
Electric companies still had until September 1, 2026 to file the large-load rate schedules required by the 2025 statute. HB 1082 would have delayed that deadline to January 1, 2027 and prescribed additional data center rate terms, but it failed; accordingly, no final Maryland utility-specific large-load tariff or special rate-class decision was available by July 17 (Maryland General Assembly HB 1082, updated 2026-06-30; Maryland Laws, Chapter 353, 2026-05-12).
3. Storage, generation adequacy, and emergency operations
The PSC received five applications totaling more than 800 MW under Maryland’s transmission-connected energy-storage procurement program by March 3. These proposed resources could help system adequacy, but the PSC did not characterize them as dedicated data center projects (Maryland PSC, 2026-03-03).
MDE’s March 25 permit for Amazon Data Services’ BWI150-BWI153 Frederick campus authorizes 99 diesel emergency generators while prohibiting their routine use as primary power or participation in ordinary demand-response programs under the state permit (Maryland Department of the Environment, 2026-03-25; MDE issued Amazon permit, 2026-03-25).
Separately, the U.S. Department of Energy used Federal Power Act emergency authority during 2026 heat events to let PJM call on backup generators at data centers and other major facilities. Orders on May 18 and June 30 covered short emergency windows, and the most recent order on July 14 authorized specified generation and large-load backup generation through July 21 when needed to address an Energy Emergency Alert Level 3 (U.S. Department of Energy Order 202-26-23, 2026-05-18; U.S. Department of Energy Order 202-26-33, 2026-06-30; U.S. Department of Energy Order 202-26-35, 2026-07-14). Those temporary federal emergency orders did not create a permanent Maryland demand-response tariff.
TeraWulf’s planned Chesapeake Data development in Charles County would pair the former Morgantown generating site with data center load and battery storage. The company described the site as having approximately 210 MW of current grid-connected generation capacity and proposed an initial concept of 500 MW of generation, 250 MW of storage, and 500 MW of load, expandable to 1 GW of generation, 500 MW of storage, and 1 GW of load; as of May 8, the acquisition remained subject to FERC approval (TeraWulf SEC earnings release, 2026-05-08; TeraWulf investor presentation filed with SEC, 2026-05-08).
4. PJM capacity market and reliability response
PJM’s July 14 auction for the 2028/2029 delivery year procured 138,318 MW of unforced capacity through the auction, with another 10,864 MW under the fixed-resource-requirement alternative. The price reached the $325/MW-day cap, the auction value was $16.4 billion, and the system remained 6,831 MW short of its reliability requirement for the second consecutive auction; PJM said forecast peak load had risen another 2,000 MW, driven in part by continuing large data center additions (PJM, 2026-07-14). The $16.4 billion figure is regional auction value, not a Maryland-only customer charge.
PJM said it would pursue backstop capacity procurement beginning in September, a connect-and-manage framework, bilateral capacity matching, and additional FERC filings to address the shortfall (PJM, 2026-07-14). Governor Moore’s office separately estimated that the negotiated auction cap saved customers $13.3 billion across the PJM region; that number is an administration counterfactual estimate, not an audited Maryland savings amount (Office of Governor Wes Moore, 2026-07-15).
5. Regional transmission costs and Maryland ratepayer exposure
The Maryland Office of People’s Counsel (OPC) said PJM advanced almost $12 billion in regional upgrades during 2024 and 2025, largely driven by data center growth, and estimated that Maryland customers would pay about $1.3 billion of those costs plus utility return (Maryland OPC, accessed 2026-07-17). A March 25 Synapse report for OPC estimated Maryland responsibility for $7.1 billion in transmission capital costs through 2030 and a possible additional $5.4 billion during 2031-2035; it also reported a PJM forecast of 67 GW of data center peak demand, 30% of PJM peak, by 2036, compared with 1.5 GW or 2% in Maryland (Synapse Energy Economics for Maryland OPC, 2026-03-25).
OPC protested $1.1 billion of PJM’s 2025 Window 1 transmission projects at FERC on March 31, arguing that data center growth outside Maryland primarily caused the projects (Maryland OPC, 2026-03-31). On May 7, OPC filed a broader FERC complaint alleging that existing rules assigned $2 billion in data-center-driven transmission capital costs to Maryland and would add $1.6 billion to Maryland bills over ten years: $823 million residential, $146 million commercial, and $629 million industrial. OPC asked FERC to assign the costs to the zones or large customers causing them; no final FERC disposition was identified by July 17 (Maryland OPC, 2026-05-07).
6. Maryland transmission proceedings
The Maryland Piedmont Reliability Project remained pending in PSC Case 9773. On February 6 the PSC denied a motion to dismiss rather than approving the project; the current schedule calls for intervenor testimony on September 2, county hearings during the weeks of September 21 and 28, evidentiary hearings December 8-18, and briefs in January and February 2027 (Maryland PSC, 2026-02-06; Maryland PSC procedural order, 2025-12-18; Maryland PSC Case 9773 page, accessed 2026-07-17). The proposed 500-kV line is a regional PJM reliability project, not a single data center interconnection, although regional data center load growth and cost allocation are central to the public controversy (PJM MPRP fact sheet, 2025-01-13; Synapse Energy Economics for Maryland OPC, 2026-03-25).
BGE also filed a separate proposal for the Maryland Line-to-High Ridge 500-kV project through Baltimore, Harford, and Howard counties. On June 29 the PSC set an intervention deadline and sought comments on whether the application was complete; this was the start of Case 9884 review, not project approval (Maryland PSC, 2026-06-29).
7. Federal large-load and co-location reform
On June 18, FERC issued show-cause orders to PJM and the other five organized wholesale markets, requiring each to justify or reform rules for large-load interconnection, cost shifting, readiness, flexible service, and withdrawal risk. PJM’s proceeding is Docket EL26-67 and remained an open federal process at the July 17 cutoff (FERC, 2026-06-18).
At the same meeting, FERC resolved parts of the PJM co-location proceeding and ordered a compliance filing within 60 days on specified tariff terms governing large loads located with generation. This affects Maryland proposals such as Chesapeake Data, but it did not itself approve that project or replace Maryland retail and siting review (FERC June 2026 meeting summary, 2026-06-18).
On July 16, FERC directed the North American Electric Reliability Corporation to develop new or modified reliability standards addressing computational-load integration and to revise its registration rules so that entities presenting a material reliability risk can be registered. Both submissions are due December 31, 2026; the order started a standards process rather than immediately imposing a Maryland data center operating rule (FERC July 2026 meeting summary, 2026-07-16).
PJM continued its generator interconnection reform, clustered studies, and readiness requirements. Those generator-queue reforms matter to Maryland data centers indirectly because the region needs deliverable generation and storage to serve forecast load, but they are distinct from Maryland’s retail large-load application and tariff process (PJM interconnection reform page, accessed 2026-07-17).
8. 2026 bottom line
By July 17, Maryland had an enacted large-load disclosure and registration framework, but its registry, clean-capacity ratings, interconnection regulation, interruptible-service process, and utility tariffs were not yet final or operational. Meanwhile, PJM’s forecast and auction showed worsening load and capacity pressure, DOE repeatedly invoked temporary emergency authority, FERC opened a computational-load reliability-standards process, and Maryland ratepayer advocates pursued unresolved federal cost-allocation challenges (Maryland Laws, Chapter 353, 2026-05-12; PJM, 2026-07-14; U.S. Department of Energy Order 202-26-35, 2026-07-14; FERC July 2026 meeting summary, 2026-07-16; Maryland OPC, 2026-05-07).