Unpacking the Hype: A Deep Dive into the Energy Industry’s Lofty Natural Gas and Electricity Demand Projection: Webinar by Natural Gas Intelligence and Yes Energy: September 23, 2025. Summary & Review

          The first part of the webinar dealt with natural gas prices, exploring regional differences and the reasons for them. Appalachian pricing has already hit the threshold of $1.50, that, if sustained, which it was not, can trigger curtailments. It is slightly above the threshold now, but is expected to come up as colder weather approaches in October. Waha in West Texas is another region with a chronic natural gas supply glut. Henry Hub gas prices have remained around $3.00 with some temporary rises last winter.

     Appalachian gas production hit record levels at 37 BCF/day, and West Texas hit records of 28 BCF/day. Haynesville gas production growth is expected, being targeted for LNG exports. The Permian will be a supplier as well. New Haynesville connected pipelines and expansions are coming online, with more to come online in 2026. 

     She notes 2TCF of storage withdrawal last winter. Gas storage is projected to reach fullness – over 3.9 TCF this season. Forecasts call for precipitation in the Pacific Northwest, which means hydropower capabilities may be restored.

     Gas storage capacity has remained stable for the past couple of decades. LNG growth will be the biggest contributor to natural gas growth, much higher than AI data center gas demand growth.

     California has two seasonal bumps in gas consumption due to winter heating demand and summer cooling demand. Different regions have different natural gas volatility profiles. New gas infrastructure should alleviate Waha Hub bottlenecks. The graph below compares gas power burn and solar generation throughout the year. The seasonal nature of both gas power burn and solar generation is displayed. Solar generation is clearly growing on the grid.

     The graphs below show forecast demand by category. Demand is increasing now, and those increases are expected to grow considerably. Data center load growth is modeled based on announced projects. He notes that under construction means ground has been broken and the facility will be online in a few years. Data centers and crypto are lumped together as large, flexible loads. The crypto growth rate is similar to the data center growth rate. It is expected to double in 2027. Crypto loads can respond very quickly to market and price signals as well as requirements to shed load during demand peaks.

     There will be 20.5GW of data center load under construction by 2027, which means ground will be broken for those projects. 

     7.7 GW of the new data center load is expected to be for crypto-mining facilities. Crypto capacity is set to double on the grid. This is often lumped into AI data center demand, but I think it should be treated separately since AI has great potential benefits to society, while crypto simply uses vast amounts of energy to provide transaction security and also benefits criminals and stock speculators. Of course, these loads can respond to price signals and be throttled when demand is high. As the graph below shows, about 30% of of projected data center demand is really crypto demand. 

     The graph below is the Freeport LNG facility in Louisiana, showing its major shutdowns. 

     Solar is leading capacity growth and ERCOT is adding the most capacity, including the most solar capacity. ERCOT has 77.1GW of planned capacity by 2030. Most is solar, followed by batteries. 

     There is more frequent daily cycling in ERCOT’s thermal fleet due to more solar on grid, as the slide below shows. The thermal fleet ramps down when solar comes on, with a steeper ramp-up rate when solar drops off. Solar’s fast drop-off is causing faster ramp rates. 

     In CAISO, solar is optimized when on peak, and batteries are smoothing out the curve. He made a new category called - Net load less battery discharge. 

     The last two slides show Security Constrained Economic Dispatch (SCED), defined as:

 “The real-time market evaluation of offers to produce a least-cost dispatch of online resources. SCED calculates Locational Marginal Prices (LMPs) using a two-step methodology that applies mitigation to resolve non-competitive constraints.”

     These are for ERCOT, which is n=both solar-heavy and battery-heavy.

 

Q&A

     Any data on hyperscale data centers? ERCOT has a 60-day delay in status data. His company is Live Power. There is not enough data available yet for hyperscale projects, but they are working on it. 

     Gas storage is nearly full. Are producers dropping production? When gas hits $1.50, it can trigger curtailment. Canadian natural gas prices have even entered temporary negative pricing and have averaged just $1.03/mcf in 2025.  Demand is coming with LNG, AI plans, and behind-the-meter gas projects. As usual, gas producers are also hoping for robust winter demand – I’m not! He projects that new data center demand will require 4-8BCF/day. Natural gas will be the main power for AI, especially in the near term, before 2030. He thinks that in the 2030s, there will be more risk for natural gas prices. The Haynesville is ready and can deliver higher gas volumes to the Gulf for LNG export as soon as price signals appear due to new facilities coming online. Solar is not replacing coal in ERCOT, but gas is. Now, with new load growth coming on, coal retirements will slow. Solar is a mid-day power generation champ, so that must be integrated. 

     Will Canadian gas imports be lower as they export more LNG? With more Canadian LNG exports, we may see fewer imports into the U.S. More than 10BCF/day of gas was imported from Canada during a cold snap last year. Variables include pricing and hydropower availability.  In Western Canada and the Pacific, there are often winter gas price spikes, like in the Algonquin City Gate region in the Northeast. 

     Why is solar still growing in Texas?  Price capture – batteries a little cheaper – virtual PPAs – carbon offset projects. It’s not profit. 

     How does extreme weather affect production? Up to 10BCF/day can be temporarily offline with extreme weather. Daily volatility in places like the Rockies often happens in early cold snaps. Weatherization of wells and infrastructure is needed. 

     Off-grid support and demand for data centers? Behind-the-meter – on-site solutions – not connecting to the grid. Gas is the prime choice due to price and reliability. Renewables cost more and are not reliable. Most LNG facilities are off-grid, but some are on grid. Whether data centers are pulling from the grid or not will affect power grid demand. Some switch back and forth from grid to island mode.