About
Requested is not signed. Signed is not built
Hundreds of gigawatts of power plants and storage are asking to connect to the U.S. grid, and only part of that capacity has a signed interconnection agreement.
Of the generation capacity that entered U.S. interconnection queues in 2000–2020, 13% had reached commercial operation by the end of 2025 and 75% had been withdrawn (LBNL, Queued Up 2026). That is a record about power plants, not data centers.
LOADSTAR reads one thing every day from each grid operator’s own queue file: how much of the capacity requested carries an executed interconnection agreement. Free to cite, dated and recomputable.
What we are
LOADSTAR publishes one number: the share of capacity requested in the seven U.S. ISO/
It is a floor under our current reading, not a forecast, and not a count of data-center demand. It takes no view on any project. It measures a present condition, the same way for every reader.
Every figure names its source file. The totals recompute from our public JSON, and every change of method is dated in Corrections.
Why now
Large-load interconnection is now before FERC and several state commissions. The generation queues are one record that bears on those proceedings. They show what supply asks to connect and how much of it has a signed agreement.
We take no side in any of them. We publish the reading, and the date we took it.
What it doesn’t cover
The number covers the seven ISO/
Our reading of a queue can be wrong. When it was, we corrected it in public and the number moved. Four corrections in late September 2026 changed it, three raising it and one, on Sept. 29, lowering it. The series is consistent from that date; earlier points used a reading later found wrong in several queues.
The source files are archived with a SHA-256 fingerprint from Sept. 26, 2026. Earlier points cannot be recomputed from an archived file.
Mission, vision, values
Our mission: to give everyone the same dated, checkable answer to one question — of the power requested to connect, how much is signed?
Our vision: to be the number people cite when they ask how much of the grid queue is signed.
Five values, each enforced by the system itself rather than framed on a wall:
- Radical verifiability
- Every figure names its source file, and the totals recompute from our public JSON — check us, don’t trust us.
- Honesty before citation
- A number that fails its own checks is withheld, not defended. Silence beats a wrong figure.
- Non-negotiable neutrality
- Nobody pays to influence a number — no sponsor, no data vendor, no exception.
- Automation with human gates
- The system runs itself; anything irreversible or outward-facing waits for a human.
- Permanence
- Dated and append-only. A correction adds a dated row; where a dated row was ever edited, the edit is flagged.
Who publishes this
LOADSTAR is an independent publication run by its founders. A largely automated system reads the queue files, archives them and recomputes the number every day.
Questions and corrections go to the LOADSTAR data desk at contact@
No grid operator, utility or developer owns, invests in or sponsors LOADSTAR. It is funded by its founders and has no revenue today. The data license is offered on the same terms to every commercial licensee, utilities and developers included, and no licensee has a say in the number.
Corrections
When we get something wrong, the correction is dated and the original error is described — never silently edited away. Every change to the number, including the four corrections of late September 2026, is listed at index
Found an error? Write to contact@