How did electricity—the most boring, taken-for-granted utility—become the single biggest constraint for billion-dollar economic development deals?

In this episode of Site Selectors Are People, Too, Devin Hillsdon-Smith unpacks the new reality of site selection: The Electron Wars. For the last two decades, U.S. electricity demand was a sleepy flatline. Today, AI-driven data centers and hyperscalers are shattering the grid, with projections showing data center grid demand nearly tripling by 2030.

To understand how we got here, Devin takes us back to 1890s Chicago to meet Samuel Insull—the relentless pioneer who invented the modern electricity customer, the "load factor," and the 120-year-old regulatory compact that is currently buckling under the weight of artificial intelligence. We explore how tech giants are pivoting to nuclear power to meet their always-on demands, and dive deep into how utilities are rewriting the rules of risk to protect everyday ratepayers.

Key Takeaways from this Episode:

• The History of the Grid: The rise and catastrophic fall of Samuel Insull, the man who bet his life on infinite electricity demand.
• The Interconnection Crisis: How speculative "phantom loads" and supply chain bottlenecks are causing up to 5-year delays for new power connections.
• The Nuclear Renaissance: Why hyperscalers (Amazon, Google, Microsoft) are investing billions into reviving legacy nuclear sites and funding Small Modular Reactors (SMRs).
• The Nerd Section: A breakdown of the new "large load tariffs"—including minimum takes, non-refundable administrative fees, collateral, and exit fees—designed to shift infrastructure risk back onto developers.
• The New Rules of Site Selection: Why "power is the new dirt," and the critical questions economic developers must ask before chasing a 300-megawatt announcement.

If you are negotiating a megasite or courting a data center, this episode is your survival guide to the new physics of economic development.