By Emma Penrod of UtilityDive.com
About 44 GW of large load projects slated for Oncor’s service territory qualified for ERCOT’s new “Batch Zero” interconnection process for large loads, company executives told analysts during a Thursday earnings call. But the timeline for that process is uncertain following an order by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott that paused new data center interconnection approvals pending a state-wide audit.
ERCOT’s criteria for Batch Zero, which include new financial and technical requirements for loads with a peak demand of 75 MW or greater, narrowed immediate load growth projects for Oncor, a subsidiary of Sempra.
The batch approach, Sempra Chairman and CEO Jeff Martin said, was intended to align the interconnection of large loads with the construction of new generation. The criteria for acceptance into the first Batch Zero was finalized in June.
Jeff Martin, chairman and CEO of Sempra, in Washington, D.C. on April 14, 2026. Kevin Dietsch via Getty Images“Think about a situation where you’ve got close to 500 GW of generation on the sideline waiting to come on the system and, similarly, over 400 GW of large load customers,” Martin said. “That batch process is intended to sequence generation with large loads. Over time, it will be a sequencing effect that’s intended to balance what we think is going to be remarkable load growth.”
The utility had submitted a qualifying load forecast of about 127 GW to ERCOT earlier this year, before the Batch Zero eligibility criteria we
