Welcome to Daily on Energy, written by Washington Examiner energy and environment writers Callie Patteson (@CalliePatteson) and Maydeen Merino (@MaydeenMerino). Email cpatteson@washingtonexaminer dot com or mmerino@washingtonexaminer dot com for tips, suggestions, calendar items, and anything else. If a friend sent this to you and you’d like to sign up, click here. If signing up doesn’t work, shoot us an email, and we’ll add you to our list.

MORE THAN 12.5 MILLION BARRELS OF OIL HAVE TRANSITED THE STRAIT OF HORMUZ, VANCE SAYS: Restrictions on oil shipments in the Strait of Hormuz are easing, with Vice President JD Vance announcing earlier today that millions of barrels have crossed the waterway last night. 

“Last night, 12.5 million barrels of oil went through the Strait of Hormuz. That’s a high since the beginning of the conflict,” Vance told reporters at a White House press briefing today. 

“The Iranians, for the second night in a row, did not shoot at any ships in the Strait of Hormuz,” he said. “So far they are honoring their end of the commitment.” He added that the U.S. Navy has allowed more than a dozen ships to transit to Iranian ports. 

U.S. Central Command announced earlier today that the naval blockade has been officially lifted, allowing traffic entering and exiting Iranian ports. Lloyd’s List earlier today said that several large cargo vessels, led by shipowners such as Grimaldi Group, Cosco, and NYK, are beginning to exit the strait. 

There have been reports throughout the week of ships moving through the strait. 

For instance, three Saudi supertankers carrying 6 million barrels of oil crossed the waterway Thursday. 

Two oil tankers left Iran and crossed the U.S. military blockade without being stopped earlier in the week, carrying a total of 3.8 million barrels of Iranian crude oil. 

Where does the deal stand? The Trump administration has remotely signed the agreement with Iran twice. The U.S. and Iran are expected to sign the deal in person tomorrow in Switzerland. Vance will be attending the talks and is expected to lead the conversation on implementation of the agreement. 

Read more by Maydeen here.  

HOW ARE MARKETS REACTING? Oil prices continued to fall today on the news of increased traffic through the strait, with domestic and international benchmarks trading below $80 a barrel. 

Just before 3 p.m. EDT, West Texas Intermediate was down 0.26% and was priced at $75.81 a barrel. Brent crude, which had fallen by more than 3% earlier in the day, began to tick back up in the afternoon by 0.16%, and was selling at $79.68 a barrel. 

This uneasiness in pricing could be due to the fact that some trackers are still seeing ships U-turn before entering the Strait of Hormuz, a sign that the waterway isn’t fully open yet. 

ENERGY REGULATORS ORDER OVERHAUL OF DATA CENTER GRID RULES: Six federally regulated organizations operating the bulk of the nation’s electric grid have been ordered to reassess their rules for connecting large-load facilities such as data centers to the grid, aiding the Trump administration’s push to accelerate the deployment of artificial intelligence.

The details: During the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s monthly open meeting today, the five-member commission unanimously approved orders for PJM Interconnection, the Midcontinent Independent System Operator, California Independent System Operator, Southwest Power Pool, New York ISO, and ISO New England. In its decision, the commission said existing rules put forth by these RTOs and ISOs for interconnecting data centers to the grid are “unjust and unreasonable.” 

In choosing to give six individualized directives, FERC stopped short of fulfilling a suggestion from the Trump administration to put forward one-size-fits-all rules for data center connections to the grid. Instead, FERC is issuing what is known as a show-cause order, calling on each RTO and ISO to assess its existing interconnection rules and determine if they are actually “unjust and unreasonable.” If not, they must prove why, and if so, they must propose alternative solutions. 

Something to note: In October, the Energy Department directed FERC to initiate a rulemaking process for accelerating the connection of large loads to the grid, suggesting the commission assert jurisdiction over terms, rates, or conditions for how facilities such as data centers can connect to the network. 

While Thursday’s orders do not go as far as suggested in that they do not involve sweeping rules, the commission said the decision does not preclude future rulemaking. 

You can read more about today’s orders in Callie’s latest here. 

PLUS – FERC TAKES ON PERMITTING DELAYS: Also today, FERC voted in favor of easing environmental permitting reviews for pipelines and other natural gas infrastructure projects. 

During her introductory remarks, FERC chair Laura Swett said the commission has not fully capitalized on recent legislation, the White House’s rescission of past regulations, and the Supreme Court’s 2025 decision in Seven County Infrastructure Coalition v. Eagle County, which determined that federal agencies are not required under the National Environmental Policy Act to consider environmental impacts of projects outside their agency’s jurisdiction. 

NEPA requires agencies to consider the environmental effects of energy and infrastructure projects requiring federal permits, such as highways, pipelines, export terminals, and more. 

“We are working hard at reforms that will streamline gas permitting, while protecting landowners and bolstering investor confidence to build the infrastructure that we desperately need in this country, and that means maintaining excellent orders that we believe will hold up to judicial review,” Swett said. 

The commission voted in favor of no longer conducting a “cumulative effects analysis,” for such projects. This does not mean that FERC will stop conducting environmental reviews, Swett later told reporters. 

“We are not going to shirk any environmental analysis,” she said. 

GUTHRIE PROPOSES DATA CENTER BILL: House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Brett Guthrie of Kentucky introduced a bill aimed at ensuring data centers bear the costs of new power generation. 

Guthrie’s proposed bill would require state regulators to create large-load standards, ensuring that companies looking to build data centers would need to cover the costs related to new generation, transmission lines, and other upgrades. The bill is intended to prevent the surge in energy demand for data centers from increasing household electricity costs. 

The bill has bipartisan support from Republicans Rep. Bob Latta of Ohio, Rep. Gabe Evans of Colorado, and Democratic Rep. Kathy Castor of Florida. 

The bill codifies the principles from the White House ratepayer protection pledge. Signed by several big tech companies in March, the pledge commits signatories to securing their own energy for data centers. 

TRUMP ADMINISTRATION REVERSES COURSE ON OCEAN MONITORING ROLLBACKS: The Trump administration has ceded to bipartisan pressure from Congress to reverse its attempt to dismantle a massive ocean monitoring system. 

The details: The Ocean Observatories Initiative is a $368 million monitoring network made up of hundreds of deep-sea sensors and research infrastructure deployed across several regions. It has been used for more than a decade to track greenhouse gases, ocean temperatures, ocean circulations, marine ecosystems, coastal flooding, and more. 

Earlier this month, the National Science Foundation said it was moving to dismantle large portions of the monitoring systems, removing most of its instruments off the coasts of Oregon, Washington, Alaska, North Carolina, and Greenland by 2027. 

The decision met with swift backlash from Republicans and Democrats, including a bipartisan group of senators who introduced a bill to bar the NSF from using any federal funds to remove instruments until a review of the program was completed. 

The bill, introduced by Alaskan Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski and Oregon Democratic Sen. Jeff Merkley, passed in the upper chamber yesterday. 

A U-Turn: Earlier today, the NSF said it was reversing the decision, saying it appreciated the concerns raised by “the range of stakeholders” who rely on data from the monitoring system. 

“Effective immediately, NSF will not proceed with further removal or descoping of equipment from the remaining arrays and will continue operations including planned maintenance,” the NSF said. “While the Endurance Array has been removed from the water, we are developing plans to redeploy the equipment after servicing.” 

Moving forward, the NSF said it will issue a “Dear Colleague Letter” to collect input from stakeholders and convene an expert panel to assess observational needs. 

UN FOOD AGENCIES SEEK MILLIONS TO PREP FOR UPCOMING EL NINO: The United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization and World Food Programme is seeking $202 million to help aid 8.8 million people who could be affected by the upcoming El Niño weather, Reuters reports. 

The second half of the year is expected to see strong El Niño weather patterns, bringing floods and storms. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration last week announced high odds that it could be a “super El Niño.” 

The financing will help to protect the millions of people in the 22 most at-risk countries: Cameroon, Ethiopia, Kenya, ​Madagascar, Malawi, Mozambique, Nigeria, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, Uganda, Zimbabwe, Afghanistan, Pakistan, the Philippines, East Timor, ​Colombia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, and Venezuela.

SOLAR DOESN’T USE MUCH FARMLAND: Solar occupies less than 1% of farmland in the U.S., according to the Solar Energy Industries Association. 

SEIA has released a new interactive map, illustrating solar development across farmland in the U.S. It noted that solar uses 0.04% of total U.S. land area and 0.07% of U.S. farmland. It added that zero states use solar on more than 0.5% of farmland. 

You can view the interactive map here. 

ICYMI – COMPANIES COMMIT $915 MILLION TO CARBON CAPTURE: Frontier, a coalition of tech companies committed to carbon removal, announced yesterday that a group of companies, including Google, Salesforce, and Anthropic, have committed $915 million in carbon removal credits. 

The company said the new funding brings the total commitment to carbon removal up to $1.8 billion. Frontier launched in 2022 with the goal of purchasing $1 billion of carbon credits by 2030. 

RUNDOWN 

CNBC Nearly 80% of data center capacity is at elevated risk to climate hazards like flooding and fire, study says

The Hill Will gas prices keep falling? It’s likely, but Mother Nature could interrupt that

Grist A solution to data center backlash? Put them in oil fields.