The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission voted unanimously Thursday to issue show-cause orders against all six regional grid operators under its jurisdiction, giving PJM, MISO, SPP, CAISO, ISO-NE and NYISO 60 days to defend or rewrite the tariffs governing how large data-center loads connect to the bulk power system, and 30 days to file informational reports on resource adequacy.

The orders, issued under section 206 of the Federal Power Act, identify five categories of reform the commission expects to see addressed. They follow a docket in which FERC reviewed more than 3,500 pages of comments before acting, a paper trail that gives the agency political cover to move at a speed the grid almost never moves at.

“We are setting the stage for a resilient, reliable, and forward-thinking grid that empowers communities and safeguards consumers,” FERC Chairman Laura V. Swett said in the announcement. At a briefing, she described the approach as “holding grid operators accountable with tight, ambitious deadlines.”

The subtext is PJM. The largest U.S. grid, covering 13 states and 67 million customers, has drawn sustained criticism over interconnection delays and rising bills, with wholesale rates up as much as 267 percent over five years per Bloomberg data cited by TechCrunch. Deputy Energy Secretary James P. Danly tied Thursday’s move to an earlier directive on large-load interconnection from Energy Secretary Chris Wright, making clear this is a coordinated push.

What’s notable is the framing. FERC isn’t proposing a rulemaking and waiting years; it’s flipping the burden of proof onto the operators themselves. That’s the same procedural posture the commission used during the 2000s wholesale-market overhauls under Order 2000, and it tends to produce settlements rather than litigation.

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