WHAT’S HAPPENING TODAY: Good afternoon and happy Juneteenth! World Cup action continues today as the U.S. Men’s National Team faces Australia. Go team USA! 
In other news, uncertainty continued to build in the Middle East as Israel launched strikes against Hezbollah in Lebanon overnight. The rise in regional conflict has disrupted Vice President JD Vance‘s planned trip to Switzerland, where he was scheduled to meet with Iranian officials to talk about an agreement. 
Meanwhile, the Department of Energy announced a second advanced nuclear reactor has reached a key milestone in its development. 
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.
QUOTE OF THE WEEK: As concerns are growing about surging power demand and electricity prices, climate change is increasingly being discussed through the lens of energy security.
One British energy CEO is now calling for this messaging shift to translate over to policy in the United Kingdom and Europe.
“On a bigger scale we could not have gone about the electricity transition in the UK and Europe in a worse way if we wanted to get public opinion to support it,” Octopus Energy CEO Greg Jackson said during the Financial Times’ Climate and Impact Summit earlier in the week.
“My request to all politicians is to relentlessly try hard now to have all policies that line up people’s immediate self-interest with that of the planet, rather than telling people we have to make sacrifices in order to fend off a threat that a lot of them don’t see,” he said.
U.S.-IRAN PEACE DEAL? U.S. and Iran talks in Switzerland today were postponed amid an escalation of fighting overnight between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon.
U.S. officials today said that Israel and Hezbollah have agreed to a ceasefire, but the most recent attacks have derailed the peace talks between the U.S. and Iran. Vice President JD Vance was set to travel to Switzerland to discuss the deal.
The U.S. and Iran signed a memorandum of understanding earlier this week, which gave the two countries 60 days to negotiate the final terms of the agreement.
“We didn’t meet out of desperation, Iran did,” President Donald Trump wrote on Truth Social this morning. “They are FINISHED! We’ll play out the 60 days. They get no money, not ten cents!”
WHAT’S GOING ON IN THE STRAIT OF HORMUZ: Some outlets reported earlier today that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps sent out a radio broadcast announcing the reclosure of the Strait of Hormuz following Israel’s attacks in Lebanon.
The broadcast reportedly warned that the Strait of Hormuz would remain closed until Israeli withdrawals from Lebanon and the U.S. naval presence was removed from the Persian Gulf.
Yesterday, there was a noticeable increase in traffic in the Strait of Hormuz. There were reportedly 25 crossings.
According to MarineTraffic, “traffic was broadly balanced across both directions, with most vessels using established Iranian route patterns. Five sanctioned vessels were identified among the crossings, while no new physical attacks on shipping have been confirmed since 10 May.”
Tehran has allowed for ships to move through the strait toll-free during the 60 days of negotiations. After the 60 days, Iran will hold talks with Oman and the Persian Gulf states on how to administer the waterway, according to the agreement to end the war.
However, Iran’s Persian Gulf Strait Authority has said that ships crossing through the Strait of Hormuz need insurance, Lloyd’s List said. The insurance policy is free, but there is the potential for charges after the 60-day window closes. Ships need to follow a certain route along Oman’s coast, according to Bloomberg.
MARKETS UNSURE: Oil prices rose slightly today on the news of the Geneva talks being postponed, a signal that traders are avoiding being overly confident in the U.S.-Iran deal.
Just before 3 p.m. EDT, international benchmark Brent crude had risen by 0.90% and was priced at $80.57 a barrel. West Texas Intermediate also jumped 0.91% and was selling at $76.54 a barrel.
In the coming weeks, some analysts estimate, prices will remain between $75 and $82 a barrel, as markets watch for any potential escalation or disruptions of traffic through the strait.
“Attention shifts quickly to whether the physical reopening actually follows major shipping lines have yet to resume transits and insurance rates remain elevated, suggesting the market is cautious about the speed of normalization,” Axi market analyst Tiago Lacerda told CNBC.
ANOTHER ADVANCED REACTOR ACHIEVES CRITICALITY: A second advanced nuclear reactor being developed under the Energy Department’s pilot program hit criticality, weeks before Trump’s Independence Day deadline.
The details: The reactor, known as the Ward 250, is being developed by Valar Atomics. Yesterday, the company successfully completed a zero-power fueled criticality demonstration at the Utah San Rafael Energy Lab, marking the first reactor authorized by the Department of Energy to be built outside of a national lab.
“Nine months ago, this was an empty site. Today, there’s a critical reactor on it, built and operated by the Valar team,” Isaiah Taylor, Founder and CEO of Valar Atomics, said in a statement. “We met the milestone the executive order set. This reactor was built to make power, and that’s exactly where we’re headed.”
Antares Nuclear’s Mark-0 reactor was the first small modular reactor in the pilot program to hit this milestone, earlier this month.
If you forgot: Achieving criticality means that a reactor is perfectly stable and its nuclear chain reaction is self-sustaining and able to produce energy.
HOW MUCH ELECTRICITY COULD U.S. CITIES USE THIS WORLD CUP? The 2026 World Cup is well underway, with 11 cities across the country hosting nearly 80 matches over the five-week tournament.
The dozens of matches are expected to dramatically increase electricity demand in the 11 cities, but have you wondered which one is expected to use the most? A new analysis published by Payless Power, a retail electric provider based in Texas, estimates that Dallas will take the top spot.
Using a per-match energy model – that was based on publicly available weather, energy consumption, and electricity rate data – Payless Power predicted that Dallas will consume around 899,323 kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity across the nine matches it will host.
By comparison, the average residential customer in the U.S. uses around 10,791 kWh of electricity in a year, and roughly 30 kWh in a day. Payless Power estimates that Dallas’ projected energy consumption is roughly equivalent to the amount needed to power more than 1,000 homes.
Atlanta, Houston, and New York/New Jersey are predicted to be the next highest in electricity demand, with all three estimated to use more than 570,000 kWh across the five weeks. San Francisco, which is hosting six matches, is forecast to have the lowest overall electricity demand at 344,518 kWh.
There are a number of factors contributing to this, as Payless Power found cities with enclosed stadiums – Dallas, Houston, and Atlanta – having the highest projected demand for each match. Meanwhile, open-air stadiums, such as those in Boston, San Francisco, and Seattle, would likely have the lowest consumption of electricity per match.
You can take a closer look at the full findings here.
EUROPEAN HEATWAVE CHARGED BY EL NIÑO: Part of Western Europe are set to face extreme heat in the coming days, which is being charged by the El Niño weather pattern.
William Henneberg, a meteorologist, told Bloomberg that the heatwave is being charged by high pressure over Europe, which raises temperatures as sinking air compresses toward the ground.
He noted that the weather pattern is likely to linger, resulting in above-normal temperatures through early July. The epicenter of the heat dome is over France, where temperatures hit 104 degrees Fahrenheit yesterday.
There are forecasts for even higher temperatures in the next couple of days. Bloomberg noted that western France and Paris could hit a June heat record on Monday.
ICYMI – BIG TECH BACKS DATA CENTER BILL: As we touched on in yesterday’s newsletter, a group of bipartisan lawmakers in the House have introduced a bill aimed at ensuring Big Tech will bear the costs of new power generation associated with their electricity-hungry data centers. And luckily for the members, Big Tech is on board.
The details: Microsoft endorsed the bipartisan legislation yesterday, with corporate vice president for U.S. government affairs Fred Humphries calling the bill an “important step” to ensuring that consumers are protected from rising electricity costs caused by soaring energy demand.
“We believe data center providers should take a community-first approach and pay their own way — covering the full cost of the power and energy infrastructure needed to support their data center operations so that communities are not burdened,” Humphries told Politico.
Quick reminder: The bill would require state regulators to create large-load standards, ensuring that companies like Microsoft would need to cover the costs related to new generation, transmission lines, and other grid upgrades. It would codify the principles laid out in the Trump administration’s ratepayer protection pledge, signed by several Big Tech firms in March.
RUNDOWN
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