Interview: Dr. William Chueh and Rahul Gupta on 10X Load Growth, Storage, and the Grid's Bottlenecks

Recorded at the OpenMinds 2026 Grid Vision Summit (OM26) at Stanford, this interview pairs Dr. William Chueh, director of the Precourt Institute for Energy and professor at Stanford, with Rahul Gupta, a partner at Bain & Company focused on utilities, power and energy. OpenMinds Communications Director Will Bernholz hosts. They discuss load growth, the barriers slowing capital deployment, and the Grid Vision Plan to optimize the grid we have and build the grid we need by 2035.

Key points

• The U.S. faces 10x the historical growth rate in electricity demand, and the Grid Vision Plan gives stakeholders a common fact base to prioritize solutions.
• Over the last 20 years, China's rate of electrification has been almost 15 times that of the U.S., and it stands up transmission projects in less than a third of the time.
• Storage paired with wind and solar costs roughly 11 to 14 cents per kWh for 24/7 clean power; storage at a third of today's cost would transform the economics.
• Both see AI speeding transmission forecasting, planning, siting and community engagement on permitting.