The scale of power requested by data centers joining the grid is straining how utilities have historically connected large customers. When a customer needs vast, uninterrupted power, major system upgrades often follow and those upgrades should be paid for by data centers to the extent they cause them. That’s the premise behind the White House’s Ratepayer Protection Pledge: data center energy costs shouldn’t slide onto household bills. But holding utilities and hyperscalers to that promise is proving harder than it sounds. A recently-filed data center transmission service agreement shows how, when sound ratemaking principles are overlooked, the true costs imposed by data centers become hard to identify and harder to properly bill.