RAMBO TALABONG / INSIDE CLIMATE NEWS – In the waning days of Governor Phil Murphy’s tenure, state officials unveiled an updated Energy Master Plan that calls for 100 percent clean electricity by 2035 and steep reductions in climate pollution by midcentury. Since 2019, the state has used the first version of the plan as the backbone of its climate strategy, promising reliable, affordable and clean power.

The blueprint lands at a moment when delivering on all three goals is increasingly in doubt.

While a second Trump administration rolls back federal clean-energy support, PJM Interconnection, the regional grid operator that serves New Jersey and a dozen other states, struggles to manage surging electricity demand from artificial-intelligence data centers …