Project Objective
Develop a sustainable business model for customer-sited storage that creates value for all stakeholders including customers, regulators, utilities, providers, and advocates.
Project Team Members
Kurt Addleburger, Principal, GooglernBrendan Blockowicz, New Products and Services Manager, SDG&E / SemprarnChris Chen, Development of Commercialization and Intellectual Capital, SDG&E / SemprarnSusan Kennedy, CEO, Advanced Microgrid SolutionsrnJamie Fine, Economist, Environmental Defense FundrnRandy Nicholson, Advanced Technology Policy Manager, SDG&E / Sempra
Develop a business model for customer-sited storage that creates value for all stakeholders, including customers, regulators, utilities, providers, and advocates. Current customer-sided storage business models rely heavily on value of demand charge reduction and Smart Grid Interoperability Panel (SGIP), which are not sustainable and unlikely to realize the full value that energy storage could deliver. Additional value (such as grid benefits or participating in wholesale market) can be maximized only if the stakeholders collaborate and design a framework that allows the storage to be used most economically. Challenges that remain to be solved include ownership of storage, control of storage, role of the utility, and others.
SDG&E has explored different potential models of utility involvement, ranging from ownership and control, to only designing a storage rate that incentivizes customers to use storage optimally. SDG&E wishes to collaborate with stakeholders to design a framework that allows the value of storage to be maximized as well as increase adoption for storage. We plan to issue an RFI (Request for Information) later this year to Providers in order to further explore business models and gauge their interest in potentially partnering with SDG&E to offer a customer-sided storage product. The eLab Accelerator would be a great opportunity to discuss and refine many issues and increase the value of the RFI to all stakeholders.
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