Sunrun customers in California have begun to share the excess solar energy they are generating on their rooftops with their neighbors, increasing grid resiliency during critical months of peak energy consumption.
Through an exclusive partnership with Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E), Sunrun, a residential solar, battery storage and solar energy-as-a-service provider, quickly reached maximum enrollment and energy capacity goals of 7,500 new and existing residential solar-plus-storage systems and 30 MW in the Energy Efficiency Summer Reliability Program, also known as Peak Power Rewards. Due to very strong interest, the program rapidly expanded to 8,500 customers and 34 MW, respectively.
The program provides meaningful and flexible energy to support the grid, every evening from 7-9 p.m. during August through October, when high temperatures challenge California’s grid to meet peak energy demand. California is among the top five states with the most hours of power disruption, making this program vital to overall grid health.
Mary Powell, CEO of Sunrun, says: “As we make significant progress in fortifying the grid and fostering partnerships with energy providers like PG&E, home storage networked into distributed power plants emerge as invaluable assets.
“This program extension plays a unique and positive role in enhancing our state’s electric grid, reinforcing our commitment to empowering customers and communities with greater energy resilience and energy security, in a time where outages have become increasingly more common.”
Eligibility for Peak Power Rewards requires Sunrun solar and battery customers in single-family homes to have an interconnection agreement with PG&E and not be enrolled in other demand response programs. Customers will receive an upfront payment of $750 and a free smart thermostat for participating.
Photo by Aleksandr Popov on Unsplash
