SACRAMENTO, US - Sacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD) and Swell Energy announced an agreement for Swell to act as the aggregator for a virtual power plant initiative.
According to both parties, The initial effort is intended to bring 20 MWh and 10 MW of renewable capacity to SMUD by recruiting, installing, and aggregating capacity from customers’ battery storage systems located in the utility’s service area in California’s capital city.
Both parties have announced that The program could scale to 54 MWh and 27 MW over the term of the partnership. The program is intended to enable customers to operate their individual systems alongside many others to aggregate and dispatch renewable energy sources. Participating customers are expected to receive both upfront and ongoing compensation, called GridRevenue, based on the capacity of their solar and energy storage systems.
According to both parties, Currently, some 600 customer-sited energy storage systems are in SMUD’s service area, with an additional 400 in the interconnection process. SMUD has committed to funding batteries for low-income customers through local non-profits such as Grid Alternatives.
Source: POWERGRID INTERNATIONAL