Packetized Energy Signs Long-Term Contract with Central Electric Power Cooperative
Water heaters powered by Central Electric Power Cooperative and its 20 member-cooperatives will get "smarter," thanks to a new five-year agreement with Packetized Energy, whose thermostat systems add flexibility and responsiveness to electric water heaters. The devices will help balance Central's system and deliver peak demand savings for its member-cooperatives.
The agreement comes after Central's tests of Packetized Energy's Mello smart thermostat devices that demonstrated significant improvements for connected water heaters. The system includes an integration with Packetized Energy's Nimble energy flexibility software platform. The result is lower demand during peaks. The system also supports several different electricity rate structures offered by participating cooperative utilities that allow consumer-members to share in the peak demand savings. Based on that success, Central is adding the Mello device to its load management offerings for its member-cooperatives.
"We've been working with Packetized Energy since 2019 to make 'smart' electric devices on our system more accessible, flexible and easy to use for both our member-cooperatives and for consumer-members," said Scott Hammond, members program manager at Central, a generation and transmission cooperative based in Columbia, South Carolina.
"Based on the success of our pilot project and availability of almost real-time data from the devices, we decided to implement their innovative and cost-saving solution on a larger scale," Hammond said.
"The electric grid of tomorrow will be digitalized and decentralized - and it's being built today," observed Jigar Shah, prominent clean energy entrepreneur, investor, and author. "As we move toward new and cleaner sources of electricity, the biggest impacts in sustainability will come from scaling distributed technologies that have already been proved, like the energy flexibility platform."
Executives at Packetized Energy view the project expansion as a vote of confidence in its technology, a major step toward enhanced grid flexibility, and an opportunity for cooperatives to lower peak demand. By lowering peak demand, cooperatives provide savings for their members.
"Partnerships like these underscore the value of Packetized Energy's software platform and associated hardware in delivering demand flexibility and a high degree of DER visibility and control at significantly lower cost than grid-scale batteries," said Paul Hines, CEO of Packetized Energy. "This, in turn, enables resilience, responsiveness, increased use of renewables, and cost savings."
Central will deploy and evaluate Packetized Energy's Mello technology for possible expanded use of energy flexibility solutions. The goal will be to reduce costs and better balance supply and demand in real-time grid conditions by using smart thermostats, EV chargers and batteries. When successful, these technologies will add resilience and responsiveness, deliver peak demand reduction for Central's member-cooperatives, reduce the need for added grid infrastructure, and generate new revenue streams.
Central Electric Power Cooperative | https://www.cepci.org
Packetized Energy | www.packetizedenergy.com
