Voltus, Inc. ("Voltus"), a leading distributed energy resource (DER) technology platform and virtual power plant (VPP) operator, together with Resideo Technologies, a leading global provider of home comfort, energy management, security and life safety solutions, announced the expansion of their residential smart thermostat demand response program offering to approximately 10 million Commonwealth Edison (ComEd) customers across the state of Illinois in the region served by the PJM Interconnection (PJM), along with over 1 million PSEG Long Island (PSEG-LI) customers served by NYISO.
U.S. electricity demand is expected to reach record highs, growing by 4.1 trillion kWh by 2025 (EEI 2023). VPPs offer a reliable, sustainable, and cost-effective solution to grid operators to help meet this growing demand. According to the Department of Energy (DOE) Liftoff Report (Sept. 2023), tripling VPP capacity could address 10-20% of this growing peak demand. The DOE Report also notes that deploying 80-160 GW of VPP capacity could avoid approximately $10B in annual grid costs by 2030. Much of the savings delivered by VPPs is returned to the participating commercial, industrial, and residential consumers.
“We are excited to expand our partnership with Resideo's Grid Services team and continue to harness the flexible capacity of residential consumers to deliver critically needed resources to the grid operator,” says Dan Svejnar, Senior Vice President of Growth at Voltus. “We are financially incentivizing residential energy users to reduce electricity usage during grid emergencies. Resideo Grid Services will then intelligently manage the comfort settings of enrolled homes across the ComEd and PSEG-LI territories to seamlessly deliver energy-efficiency savings while keeping homes comfortable. This partnership continues to create a double win for residential consumers by offsetting rising energy costs and ensuring greater grid reliability in their home communities.”
“Resideo is eager to help more customers access the economic and reliability benefits of these smart thermostat demand response programs,” said Linsey Miller Senior Vice President, Business Development and Strategic Marketing at Resideo. “Our expanded work with Voltus not only unlocks value for our Honeywell Home smart thermostat consumers, but our Resideo Grid Services team can help the Midwest and East Coast avert dangerous power outages during periods of peak demand by aggregating thousands of residential customers into a powerful demand-side resource."
Voltus is actively growing its residential business to drive grid scale decarbonization and resiliency through strategic partnerships. Last year, Voltus and Resideo announced a partnership that, for the first time ever, connected Ameren Illinois customers directly to the Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO). Since the program first launched in January 2023, over 9,400 customers from over 550 Illinois cities have signed up to participate. Prior to that, in April 2022, the companies announced a program that would deliver both demand response capacity and ancillary services value to PJM across PPL Electric Utilities customers in Pennsylvania.
