Q&A: The Northeast takes the lead on energy storage legislation

This summer, Rhode Island joined its New England neighbors in passing legislation specifically aimed at energy storage development. The state has an aggressive clean energy target of 100% renewable electricity by 2033, and the Energy Storage Systems Act will contribute to that endeavor.

As most areas of the country are still working on positive solar legislation, New England’s energy storage efforts seem almost futuristic. Rhode Island’s latest legislation establishes storage programs, deployment targets, utility storage procurements and rules for connecting batteries to the grid. Solar Power World spoke with Kat Burnham, senior principal at the national business association Advanced Energy United, about how energy storage advocacy efforts have developed recently.

SPW: What is Advanced Energy United, and what advocacy efforts are you working on, especially in New England?

Burnham: Advanced Energy United is a national trade association of clean energy companies, united in our mission to achieve 100% clean energy. What makes us stand out is we are not a single sector — we represent batteries, wind, solar, grid enhancing technologies. While we’re national, we have state representatives across the country. I’m the state lead for Rhode Island, as well as Massachusetts and Connecticut.

There’s a lot going on in New England, and we as an organization are relatively new to this space. I’ve worked in Rhode Island advocacy for a few years, and our New England team has a track record of work in the area. Our [energy] work in New England covers legislative issues like the energy storage bill in Rhode Island. We also do some regulatory work at Public Utilities Commissions, and our team does work with ISO New England, advocating for reforms at the wholesale level. We really cover our bases. We even have a federal team keeping an eye on how federal dollars from the DOE are investing in the New England states and how they can be leveraged for our shared energy goals.

What were your goals with the Energy Storage Systems Act in Rhode Island?

Our goal was to have legislation that would enable storage in Rhode Island. To put it simply, right now, the market is not well-designed to incentivize storage development. It was designed at a time when we had big, centralized power sources, and storage is really unique. Our goal was for that legislation to encourage investment in storage solutions in Rhode Island and have a forward-looking view, including deployment targets for Rhode Island to offer some predictability to the market and help grow interest in the state.

Looking around Rhode Island, we see our neighbors Connecticut, Massachusetts and Maine all have viable storage targets. To keep pace, we absolutely want to have our own deployment targets. It definitely helps having other states take the first step, and we can learn best practices or lessons learned from those states, which is reassuring to policymakers. Just like solar has evolved, storage has finally hit its moment. We’re seeing both the cost savings and the abilities with storage in a way that we hadn’t in previous years. That’s helped make the case for storage and made it a positive success story.

Rhode Island had an aggressive clean energy law already, so was this more of a clarification for energy storage?

Yes, and with this legislation, it doesn’t just enable battery developers. We’ve seen it proven out that [storage] can be a really important tool for integrating other distributed energy resources, like wind, solar and EV chargers. It can be a helpful tool to balance out the system. I come back to the way things are structured in Rhode Island, as well as other states, that’s not really great at accommodating storage, which is not in a tidy box of solely a producer or solely a consumer — storage is something else. That’s why we needed this legislation.

When you talk to legislators and committees, what’s the selling point for energy storage?

There isn’t one selling point for storage. It is a range of benefits that really make it attractive to policymakers. Workforce development is part of the picture. Reliability is important. Grid resilience, being able to integrate other resources, is important. Another important benefit that storage brings that resonated in Rhode Island is the potential savings for ratepayers, because storage can charge up when power is plentiful and discharge when demand is higher. That can help balance the system and help with ratepayer savings. In New England, we have relatively high electricity rates, so any opportunity to invest in a system that will make it more reliable and help smooth out costs and make them more cost effective for the consumer — that really appeals to policymakers.

It takes a lot of time to educate legislators and policymakers. We were really fortunate with this legislative push to have incredible bill sponsors — Sen. Dawn Euer and Rep. Arthur Handy. It takes a lot of time and expertise and dedication, and they have that in spades. That’s important as we think about the transition and all the potential solutions. That also means we need to make sure that all policymakers are aware of these technologies as well as the potential hurdles we need to overcome, and we have a legislative body that gets it.

What’s next for energy storage advocacy in Rhode Island?

The next step is implementation. The Energy Storage Systems Act goes to the PUC and the Rhode Island Infrastructure Bank has been tasked as a program administrator. On behalf of the industry, we want to raise our hands to be a resource and help guide that process as the PUC thinks about developing tariffs specific to storage, recognizing all the different features it can offer, and making sure that’s clear and effective to stakeholders. That’s my biggest next step for Rhode Island — implementation of the bill.