Identifying Potential Markets for Commercial Behind-the-Meter Battery Storage

The National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) and Clean Energy Group have released the first national public analysis estimating the potential size of the commercial behind-the-meter battery storage market in the United States. The analysis of building load profiles and more than 10,000 utility tariffs found that approximately 5 million of the 18 million commercial customers across the country may be able to cost-effectively reduce their utility bills with battery storage technologies.

The researchers looked at the number of commercial customers eligible for utility rate tariffs that included demand charges of $15 or more per kilowatt, an industry benchmark for identifying economic opportunities for behind-the-meter storage. Customers subject to these demand charges include private and nonprofit businesses, as well as community facilities, public buildings, and multifamily housing properties. In many cases, demand charges can comprise anywhere from 30 to 70 percent of a commercial customer’s utility bill.

Based on the analysis, market drivers for storage are present not only in first-mover states like California and New York, but also across the Midwest, Mid-Atlantic, and Southeast. For example, tens of thousands of commercial customers in Georgia, Alabama, Colorado, Michigan and Ohio may be subject to utility tariffs with sufficiently high demand charges to make storage a viable economic investment.

The findings from this analysis are presented a new white paper from NREL and Clean Energy Group, Potential Markets for Behind-the-Meter Battery Energy Storage: A Survey of U.S. Demand Charges. In this webinar, coauthors Joyce McLaren and Seth Mullendore presented their research and answer questions from the audience.

This webinar was presented by Clean Energy Group’s Resilient Power Project. For more information, visit www.resilient-power.org.