Microgrids offer utilities eight distinct value stacks (or streams), yet most still treat them as experimental pilots. Today on the Clean Power Hour, we reveal how microgrids are strategic network assets that deliver value every single day, not just when the grid fails.
Martin Szczepanik is Director of Energy and Resources at Baringa, a global energy consultancy. He brings 11 years of utility strategy experience, including work with SolarCity, major West Coast utilities, and renewable energy developers. Baringa recently released a white paper called "From Pilots to Portfolios: Scaling the Rollout of Utility Microgrids."
Key Discussion Points:
• The complete microgrid value stack: resilience, distribution capacity deferral, transmission capacity deferral, ancillary services, energy arbitrage, generation capacity deferral, avoided emissions, and avoided public safety power shutoffs (PSPS)
• Why resilience differs from reliability: climate-driven extreme weather events versus age and condition-driven outages
• How billion-dollar natural disasters increased from once every 90 days in the 1980s to once every 19 days today, which necessitates the increased need for microgrids
• Distribution and transmission capacity deferral: using microgrids to avoid $5-10 million infrastructure upgrades
• Energy arbitrage opportunities: charging batteries when solar floods the grid, discharging during peak demand
• FERC 2222 enabling distributed energy resources to participate in wholesale markets and earn revenue
• California wildfires and PSPS (Public Safety Power Shutoffs) events: how microgrids reduce the cost of de-energizing lines
• Why utilities need to assess microgrids in distribution planning instead of defaulting to substations and reconductoring
Three converging trends make microgrids essential now. Rising power prices from the IRA repeal and infrastructure costs. Extreme weather events are destroying grid infrastructure faster than utilities can rebuild it. Electrification from data centers, heat pumps, and EVs is straining capacity.
Microgrids address all three simultaneously while generating revenue on days when the grid operates normally. The technology exists, the economics work. Regulatory barriers like FERC 2222 are falling. What remains is shifting the utility mindset from pilots to portfolios.
Connect with Martin Szczepanik and Baringa
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/martinszczepanik/
Website: https://www.baringa.com/en/about/regions/north-america/microgrids/
Whitepaper: https://www.baringa.com/en/insights/digitising-the-energy-system/scaling-microgrids/
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