Beating heart of a decarbonized energy system

As energy becomes a center of conversation in many households (mainly on how expensive the winter will be), renewable energy is what allows homeowners to actually take the topic beyond just reading their bills. With more renewable technologies, such as solar and batteries, decentralizing the energy system, homeowners can be a leading force in the energy transitions, but is everyone willing to jump on board?

According to Natasha Morgan, Senior Commercial Manager at Lunar, the key to increasing the adoption rate of these technologies is visibility on how people use their energy and what is the value associated with it.

Consumers need to understand the transition they are part of

Sounds easy? Not in practice! For most of us, the energy system's complexity is hidden, and we are only exposed to a simple flat-rate tariff and outgoing on our account balance. Therefore, considering how to optimize your energy by using it at specific times doesn’t mean much, as no value or incentive is associated with that. People only think about energy in terms of how much power they consume.

However, as the energy transition accelerates, the “when” is becoming more important than the “how much”, so it’s about time we pull the curtain back on fluctuating energy prices.

Energy retailers on the back-burner

Given the pace of decarbonization we need, energy retailers are the ones to lean on when it comes to supporting homeowners in understanding what it means to optimize their energy use.

It could be achieved by:

1. Developing and introducing transparent time-of-use tariffs, so there is a clear incentive to shift consumption behavior. If one uses less energy at peak times, that takes pressure off the grid and simultaneously saves money on their bills - so it’s really a win-win situation! 
2. Deploying smart distributed energy resources (such as batteries or EV chargers) at scale, so they can be connected to form distributed power stations that help the grid cope with fluctuating renewables while generating savings for customers.
3. Engaging consumers around new products and services and educating them on how they will benefit from these offerings. Gaining customers’ trust is key to progress and scale.

Energy flexibility is key to decarbonizing our economies

To enable successful flexibility programs, it’s very important that homeowners see the benefits of sharing their energy to support the grid. Currently, many companies worldwide have simple business models for rewarding people taking part - a lot of the time, it’s just an upfront discount on the cost of the battery. However, these offerings often do not consider the actual cost of flexibility for people, as they do not take into account details such as their customers’ energy tariffs and the optimal battery behavior - mostly due to a lack of data.

For successful customer engagement, we need to ensure that everyone is better off when sharing their power to support the grid by offering their home battery to export or import energy when needed. The value distributed energy resources provide to the homeowner and the grid must be combined and considered hand in hand.

This is where  Lunar Gridshare software comes in handy.

Energy transition should be worthwhile for homeowners

Enabling homeowners to be a driving force behind the decarbonization at scale is exactly why we built Gridshare.

As a cloud-based software platform, Gridshare can manage any type of distributed energy resources to co-optimize them for the grid and help homeowners maximize the value of their energy.

We aim to provide simplicity and transparency to energy businesses and their customers. Thanks to Gridshare, companies can visualize and analyze the detailed behavior of individual devices and their fleet, helping them understand the costs customers might incur for participating in flexibility programs. Gridshare also enables companies to show this data to customers in a standardized way, exposing them through your own app to boost transparency and, consequently, customer trust.

At Lunar, we are creating a future where people are at the heart of a zero-carbon energy system, and we’re here to talk about how Gridshare can support you.