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2
Abstract
The global energy transition is a transition to renewable energy. Are there renewable energy transition
pathways that lead to both decarbonized electricity and gas usage and energy resilience as well?
California’s gas and electric energy resilience eco-system attracts massive non-utility investment but is
integrated only at the site level. The current inventory of on-site energy resilience assets has
accumulated over time to the point that its collective supply capacity is a major potential supplement to
power plant fleets around the state. Emerging supply capacity in the form of electric vehicles and
stationary batteries, inter-operable with fast growing on-site solar capacity will create an opportunity
for many California communities to become fully energy resilience over the next five to ten years. Yet
there are challenges to overcome and new methods of strengthening local energy resilience to
implement as the energy sector transitions to reliance on renewable resources. A fundamental
challenge is integration of local electricity supply with imported electricity supply - for example using
microgrids to aggregate local supply and make it available when electricity imports are disrupted.
Success in meeting the challenge depends on engagement and collaboration among energy resilience
stakeholders, with local governments playing a leadership role empowered by state action to clear away
roadblocks.
Acknowledgements
project work scope and met to review progress. Keith Davidson, Ron
Edelstein, and Byron Washom provided guidance and/or
review.
Cover illustration: Figure 1 shows three tiers of energy production, transport1 and operations. The left
tier includes inter-state energy sources, transport systems and operations responsibilities. The middle
and right tiers include local and on-site energy sources and nanogrids, gas and electric distribution
systems and microgrid operation and control responsibilities. While integration and inter-operability are
inherent at the bulk level, inattention to integration of local energy resilience assets results in
vulnerability to local disruption and economically sub-optimal energy resilience asset utilization.
Deployment of operational local energy resilience assets, already massive, is rapidly being supplemented
-located batteries and electric vehicles. Because
these additional available assets already have a beneficial and quantifiable effect on local economies,
their current under-utilization is a growing concern. Microgrids address the problem by providing a
platform for integration and inter-operability between local assets and regional energy grids and
transport systems. The microgrid platform both enhances the resilience of regional systems and unlocks
on-site resilience asset benefits to neighborhoods and communities.
About IRESN and the project manager: IRESN is a registered California non-profit dedicated to pragmatic
local energy integration and collaboration. Gerald Braun is an energy utility and solar industry veteran
who also, at other times, directed national, state, utility and university-based renewable energy RD&D
programs.
3
Inventory and Integration of California’s
Local Energy Resilience Assets
Are California’s energy resilience assets being used to provide energy security for diverse and important
groups of individual electricity customers? Yes, but not for most residential and commercial groups.
Has deployment of on-site energy resilience assets in California over many decades enabled numerous
energy resilient communities. Not yet. Are energy resilience assets being integrated with grid assets to
maximize local energy security? Not yet. They are not called on to feed electricity into the regional grid
when it is under stress. Two strategic opportunities are being missed. First, the opportunity to use local
resilience assets to back up the state’s electricity system during times when the combination of
California power plants and imports from other states falls short of meeting aggregated demand.
Second, the opportunity to isolate and continue to serve local areas cut off from the state’s electricity
system due to regional or localized blackouts.
Will the doubling of operational on-site energy resilient supply assets expected in the next five to ten
years materially improve energy resilience in California? Not to the extent it could. Nor at minimum
societal cost. Optimally effective asset use can only be achieved when there is more flexible local
electricity grid operation that enables aggregation of local decarbonization and resilience assets. The
cost of local energy resilience can either be high or modest, depending on whether low carbon on-site
energy supply and storage assets are used fully and effectively. Resilient decarbonization is maximized
when a portion of these assets rely on negative or zero carbon fuels.
Community microgrids enable aggregation and integrated operation of local resilient decarbonization
assets. They are not primary targets for utility investment and rate-base building. The urgent question
is whether other stakeholders - cities, counties and states - will overcome utility and regulatory
resistance and lead the way on an energy resilience path that serves all energy users, not just those who
have backup on-site.
Resilient decarbonization is an urgent local need requiring local initiative and leadership. It cannot be
completely outsourced, because the best pathway is unique to each city or county. Among currently
inactive stakeholders, local governments and utilities have crucial future roles to play if energy resilience
is to be achieved at the community level as well as the site level. Utilities have the technical and
economic resources to facilitate economic integration of energy resilience assets but as yet have no
obligation under state law to do so. Cities and counties have the most at stake economically and will
need to add energy management staff to engage promptly and effectively. State governments can
facilitate local leadership and engagement and reward energy utility engagement and investment.
Until currently inactive stakeholders step up, energy resilience will depend on individual energy user
choices. Many users currently have no choices, or ineffective ones.
4
Local Energy Resilience Assets and Integration
1. Introduction. Energy resilience is the ability to restore energy supplies quickly even when they are
severely disrupted. California now finds it necessary to shut parts of the state-wide electricity grid down
where and when high winds, power lines and dry vegetation threaten to cause wildfires.
wildfire experience and anticipating further and more severe wildfires, an energy resilience conversation
is beginning in California. Robust energy resilience minimizes costs and economic dislocation in the
wake of natural disasters. 1 It is made possible by on-site and community managed electricity sources
and control systems. The following sections will refer to them as “local energy resilience assets”.
Figure 1. Bulk, Local and On-site Energy Supply, Transport and Supply/Demand Balancing
Figure 1 shows three tiers of energy production, transport1 and operations. The left tier includes inter-
state energy sources, transport systems and operations responsibilities. The middle and right tiers
include local and on-site energy sources and nanogrids, gas and electric distribution systems and
microgrid operation and control responsibilities. While integration and inter-operability are inherent at
the bulk level, inattention to integration of local energy resilience assets results in vulnerability to local
disruption and economically sub-optimal energy resilience asset utilization. Deployment of operational
local energy resilience assets, already massive, is rapidly being supplemented by even more massive
, co-located batteries and electric vehicles. Because these additional available
assets already have a beneficial and quantifiable effect on local economies, their current under-
1 The costliest disasters to which California is prone, earthquakes, have occurred infrequently enough to be incidental to
routine energy policy and planning.
•Fossil Fuels
•Electricity
Bulk
Energy
•Rail
•
•
Inter-and
In-State
Transpo rt
•Renewable
Fuels
•Renewable
Electricity
Locally
Energy
•
Microgrids
Local
Transport
•Electricity &
Heat from
Solar, , &
Generators
Energy
on Site
•Wiring, Gas
Lines and
Nanogrids
Transpo rt
in
Buildings
•Regional
Transmission
Operator
and/
Regional
Supply -
Demand
Balancing
•Community
Choi ce Age ncy
or Microgrid
Operator
Local
Supply-
Demand
Balancing
•Energy
Management
System or
Microgrid
Controller
Site
Supply -
Demand
Balancing
5
utilization is a growing concern. Microgrids address the problem by providing a platform for integration
and inter-operability between local assets and regional energy grids and transport systems. The
microgrid platform both enhances the resilience of regional systems and unlocks on-site resilience asset
benefits to neighborhoods and communities.
Over-reliance on bulk electricity supply systems is also
and to cyber and physical attack make regional electric systems a double edged sword. Their relative
reliability and operational flexibility provide a fundamental level of adaptability under normal
circumstances. But when flows of fuels and bulk electricity are disrupted, local energy resilience assets
sustain economic activity, critical services and life support.
Building and transport electrification is an important pathway to energy sector decarbonization but not
necessarily to greater energy resilience. Nevertheless, a suite of synergistic pathways, including but not
limited to electrification, can lead to “resilient decarbonization”. The suite includes integration of local
zero or negative carbon resources to accelerate decarbonization and community-wide energy
resilience.2
Resilient decarbonization is enabled by a number of technologies just now gaining traction in energy
markets. Under-investment in their timely deployment and integration with existing infrastructure is
the primary barrier to resilient decarbonization. See Appendix A for additional detail on resilient
decarbonization enablers and barriers.
2. California’s Energy Resilience Assets. On-site assets that produce or store energy cost-effectively
offer the additional benefit of operating
independently of local grids in an
emergency. Unlike sources on which
routine service depended in the past,
energy resilience assets typically operate
independent of energy transport systems
and provide backup power to electricity
customers who own them. On what local
supply assets does energy resilience
depend? How do they work to deliver
resilience? In what amounts have they
been deployed and what is their current
rate of deployment? How can new asset
types be added and integrated in the mix?
Deployment status and trends for major
energy resilience asset categories are
2 A 2020 white paper (Ref. 1.a) identified synergistic pathways to greater use of locally produced renewable
electricity and gas.
Table 1. California's Energy Resilience
Assets
Resilience
Asset
2020
Capacity
(est.)
(GW)
Annual
Market
Growth
(%)
Projected
Capacity
in 2025
(GW)
Currently Operational Assets
Combined Heat
and Power
8.6
5
11.0
Standby Power
10.4
4
12.6
Additional Assets Available for Use
Solar PV
9.3
14.5
19.5
Electric Vehicles
41.4
22
108
Enabling Assets
Campus
Microgrids
0.2
19
0.5
Community
Microgrids
No est.
No est.
0.5
6
summarized in Table 1. Local energy resilience assets deliver energy security by backing up electricity
and gas transport systems. They serve selected on-site energy uses when regional or local energy
transport systems are disabled. They include publicly and privately owned systems that convert fuels,
waste materials or renewable energy to electricity for local use. With the exception of standby power
assets using diesel fuels3, almost all energy resilience assets are also decarbonization assets.
The asset categories summarized in Table 1 are detailed in later sections. They encompass a diverse
menu of modular fuel and renewable energy conversion technologies - combustion engines and
turbines, on-site and community arrays, batteries, fuel cells and more. Their reliance on secure local
fuel and renewable energy sources enables to automatically fill in when bulk electricity transport
systems are temporarily disabled. Their energy resilience benefits are typically captured by transferring
building circuit connections from the local electricity grid to on-site generation or energy storage when
there is a grid outage.
Unlike the sources on which routine grid electricity service depends, currently operational local energy
resilience assets typically are not directly connected to energy transport systems. Most are owned and
operated independent of electric utilities. Most are permanently installed but some are portable or
mobile. They provide backup power to one of eight California electricity customers. Thanks to non-
utility investments over decades, California’s currently operational on-site energy resilience asset
capacities add up to 20GW. Their cumulative capacities are still growing at modest annual rates. For a
sense of relative scale, total in-state grid electricity supply capacity, 80GW, is only four times greater.4 5
Additional available on-site energy resilience assets are being deployed at much faster rates
and standby generators. They include on-
arrays. Battery storage must be available on- sustained 24/7 energy
resilience. On-site solar arrays can charge vehicle batteries that both power the vehicle and feed
electricity into the local distribution grid. Solar plus storage systems relying on stationary or vehicle
batteries can increase the current operational on-site asset total by a factor of two over the next
decade. This fact should invite policy attention to the opportunity for more effective use of all resilience
assets, currently operational and yet-to-be exploited.
3 Standby generators rely on diesel fuel storage that enables up to three days of operation following a loss of grid
service. They have long been an antidote to local outages that might otherwise be costly for their owners. Diesel
generators designed to use natural gas have long been commercially available and can provide backup indefinitely
until grid service is restored. For health, safety and GHG emissions reasons, where extreme weather events may
result in outages that last weeks, not days, the state has an interest in fueling new and replacement standby
generators with gaseous fuels already available on-site.
4 Almost three-tenths of California’s electricity comes from outside the state, enhancing on both California’s
vulnerabilities and buffering against disruption of in state sources. Source: US Energy Information Administration.
5 Unlike the sources on which routine grid electricity service depends, local energy resilience assets typically
operate independent of energy transport systems and provide backup power to only a small fraction of electricity
customers.
7
Microgrids can bring operational energy resilience assets into play when needed to back up
neighborhood, community and campus grids. Currently deployed microgrids play a relatively small
energy resilience role because of rules that prevent electricity from flowing from one electricity user to
another. This limits microgrid applicability to university and industrial campuses where electricity
metering is at the campus boundary and the campus owner distributes electricity to campus energy
uses.
Microgrids can also be deployed to economically serve new neighborhoods and communities and can
enable on-site generation and storage and community renewables projects to be cost and operationally
effective community energy resilience assets.6 However, their applicability to existing neighborhoods
and communities will depend on adaptation of existing utility owned distribution infrastructure and
compensation of utility owners for its conversion and use to collect and distribute locally generated
electricity.
The relatively small current microgrid capacity identified in Table 1 can grow much more rapidly than
current projections when/if California makes such adaptation possible. Until then, additional energy
resilience “enabling assets” will be limited to campus microgrids, microgrids serving new neighborhoods
-site solar arrays and electric vehicle batteries.
Local energy resilience in California is currently financed by individual energy users.
There is and will be no shortage of available
energy resilience assets. Many energy users
already invest in energy resilience. But can local
assets deliver energy resilience benefits to
communities as well as to asset owners? They
can. What will it take? First, new non-
monopolistic models for local energy service.
Second, local government engagement with
energy service providers to make full use of
available local energy resilience assets.
2.1 Combined Heat and Power (CHP). California
and US policy targeted combined heat and power
because it results in more efficient fuel use and
lower emissions than non-integrated production
of power and heat. The US relies heavily on
combined heat and p
6 On-site solar plus storage configurations can also be operationally effective when connected to local electricity
distribution grids operated by municipal utilities, but only if local decentralized production suffices to meet local
demand.
8
commercial facilities accounting for 7% of U.S. electric generating capacity and 13% of electricity supply
is located in industrial areas, with
natural gas fueling 72% of the total and biomass, biogas and municipal and process waste fueling 15%.7
As shown in the US Department of Energy’s breakdown of recent applications (sidebar – previous page),
top applications have been multifamily buildings in high population density areas where demand
exceeds what on-site solar sources can supply.
– hospitals, wastewater treatment, schools and nursing
-enabled public safety and recovery operations during
Hurricane Sandy and other recent large-scale power outages were documented.
Texas and Louisiana require that all state and local government entities identify which government-
owned buildings are critical in an emergency. They also require
conducted prior to constructing or extensively renovating a critical government facility. New York
Many industrial and commercial energy users rely on combined heat and power systems to save energy
costs. They reap a collateral energy resilience benefit when electricity service is disrupted and gas
service is not. Efficiency benefits depend on significant consumption of low grade heat, preferably all or
most of the 24 hour day, as required by many industrial processes.
combined cooling, heating and power) systems deployment has long been supported by
California policy because California electricity use is driven by cooling as well as heating, and even
greater fuel efficiency can be attained by producing both hot and cold water for distribution on
industrial and university campuses.
Residential energy use typically results in low
on-site equipment utilization factors, especially
in temperate zones, resulting in less attractive
economics in the absence of significant
incentives. Table 2 shows that deployment of
“micro- is still dwarfed by
deployment of larger systems. However,
micro-
accelerate as small fuel cell electricity
generators converting renewable hydrogen are mass produced for vehicular power and migrate into
stationary power applications.
community microgrids, as it provides reliable capacity that complements the seasonally variable
7
8 Industrial and commercial installations as of 12/31/2016: Reference 2.c. Reference 2.a.
8
Resilience
Asset
Est. 2020
Capacity
(GW)
Market
Growth
(%/yr.)
Est. 2025
Capacity
(GW)
CHP
8.6
5
11
Industrial
4.1
3
5
Commercial
Other
4.5
5
5
0.3
20
1
9
capacities of solar plus storage. In this
able fuels,
allowing such microgrids to have a net zero
carbon environmental profile.
Some level of mutual reliance and coordination
among nanogrids, microgrids and local electricity
distribution systems will likely result in the
overall lowest cost of service and overall
maximum reliability and resilience. However,
compartmentalized thinking about energy
resilience and decarbonization poses a major
barrier to technical and economic integration
that maximizes community and energy user
benefits and equitable sharing of benefits and
costs.
2.2 Standby Power. The most diverse and
pervasive energy resilience resources are back-
up generators (BUGs) engine based “gen-sets”
and micro-turbine generators. Converting diesel
fuel stored on-site or natural gas from local gas
distribution systems, they allow critical industrial
and commercial electricity uses to be restored
9 Existing California asset capacity is inferred from data in CARB analysis in Ref. 4.b. Analysis of > 50kW BUG standby power
capacity in Ref. 4.a results in a higher proportion of >25kW capacity and a lower proportion of <25kW capacity, but the total
current capacity is consistent with both analyses. Growth rate source for North America: Global Market Insights.
10 Regarding <25kW, one of 8 houses in CA has an average 3.5 hp generator. 13.16 million households in CA in 2019
Table 3
Assets
910
Resilience
Asset
Est.
2020
Capacity
(GW)
Market
Growth
(%/yr.)
Est.
2025
Capacity
(GW)
Standby
Power
10.4
4
13
>25 hp
Rental
3.7
>4
4
>25 hp
other
2.4
>4
3
<25 hp
4.3
4
5
Across five of 35 California air quality
districts, roughly 25,000 back-up and emergency
generators in the size range above 50kW are
permitted, most to run less than 500 hours per
year with nearly reliant on diesel fuel stored on-
site. Comparable numbers of standby generators in
the 10 to 50 kW range serve residential and small
commercial emergency and back-up needs.
(Source: reference 4.a) According to the California
Air Resources Board “of particular concern are the
health effects related to emissions from diesel
back-
has been identified as a toxic air contaminant,
composed of carbon particles and numerous
organic compounds, including over forty known
cancer-causing organic substances. The majority of
lungs and make them more susceptible to
injury.” (Source: reference 4.c)
Their (hard to monitor and quantify)
pollutant and GHG emissions are a concern as
noted on and discussed in reference 4.b.
10
quickly. Capacities span a three order of magnitude range. Table 3
shows that capacity growth is expected to continue.
Diesel fuel is used in 95 percent of large BUGs (unit sizes greater
than 50kW) in the air districts highlighted in the sidebar on the
previous page. Each BUG technology/fuel option has significant
advantages and limitations. Generally, gas fuel (natural gas and
propane) is preferred in the lower size ranges where it avoids the
complication diesel fuel storage and where grid-connected
generators provide additional services as well as back-up and so
have higher reliability and lower net costs due to more frequent
operation. Natural gas generators pose a risk of a loss of gas
pressure, while diesel fueled generators pose a risk of running out
of fuel in situations where resupply is not possible. Fuel-related
risks are highest for widespread, long outages, especially in areas
prone to natural disasters. Anecdotally, based on cases where data
is available, natural gas provides additional reliability compared to
diesel for regions that face high risks of long outages.11
2.3 Solar PV. California electric utilities allow on-site solar
electricity to spill over into their local grids when production
exceeds usage. Net usage and net production are metered.
local grid at the same price they pay for electricity they get from
the grid. They are currently not allowed to size their solar arrays to
produce more electricity annually than they got from the grid in the
past.12
More than 7% percent of California’s electricity usage is supplied by
more than a million net metered solar arrays. Their cumulative
11 Cf. Ref. 4d.
12 This impedes rapid energy resilience progress. Local electricity systems must enable net positive on-site solar
electricity from existing arrays to be distributed to energy users lacking on-site solar supply.
13 Residential and non-residential installations as of 12/31/2020 and 1/31/2021 respectively. Source: Ref. 3.a
Table 4. California's On-site Solar Resilience Assets13
Resilience
Asset
Est. 2020
Capacity
(GW)
Market
Growth
(%/yr.)
Est. 2025
Capacity
(GW)
Solar PV
9.3
14.5
19
Residential
6.1
17
13
Non-res.
3.2
14
6
considering utility proposals to
make on-site solar much less
economically attractive to property
owners. This makes it very hard to
predict whether and to what extent
on-site solar installations will
continue to be part of growing base
of energy resilience assets,
disciplined by competition and
commitment. Also, whether a retail
solar industry will remain that has
strength and capacity to respond to
property owner interest in battery
storage. Currently, because of
energy resilience concerns, interest
in battery storage is growing. But
its capital costs are greater than
those of standby generators.
Rather than limit on-site
solar deployment, regulators can
recognize, enable and reward the
benefits of on-site solar plus storage
integration for local grid operation
and resilience. Solar plus storage
integration will be throttled if solar
deployment is throttled. Solar plus
storage systems have potential
benefits for local grid operation that
must be shared with their owners
before rapid adoption can be
expected. Until then, deployment
of solar plus storage systems that
provide backup in an emergency
will be limited.
11
production capacity has been increasing at more
than 16 percent per year. Installed system costs,
that plummeted in the past ten years, are leveling off
and have become more predictable.
Table 4 quantifies the result of tens of billions of
dollars in California home and business owner solar
investments and the expected doubling of on-site
electricity production capacity over the next five
years. On-
percent of the solar electricity generated in California
and about 7 percent of all electricity consumed,
though the latter percentage can be as high as 15 or
20 percent in specific cities and counties. At current
market growth rates, cumulative capacity will exceed
that of any other available on-site non-vehicular
energy resilience asset.
Residential and small commercial energy users have
been deploying on-site solar arrays in recent years
but use of arrays to back-up local grids is at best
limited to daytime hours if the arrays are not coupled
on-site battery storage and cannot continuously
match on-site demand.14 Energy resilience concerns
and time-of-use utility rates could result in significant
on-site storage deployment by 2025. The
electricity generation has potential to allow
microgrids to provide resilient electricity service at
electricity prices below rates those offered by
electric utilities.
2.4 Electric Vehicles. Unlike battery electric vehicles
, do not require an on-site electricity
source to be effective resilience assets. In the longer
term, their energy resilience asset value can be
exceptional, because they rely on hydrogen, a fuel
that can be produced, stored and distributed locally
14 Modern grid-tied solar inverters are capable of supplying on-site usage during a grid outage, but the property
owner must know this feature exists and install transfer switches that allow it to be used when daytime backup is
needed. The number of solar homeowners that have taken this extra step is probably quite small.
California’s battery electric vehicle market is
expanding in response to state policies and
incentives. Nissan is ready to launch vehicle
respond to local grid demand and/or shift on-site
solar usage to high demand periods. Tesla will
continue to market stationary battery systems as
storage would not be sufficiently convenient for
effective demand response or grid backup
lesser use depending on time of use rate
differences. TOU rate differentials typically
suffice to influence customer behavior but not to
stimulate customer investment. Even so, a
combination of energy resilience concerns and
greater usage shifting benefits may lead to
vehicle purchaser interest in m
functionality.
National Fuel Cell Electric Vehicle Deployment Goals
Fuel cell electric vehicles are conceptually
higher power ratings and greater on board
energy storage capacity. Sales will expand fastest
in smaller markets, such as long haul transport,
that do not require extensive fueling station
coverage. Toyota plans to adapt the on board
fuel cell power system for the Toyota Mirai to
stationary power applications, creating a faster
ramp to high volume production. Green
hydrogen supply and distribution is a gating issue
as
hoping thereby to secure larger shares of the
expect to emerge
12
and converted to electricity in amounts that exceed on-site demand.
Table 5 quantifies the result of tens of billions of
dollars in California vehicle owner investments and
the expected rapid increase of vehicle based
electricity production and storage capacity
expected the next five years.
vehicle owners’ property is a current norm that
creates an opportunity to power a home 24/7 in the
wake of a short term (day or two) grid outage.
Once use in on-site demand management and
load shifting is demonstrated, can
add to the resilience benefits of on-site solar and
on-site solar plus storage systems. However,
complete, continuous back-up over an extended
period in the wake of a disaster will be subject to seasonal and daily variations in solar electricity
production.
s and solar-microgrids will provide energy resilience
benefits to communities as well as individual energy users.
2.5 Community Microgrids. Table 6 provides a
rough estimate of California’s microgrid inventory
measured according to generation capacity.
Capacity is growing in spite of impediments to
community microgrid development discussed
below.
Community microgrids have been deployed in
parts of the world that lack regional or municipal
grids. Where grid interconnection is available but
service is prone to outages, microgrids can
provide a significant resilience benefit. Where the
grid interconnection is strong, for example where the microgrid interconnects with the higher voltage
systems, there is an opportunity for mutual back-up.17
15 Sources include Refs. 5.a and 5.b.
16 Sources include Refs. 6.a and 6.b
17 There are cases where the grid backs up the microgrid and vice versa. Smaller solar powered microgrids typically
interconnect with less reliable, lower voltage “distribution” grid circuits and may have a greater reliability and resilience
contribution.
voltage “transmission” grid circuits and may receive as well as provide back-up. In both cases California experience is limited
and data may not be available for analysis.
Assets
15
Resilience
Asset
Est. 2020
Capacity
(GW)
Market
Growth
(%/yr.)
Est. 2025
Capacity
(GW)
EVs
41.4
22
108
30.0
23
84
11.0
15
22
0.4
35
2
buses &
trucks
0.01
35
0.05
Table 6. California's Microgrid Resilience Assets16
Resilience
Asset
Est. 2020
Capacity
(GW)
Market
Growth
(%/yr.)
Est. 2025
Capacity
(GW)
Microgrids
0.0
19
1
and Diesel
0.1
19
0.3
Solar,
Battery,
Other
0.1
19
0.3
13
Experience following hurricane Sandy
and more recent disasters indicates
that microgrids can not only carry load
until grid service is restored but can
help enable faster restoration of grid
operations. Historically, campus
microgrids deployed in California
campus microgrids may have limited
roof and parking areas to be fully
powered by combinations of solar and
battery storage. In cases where on-
site solar production is insufficient or
in some seasons, the buildings
microgrids serve can be backed up by
other decentralized power sources
(renewably fueled gen-sets and fuel
cells).
In addition to emergency use, fuel cell
and engine generators are being used
to optimize the overall cost of making
new microgrids fully resilient. The cost
of relying exclusively on solar plus long
term battery energy storage scales
with the number of hours of storage
capable of carrying all or a major part
of daily load during days and weeks
where solar electricity production is
minimal or significantly degraded.
Fuel cell and engine generators can be
included in a microgrid’s supply
portfolio to avoid investment in under-
utilized battery capacity. In cases
where their economically optimum
annual utilization factor of is more
than a few percent, arrangements
should be made to supply them with
renewable methane or renewable
hydrogen.
Image: Montgomery County Maryland Correctional Facility
Powered by a Campus Microgrid
During a power outage a microgrid can
disconnect from the surrounding grid and continue
normal operations autonomously. Larger campus
microgrids may have reliability comparable with that
of high voltage grids. They have had an economic
purpose enabled by highly efficient fuel conversion
and thermal energy production and storage. In cases
where microgrids also serve a resilience purpose,
achieving the purpose depends, as it does in the case
of larger grids, on a mix of generation sources, not a
single source. Like gas and electric grids, microgrids
serve as a resilience asset by enabling energy from
, and
standby generators to feed in and be distributed to
energy users.
California offers incentives and other
assistance for microgrid projects. So, companies that
offer microgrid design integration and controls,
including Schneider, Hitachi, Siemens, and EDF
Renewables are pursuing project opportunities.
Microgrid implementation requires authority to
distribute electricity to electricity users. Utilities have
this authority because they are chartered to deliver
electricity. Energy users can distribute electricity on
their own property but not beyond. Local
governments have the authority to own electricity
distribution assets. They can set up publicly owned
utilities or energy distribution cooperatives.
Microgrid implementation without the exercise of
above-mentioned authorities is virtually impossible.
14
Microgrids are assembled, not manufactured. So, there is no microgrid manufacturing industry able to
replicate the manufacturing scale economies that drive growth in markets for energy resilience supply
and storage assets. Rather, there are microgrid architects and system integrators who specify a mix of
supply and storage assets to fit each energy usage profile. The need for each microgrid to accommodate
a different suite of power source types and sizes and end use profiles may limit the benefits of
standardization and scale that drive system-level cost reductions important to rapid adoption.
2.6. Locally Produced Renewable Fuels. Gas transport systems are a de facto energy resilience asset
and must evolve to deliver primarily zero and negative carbon fuels. As an enabler of resilient
decarbonization, locally produced negative and zero carbon fuels will have an important role regarding
both decarbonization and energy resilience.
Gas transport utilities operate systems that are more flexible regarding throughput and in-line storage
capacities than electricity systems. Though their systems do not need real time communication with gas
users, gas utilities now face the challenge of delivering lower carbon and renewably produced gas, plus
the need to ensure its compatibility with transport infrastructure. At a minimum, more complete real
time monitoring of gas energy content and leakage will be required. Renewable methane can be
blended with fossil methane with no technical consequences, provided it is free of contaminants, but
percentages of renewable hydrogen in a blend with methane are limited by existing infrastructure that
can accommodate only limited percentages of hydrogen. At current levels of renewable hydrogen
production, blending is feasible, but once blended, hydrogen is costly to separate for use in fuel cells
that convert it to electricity.
Gas transport systems must be retrofitted to handle low carbon fuels, upgraded to respond to real time
changes in local supply and demand, and able to supply local demand when imported supplies are cut
off.
Gas utilities can spur biomethane and renewable hydrogen development by investing in local
infrastructure to connect gas users with local renewable sources. They can partner with local
governments and developers have a pivotal role in broader use of renewable natural gas for both
decarbonization and energy resilience. Leveraging California and Federal incentives, gas utilities are
starting to source renewable gases, especially biomethane produced from agricultural feedstocks in
other states. This step is welcome but does not address the opportunity to source renewable gases
from local in-state sources while also capturing local energy resilience benefits.
The gas utility role in sourcing renewable gases from in-state sources is affirmed and clarified in a recent
18 The report recommends approval of a mandatory biomethane procurement
program; state regulated gas transport utilities would be required to procure biomethane derived from
organic waste at levels sufficient to meet California’s statutory obligation to divert 75 percent of organic
waste away from California landfills by the end of 2025.
18 Cf Ref. 7.a
15
Incentives are available for transportation uses of renewable gas, but not for energy resilience uses.
This situation exemplifies trade-offs between decarbonization and energy resilience that California will
need to address.
2.7. Energy Transport Infrastructure. To minimize energy service rate increases, local energy transport
infrastructure will need to operate more flexibly and at higher, more economically efficient utilization
factors. Because electricity and gas usage varies more at the local level than at the regional level, local
infrastructure is currently much less efficiently utilized than bulk transport infrastructure, despite
demand response programs that attempt to influence energy user behavior to achieve better utilization.
More efficient electricity infrastructure utilization and more complete and inclusive energy resilience
will be enabled by real time exchange of information between grid operations and building energy
management systems. Capturing community resilience benefits of energy user investments energy
resilience supply and storage assets will require electricity grid owners to go beyond collecting and
accumulating and cataloguing energy usage information. Grid operators will need to know the status of
interconnected energy production and storage systems, whether the systems are permanently
interconnected at a fixed location or on a vehicle capable of interconnecting at multiple locations.
Ultimately, energy transport systems, building energy management systems and vehicle based power
sources must all communicate status and economic information with one another without routine
human intervention.19 Automated dispatch of on-site resources enabled by nanogrids and microgrids
may prove to be the most effective enablers of efficient utilization and energy resilience in the long
term.
Achieving improved energy resilience results and asset utilization in California will require increased
local engagement, including review and advice regarding local energy infrastructure investments and
operations. At this time, state administered economic reward systems for energy transport
infrastructure asset owners may be having a perverse effect of focusing attention on transmission assets
rather than local grids infrastructure.20 Where for-profit companies continue to own energy transport
infrastructure, performance based rate setting may provide the right framework to encourage local
energy collaboration.
3. Energy Resilience Stakeholders. Currently active energy resilience stakeholders include a small but
stakeholders include local governments, energy product and vehicle manufacturers and retailers, energy
utilities, state government, and notably, the majority of energy users that rely exclusively on energy
19 The “smart” electricity grid capabilities necessary to enable greater local energy resilience have been under active discussion
since the 1980s in California, along with changes in the electric utility business model would be necessary to implement them.
(Will utility business models change or will new service providers simply design their business models to fit an unchanging
utility business model, just as the trucking industry grew up around the railroad industry and the air travel and air freight
industries grew up around both while established business models remained immutable?)
20 California’s for-profit energy transport infrastructure owners, its regional energy utilities, are incented to increase the asset
base to which their profits are indexed. They enable but do not make decarbonization or local energy resilience investments.
Their strategic choices, between capacity margins and efficient utilization, tend to default to centralized capacity additions. A
small number of major capacity additions are easier to accommodate than large numbers of decentralized capacity additions. .
16
utility service. Without engagement by all stakeholders, electricity users will continue to solve energy
resilience problems on their own, often after the fact of a major outage. The result will be continued
uneven, uncoordinated and economically inefficient deployment of energy resilience assets.
Figure 2 outlines an energy resilience eco-system organized to implement integrated local action for
energy resilience. Such action is impossible without active engagement by all stakeholders - energy
users, equipment vendors and installers, cities and counties, energy utilities and state government. In a
healthy eco-system:
California energy users will continue to invest in resilient decarbonization by purchasing energy
resilience assets. They will do so in order to reduce their life cycle costs and carbon footprints while
increasing their energy security. Their role is crucial, because it will continue to account for the lion’s
share of investment in energy resilience and decarbonization assets - for example, on-site solar plus
storage systems, electric
vehicles, renewable gas
fueled backup power
systems, and combined
heat and power systems
that combine with
renewable sources to
power microgrids.
California energy
equipment vendors,
retailers and installers will
provide increasingly
integrative
decarbonization and
resilience services.
Technical and economic
integration will improve as
solar retailers and energy
appliance installers respond
to the need for technical
integration of a growing array of energy resilience assets.
California cities and counties will invest in and facilitate investment in decarbonization and energy
resilience, for example by sponsoring community renewable energy projects on behalf of renters and by
requiring new neighborhoods to be served by microgrids. They will also inventory local energy
resilience assets specific to their jurisdictions in order to identify opportunities and gaps.21 For
example, they will initiate purposeful engagement with electric utilities regarding municipal microgrids
21 This will require cities and counties to create local versions of Tables 2 through 6.
Figure 2. Local Energy Resilience Eco-system
17
and with gas utilities regarding 100 percent capture and conversion of locally generated organic waste
to renewable gas. To do so they must acquire in-house energy management and engineering expertise
necessary to move projects forward and make the services on which their community depends immune
to energy service disruptions. In the future this will require attention to energy resilience planning and
projects as well as their technical integration with waste and water management and other local
government responsibilities.
California energy utilities will rethink, rescope and expand relationships and collaboration with local
governments. For example, they will engage with cities and counties to rethink and rescope franchise
agreements to empower energy resilience. The emerging shared focus will be on community energy
projects that deliver a double benefit of increased energy resilience and greatly reduced local carbon
emissions.
While states cannot mandate local energy resilience investments, California state government22 will use
proven strategies to incent energy user action – multi-year rebate programs, for example, that buy
down the cost of early energy resilience projects. California state government will also: 1) encourage
direct technical engagement by energy utility staff in local decarbonization and resilience
program/project planning and implementation, 2) require that energy utilities create platforms for two
way communication between energy transport infrastructure and energy resilience assets, 3) establish
metrics for effective use of on-site or on-vehicle energy resilience assets, and 4) convene stakeholders to
share project experience and lessons learned.
See Appendix B for additional detail on energy resilience stakeholder roles and responsibilities.
4. Summary. Gas and electric energy systems have been designed to maximize affordability, reliability
and to minimize environmental impacts. Their vulnerabilities to disruption by natural disasters and
physical attack or cyber-attack raise concerns about both reliability and energy resilience. Reliability is a
measure of predictable, uninterrupted service. Resilience is the ability to recover quickly and
completely from a disruptive event. Reliability and resilience relate but are not synonymous.
Energy resilience currently depends primarily on on-site generators, including combined heat and power
systems and standby generators. On-site generators provide backup that may be limited or complete,
temporary or indefinite, depending on fuel supply and storage. Additional energy resilience assets
available for future use include on-site solar arrays, community renewable projects, on-site fuel cell
generators, vehicle based batteries and fuel cells, and microgrid controllers that enable combinations of
supply assets to operate in isolation from local electricity grids.
available additional assets into use can double California’s already massive inventory of energy
resilience assets in the next five to ten years. More importantly, it can extend the benefits of energy
22
d
to determine how to “prepare the electric grid for a high number of “distributed energy resources” gets underway.
See Ref. 8.a
18
resilience to communities as well as individual energy users. But all of California’s energy resilience
stakeholders must work together to meet the challenge. Each has a critical role to play. City and county
governments must come off the sidelines, and state government must remove roadblocks that prevent
local governments from providing leadership and taking action.
5. Conclusions. Local energy resilience assets, other than diesel fueled backup generators, are also
decarbonization assets, which suggests “resilient decarbonization” as a unifying theme of state and local
policy. Energy sector decarbonization has the potential to degrade energy resilience if it relies too
heavily on expansion of centralized electricity supply and transport infrastructure to achieve increased
electrification of energy use. Resilient decarbonization implies trade-offs that coordinate and cross-
leverage decarbonization and resilience investments.
California’s investment in on-site and community renewable and zero emissions vehicle assets is already
comparable in dollar magnitude to California’s investment in bulk electricity generation and is expected
to double in the next five years.23 But energy resilience benefits are currently limited to energy users
owning or leasing assets that are connected to on-site circuits. This is especially sub-optimal from
energy equity24 and community energy resilience perspectives.
At present, on-site resilience assets typically are not used to back up neighborhoods and communities.
Achieving such coordination would strengthen both state and local economies. Effective coordination
would require more active and purposeful attention by energy service providers and energy retailers.
Resilient decarbonization is an urgent local need requiring local initiative and leadership. It cannot be
outsourced, because the best pathway is unique to each city or county. Among currently inactive
stakeholders, local governments and utilities have crucial future roles if energy resilience is to be
achieved at the community level as well as the site level. Cities and counties have the most at stake
economically and will need to develop energy management skills and programs if they are to engage
promptly and effectively. Utilities have technical capacity to facilitate economic integration of energy
resilience assets but as yet have no obligation under state law to do so.
State government has the ability to facilitate local leadership and engagement and to reward energy
utility engagement and investment. Until currently inactive stakeholders step up, energy resilience will
depend on individual energy user choices, and many users will continue to have no choices or ineffective
ones.
23 The supplemental capacity in California to supply electricity in the wake of a disaster or attack that disables all or
part of the state-wide electricity grid is approximately 70 GW - close to the 80 GW combined capacity of in-state
utility scale power generation resources – and is likely to double in the next ten years.
24 Energy equity refers affordable and low income and minority communities’ access to clean and resilient energy
service.
19
References.
1. Energy Resilience
a. IRESN, Local Gas Fuel Decarbonization and Resilience
b. BCSE, Energy Resilience Case Studies
c. ANL, Building a Resilient Energy Future
d. CEC, State Energy Resilience Framework
e. SCG, Energy System Resilience
2.
a. CEC, in California
b. NIST,
c. CEC,
d. WRI, Renewable Natural Gas
e. Entropy Research,
3.
a. California Distributed Generation Statistics
b. IRESN, Solar Cost, Benefit and Capacity Shifts
c. CEG, Overcoming Barriers to Solar and Storage in Affordable Housing
d. Utility Dive,
e. NREL, Microgrid-- Resiliency
4. Standby Generators
a. MC3, California’s Fossil Fueled Backup Generators
b. CARB, Additional Generator Usage Associated with
c. NREL, Fuel Choice for Backup Generators
d. Million Acres, Do You Need a Standby Generator?
5.
a. GCC, California
b. FCW,
c. Deloitte, Fueling the Future of Mobility
d. Applied Energy, ogies
e.
f. ResearchGate,
6. Microgrids
a. Hitachi, Microgrid Market in the USA
b. GMI, North American Microgrid Market
c. Microgrid Knowledge, Fuel Cell Microgrid for Billion Dollar Data Center
d. ICN,
e. BioCycle, Biogas and Microgrids in California
f. Schneider, Case Study – Innovative Technology to Weather the Storm
7. Electricity and Gas Transport Infrastructure
a. SB 1440 Implementation
b. C, OIR to Modernize the Electric Grid
20
Appendix A. Resilient Decarbonization Enablers and Barriers
Enablers:
1. Integration of Zero Carbon Vehicles with Local Energy Transport Systems. California energy users
have funded a massive investment in energy transport systems. These systems were not intended to
transport electricity and fuels for use in vehicles. Yet they can and must be used and adapted to this
new purpose. The challenges are daunting in each case. Operation of electric systems and gaseous fuel
distribution systems has relied on the predictability of stationary energy uses. Electric systems must
now be adapted to not only deliver energy to “moving targets” but to accept energy from them. Gas
transport systems must now be adapted to not only deliver an evolving blends of lower and lower
carbon fuels but to source fuels locally rather than rely on interstate pipelines. These transformations
require a much higher level of technical and managerial attention than before.
2. Storage Coupled On-site Solar. On-site solar heating installations are inherently resilient because
solar water heating panels are coupled with water tanks that provide for heat storage. Likewise, solar
computer and vehicle batteries, battery manufacturing costs are trending downward. Some solar
retailers are starting to gain experience providing proper battery installation and service. This trend
responds to the emerging need in California to shift on-site solar electricity consumption to peak
electricity usage periods. Utilities and state regulators can respond to the need by compensating energy
users for energy resilience benefits they help provide as well as cost savings made possible by shifting
usage to lower-demand periods.
3. Heat Pumps and Building Energy Retrofits. The accelerating impetus in California for
decarbonization will have a knock-on effect strengthening energy resilience. Solar arrays and electric
vehicles are decarbonization and energy resilience enablers. Electrification is one of several pathways to
building and transportation decarbonization, though not necessarily to improved energy resilience,
should California come to rely even more on large power plants and high voltage transmission. Where
local electrification initiatives focus on substitution of renewable energy for non-renewable energy (for
example, solar electrification of buildings), they may have the added benefit of opening a pathway to
improved energy resilience.
4. Micro CHP. While storage-coupled solar arrays can deliver a resilience benefit when deployed on
homes and low rise buildings in suburban and rural areas, demand in high density urban areas can
greatly exceed their potential ability to meet cumulative local demand. Recognition of micro-
reliability and resilience benefits combined with its life-cycle economic energy efficiency benefits can
lead to an expansion of micro-
fuel is available and affordable.
5. Biomethane and Renewable Hydrogen. As described in the sidebar the University of California is
moving aggressively to substitute renewable natural gas (biomethane) for “fossil” natural gas extracted
21
renewable natural gas is an alternative to organic
waste disposal practices that result in releases of
methane, a potent greenhouse gas, into the
atmosphere. What are the local energy
resilience benefits of renewable gas use? Gas
fuel is essential to the affordability and
effectiveness of neighborhood and community
microgrids, but new California projects that
result in increased natural gas use may be
misaligned with local climate action goals.
However, renewable gas can be produced as a
byproduct of essential local waste management
operations, greatly reducing local methane
standby power and microgrids a win for local
decarbonization as well as local energy
resilience.
6. Stationary Fuel Cells. Multiple fuel cell
technologies are in commercial use around the
world. In addition to fuel cell technology suitable
for vehicle propulsion, technologies for
stationary applications with modularity in the
250 kW and 2 MW size range and larger are in
use around the world. Their energy resilience
benefits are a byproduct of their ability to
produce power at costs lower than retail
electricity prices. Their commercial and
industrial use in California faces headwinds
because their cost-effectiveness depends on the
number of hours per year they produce
electricity. This conflicts with California’s goal to
minimize the number of hours per year it relies
on natural gas generation. Fuel cells best fit to
California’s power generation needs may be as
mainstays of campus microgrid supply portfolios
deployment. In these cases, the microgrid can provide a high degree of energy resilience.
The University of California system
includes 10 campuses, 5 medical centers, and
California based national labs. Its primary
GHG emissions sources are natural gas (63%)
and purchased electricity (29%). Its
decarbonization plan aims for carbon
neutrality by 2025. It is halfway to its goal of
substituting cap and trade eligible renewable
natural gas for natural gas from geologic
formations.
UC’s plan aligns with California policy
to emphasize substitution. For example,
California has phased out self-generation
100% renewable fuel, while supplementing
incentives for projects that rely on biofuels.
California has many energy programs and
policies and no doubt is considering how to
balance state interests in decarbonization
with local interest in energy resilience and its
benefits to local economies.
22
Barriers:
1. Under-investment in Integrated Local Electric Systems. Electric transportation and solar/battery
markets are likely to be transformed by high volume product sales and resultant industry scale up. But
without strategic utility investment in smarter local grids and public investment in setting up microgrids,
the majority of available resilient energy supply assets will remain just building and transportation
decarbonization enablers.
Barriers to economically efficient local energy resilience and decarbonization can be lowered in multiple
ways. First, emerging resilience options – - can be sized and integrated to
provide full on-site energy resilience rather than resilience that is impaired or jeopardized by seasonal
variations and cloudy weather. Second, the economic use of both current and emerging resilience
assets can be enabled by their connection to independently operated neighborhood community
microgrids. These neighborhood and community microgrids may share infrastructure with utility
distribution systems and/or may serve to back them up. Decentralized operation as integrated energy
sources allows them to deliver economic, decarbonization and resilience benefits denied under rules
that only maximize electric utility revenues.
2. Under-investment in Local Carbon Negative Fuel Production and Distribution. Use of locally
produced renewable methane and hydrogen25 has potential to reduce GHG emissions from solid and
liquid waste management, which comprise 2 percent of California’s GHG inventory, as well as GHG
emissions from livestock manure management, which comprise about 3 percent.26 Locally produced
renewable fuels are a natural complement to most or all categories of on-site power assets, enhancing
their resilience benefits, and in the case of solar assets, eliminating the need for long term battery
storage. Renewable fuels can be converted to low or zero carbon electricity or motive power and to
back up electricity that powers buildings and microgrids.
25 Renewable methane, aka renewable natural gas, is produced from organic wastes in in numerous small scale
systems throughout California. Renewable hydrogen is not yet produced in comparable amounts.
26 It also has potential to reduce the amounts of geological natural gas (NG) being produced outside of California
and the related methane leakage and water consumption impacts of NG production via fracking and long distance
NG transport. Though difficult to quantify and not currently included in California GHG inventories, these indirect
decarbonization and environmental benefits are comparable in magnitude to those deriving from avoidance of
waste management related emissions.
23
Appendix B. Energy Resilience Stakeholder Responsibilities.
Enabling cost saving and improved technical and operational integration will require active, mutually
supportive engagement by five California stakeholder groups: 1) energy users, 2) energy equipment
vendors and retailers, 3) cities and counties, 4) energy service providers27, and 5) legislators, regulators
and government agencies.
Most energy users learn from experience and are eager to avoid the inconvenience of extended power
outages. They are eager to share their experience with one another, which results in better investment
decisions generally and better informed transactions with equipment vendors and retailers and energy
service providers.
Their opportunities in energy resilience assets depend critically on the experience and capacity of local
energy equipment vendors and retailers. Teamwork among local companies can result in better
integrated energy resilience and decarbonization assets. For example, retrofit packaged that combine
on-site solar and heat pump enabled space and water heating can be offered by solar retailers teamed
The combination of an unlucky event and lack of preparation can literally wipe a community off the map
or leave it crippled and struggling. Cities and counties face an existential energy resilience concern.
They make energy resilience investments and are primary beneficiaries of energy resilience investments
by energy users and energy service providers.
Both gas and electric utilities have much to contribute to increased local energy resilience. They have
learned that disasters for which they share responsibility can seriously inconvenience their customers,
employees and even their shareholders and bondholders. They pay little attention to on-site energy
resilience but must begin to pay a great deal of attention to energy resilience enabled by community
energy supply resources, nanogrids and microgrids.
Finally, state governments in the US exercise a constitutional right to set energy policy and are
accountable to voters to regulate in-state energy services in the public interest. As local California
governments work to make their communities energy resilient, state policies must be adjusted to
remove roadblocks.
Little will happen to significantly improve local energy resilience unless all of the above-mentioned five
sets of stakeholders do their part and reach out to one another. What is the best thing each stakeholder
can do to bring about greater and more pervasive energy resilience?
1.1 California energy users: Invest in resilient decarbonization. California energy users are directly
reducing local carbon footprints while laying a crucial foundation for improved energy resilience.
27 Energy service providers include gas and electricity transport utilities, “direct access” electricity wholesalers and
Community Choice agencies.
24
Until now, most California energy users have out-sourced affordability, decarbonization, reliability, and
resilience to state agencies and state or locally regulated energy transport utilities. This made sense
when electric service reliability was high and extreme weather and natural disasters were rare. But
now, public safety power shut-offs have degraded electric service reliability, and energy users face the
need to backstop an electricity system that is increasingly less reliable and perhaps also less resilient.
They
systems or standby generators or solar plus battery systems. They can purchase battery and fuel cell
electric vehicles, charge and fuel them with renewable energy, and push for changes that allow vehicles
to supply electricity to building circuits when the local electricity grid is de-energized by disaster or
precaution. Their energy investments will be sub-optimally rewarding until rules are enacted that
maximize their cost-effectiveness.
4.2 California clean energy retailers: Provide decarbonization and resilience services.
A California homeowner or business can purchase an energy appliance or solar array and get it installed.
Retailers pass along available clean energy vendor warranties. Like energy utilities, their business
models are founded on industry experience gained when decarbonization and energy resilience were
not major consideration for most customers. The focus then was affordability and trouble-free long-
term operation.
Now decarbonization saves money.28 Electrification is a pathway to decarbonization. Full solar
electrification that achieves net zero carbon at the building level saves more money than substitution of
solar electricity for historical grid electricity use enabled by net metering rules. Solar plus storage
systems have potential benefits for local grid operation that would need to be shared with system
owners before rapid adoption can be expected. On-site solar plus storage systems must be “microgrid-
ready” - designed and installed in ways that allow integration with neighborhood and community
microgrids, when they are deployed, without major additional owner expense. Until then, deployment
of solar plus storage systems that provide backup in an emergency will be limited.
These are issues that installers are typically not prepared to address. But decarbonization and resilience
services that provide clean energy security at the least life cycle cost will be required. These are issues
that installers are typically not prepared to address. But decarbonization and resilience services that
provide clean energy security at the least life cycle cost will be required and rewarded. Until such
services are available, pathways to resilient, cost-efficient decarbonization will be too hard for most
energy users to navigate.
28 https://www.iresn.org/news/2021/6/17/solar-power-cost-benefit-and-deployment-capacity-shifts
25
4.3 Local governments: Implement
energy resilience projects. Lack of
community investment in
renewable projects continues to
undermine energy resilience,
making it all the more important
that individual energy users know
their options and make
economically self-interested
choices.
However, energy users that do not
own real estate have limited energy
resilience investment options.
Specifically, low-income and
minority communities and renters
are at risk of not having solar or
micro-grid options available. They
must rely on local governments to
invest in decarbonization and
energy resilience on their behalf, for
example by sponsoring community
renewable energy projects and
requiring new neighborhoods to be
served by microgrids. Local energy
sector decarbonization can
strengthen local economies and
generate revenues to provide
municipal services. Local energy
resilience improvements can
substantially cushion the economic
blow to a community in the wake of
a disaster or disruption of energy
supplies coming into the community
from afar.
adaptation plan, a hazard mitigation
plan or the public safety element of
a general plan is an opportunity for
a local government to consider taking direct local action. By focusing a major part of the local planning
effort on energy resilience, local projects can be targeted that have realistic prospects for
Technologies likely to have the greatest impact in
reducing a community’s carbon footprint are in most
cases technologies that can be adopted by residents,
businesses and public agencies. Therefore, timely local
action empowered by collaboration with energy service
providers will be crucial in the years ahead as California
cities and counties act to reduce GHG emissions and
improve energy resilience. On average, fifty percent of
local GHG inventory reduction is locally actionable.
Starting a decade ago many southern California cities
and counties prepared and adopted Climate Action and
building energy use and opportunities to import low
carbon electricity. Now cost-competitive renewable gas
and electricity can be produced and distributed locally,
helping insulate communities from risks of being cut off
from regional energy delivery networks. An IRESN white
paper identifies specific immediate opportunities to
decarbonize fuel production and usage for heating,
transportation or industrial and agricultural operations
are identified. Emerging opportunities that will be
actionable later or by the end of the decade are also
identified as are potential local GHG inventory
reductions that can result from taking local action are
identified.
LOCAL CAAP WHITE PAPER
26
implementation. Consultants that offer local climate planning assistance are knowledgeable regarding
processes for public participation in setting decarbonization goals. But they may have little or no
expertise related to energy resilience. So, local governments must engage with relevant industries and
public works engineering staff in the planning process.
Some local governments are starting to engage with electric utilities regarding municipal microgrids.
Others are starting to engage and with gas utilities regarding 100 percent capture and conversion of
locally generated organic waste to renewable gas. In both cases, projects the engagement process sets
in motion can deliver a double benefit of increased energy resilience and greatly reduced local carbon
emissions.
At a minimum, every climate related local planning and energy project development initiative should
draw on energy utility technical expertise. Energy utilities should commit engineering research
resources to advise local planning efforts, because the focus of such efforts should be on
transformation, not business as usual.
4.4 Energy utilities: Rethink, rescope and expand relationships and collaboration with local
governments. Utility franchise agreements compensate local jurisdictions for the right to maintain and
operate above-ground and underground infrastructure in public rights of way.29 A broader agreement
scope would give local governments and utilities context and leverage to move energy resilience project
implementation forward. For example, enabling decarbonization and increased energy resilience
requires locally produced energy to be more widely accessible when energy flows into a community are
cut off. It requires that electricity produced on energy user property be enabled to feed into local
microgrids when necessary to avoid loss of service to local areas. New local energy transport
infrastructure, microgrid controllers and automated distribution system operations software, that
enable access to locally produced energy could be a legitimate item on the negotiating table.
If the scope of negotiation and collaboration between local governments and energy utilities is to
expand, what capabilities and assets do the two sides bring to the table? On the electricity side, cities
and counties may control and be willing to lease brownfield sites suitable for solar project development,
while the utility is a potential “off-taker” for any energy the local government enables to be produced
locally. On the gas side, cities and counties may control organic waste streams suitable for conversion
to biomethane that can be cleaned up, fed into local gas distribution systems, and resold locally by the
gas transport utility.30
Negotiation and collaboration can focus on strategic energy resilience outcomes. For example:
29 Undergrounding of local transport infrastructure is perhaps more fundamental to energy resilience than any other
economically feasible measure. How well underground infrastructure is maintained also has reliability and resilience
implications.
30 Gas utilities can charge a premium for locally produced gas, just as electric utilities charge a premium price for one hundred
percent renewable electricity.
27
• Sharing costs of cleaner and more resilient back-up generation for schools and critical local
facilities.
• Sharing costs of enabling local organic waste streams to be collected and converted to
biomethane.31
• Sharing costs of equitable access to resilient on-site solar electricity for community members
unable to take advantage of net energy metering.
Achievement of such outcomes likely would start with utility leaders and elected officials kicking off and
negotiations and charging negotiators to work toward win-win outcomes.
4.5 States: Buy down the cost of early local energy resilience projects.
Capturing emerging energy resilience opportunities will be a slow process until energy utilities create
local grids that are inter-operable with microgrids and even smarter than those needed to take
advantage of on-site solar plus storage capacities. The need is for utilities to engage and do so in a way
that is collaborative, not monopolistic. States must reward utility collaboration with local governments
while opening pathways to non-utility investment.
California benefits when disaster recovery in any of its local jurisdictions is accomplished quickly thanks
to resilient local energy supply and services. California does not yet have quantitative energy resilience
goals, metrics and investment strategies. Its cities and counties have begun to identify critical energy
needs, but they lack experience and budgets.
California’s most successful energy incentive programs, including the California Solar Initiative, have
been designed to offer rebates that decline as experience is gained and costs come down. This design
rewards timely adoption decisions. Local government expenditures on energy resilience project
management and project engineering could also be eligible for rebates, as could costs of project
implementation. Rebate percentages could be adjusted according to whether on-site systems provide
partial, temporarily or complete and indefinite back-up.
The primary eligibility criterion should be energy resilience, the ability to provide safe and clean energy
service when energy networks cannot. The focus should be on shovel-ready projects and commercially
available equipment.32 For example, community and neighborhood microgrids capable of islanding
would qualify as energy resilient. So would fuel cell and battery electric vehicles equipped to serve as
emergency generators. 33
31 This requires creating a blend of renewable and non-renewable gas for local use, thus simultaneously reducing the local
carbon footprint and methane emissions released in fracking operations and long distance gas transport.
32 Timely energy resilience investments are crucial. In addressing climate risks, to be late is to be irrelevant. Rebates are
preferable to grants. Five years is a typical time period from California energy grant program initiation to completion of work
on the first round of grants.
33 Rebate eligibility criteria may exclude commercially available solutions already in wide-spread use, such as diesel fueled gen-
sets.