A 10-year horizon: 2005 - 2015.
Dan Rastler is the manager of EPRI’s Distributed Energy Resources Program.
What does the current landscape look like for distributed energy resources (DER)? What applications and business models are being pursued by leading companies, and where can we expect to find DER in the next 10 years-in 2015?
An EPRI white paper, Distributed Energy Resources: Current Landscape and a Roadmap for the Future, developed with input from industry stakeholders, provides a broad-based picture of the current state and potential future of DER. The project team conducted interviews with more than 15 utilities and systems developers. These interviews offer a diverse portrait of different approaches to DER and an up-to-date, "on-the-ground" look at energy company attitudes toward DER.
Overall, EPRI found a renewed interest in DER. Increasingly, evidence suggests DER could have significant impact on the future of the grid and its design, including better utility asset utilization and less expensive system upgrades to meet new peak demands. Opportunities also are being explored for DER to be applied in joint utility/end-user applications-to meet both customer end-use needs as well as utility grid support-and thereby to capture dual benefits.
However, much remains to be done to reduce the costs of technology, facilitate applications in concert with the needs of the grid, and remove policy barriers.
From the 1990s to Today