Non-Wires Alternatives

Problem

Historically, load growth was relatively predictable and steady. When load reached a certain threshold, if only for a few hours each year, a grid upgrade would be triggered.  Electric loads are expected to continue accelerated growth in the coming years as the heat and transport sectors are electrified. The use of customer DER assets with the availability of DERMS provides new opportunities to provide cost-effective alternatives to grid upgrades to address this growing load demand. The challenge for distribution utilities is to manage the DER NWA to provide an effective, secure and economic alternative to grid investments.

Utilities are more aware of the potential to utilize flexible assets such as BESS or EV to offer flexibility. DER operators are also interested in finding ways to stack revenue and one way is to deliver NWA assets for utility control.  

Solution

Our NWA solutions for utilities are based on our Strata Grid product which connects DER to grid operations to deliver highly localized and dependable load relief.  The core product features of real-time grid monitoring and control, wide-area multi-site DER management and tight integration to utility systems and processes deliver exactly what utilities require for effective NWA implementation and roll-out at scale.

When Strata Grid detects a violation of a grid constraint, it sends dispatch commands to the NWA to help relieve the issue in real-time. Real-time deployment of NWAs save utilities millions of dollars in avoided capital expenditure. Through the use of real-time control, third-party (or utility-owned) NWAs