As Trump targets clean energy, will utilities embrace DERs and VPPs?

Amid stiff headwinds for utility-scale renewables and gas, electricity system experts say utilities, industrial companies and other heavy power consumers may find some relief in a cheaper, faster and increasingly scalable solution: distributed generation and flexible loads, known as distributed energy resources, or DERs, that can be batched into virtual power plants or multi-megawatt demand response programs and deployed faster than utility-scale assets.

“There is an awareness that, oftentimes, distributed solar and distributed storage can come online much more quickly than larger resources … and a recognition of the role [they] can play in providing energy and in some cases capacity resources,” said Sean Gallagher, senior vice president of policy for the Solar Energy Industries Association.

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