Sunrun Illustrates Potential for Home Solar and Batteries as Wildfire Mitigation Solution
March 19 2019 - 2:20PM
Ahead of this week’s Wildfire Technology Innovation Summit in
Sacramento, Sunrun Inc. (Nasdaq: RUN), the nation’s leading home
solar, battery and energy services company, today issued a new
technical analysis describing the role that distributed energy
resources, such as home solar and batteries, can play in providing
reliable electricity and reducing the threat of wildfire in
California and other wildfire-prone areas. A copy of the new
report, Building A More Resilient Grid, can be found here.
“Today’s aging energy infrastructure is
ill-equipped to deal with the impacts and risks of a changing
climate. We need modern, bold solutions to transform the way that
our electricity system works - providing power where people live
and work. That means empowering people to develop local clean
energy, including home solar and batteries as we transition to 100%
clean energy for all,” said Anne Hoskins, Chief Policy
Officer at Sunrun.
Sunrun’s analysis illustrates the risks of
transmitting electricity over long stretches of power lines, and
the potential for distributed energy to mitigate these risks while
providing safe and reliable electricity.
Power lines can overheat when overloaded with
energy, which can cause the lines to sag closer to the ground and
to other objects like timber that can spark fires. Networked
distributed energy resources, like home solar and batteries, in
remote communities can reduce the amount of power on transmission
and distribution infrastructure and lower the risk of power lines
sagging and sparking wildfires.
Sunrun’s analysis considers a specific scenario
demonstrating how networked home solar and battery power in a
wildfire-prone community can reduce power line sag to safe levels.
At the same time, this type of community microgrid can provide
reliable electricity to remote communities, which are increasingly
at risk of de-energization events.
"We need to consider battery storage and solar
as part of a toolbox to provide customer resilience in the face of
the growing threat from wildfire. The catastrophic events of the
past two years are forcing us to rethink how the electricity grid
is built and operated. Clean, customer-sited energy storage and
generation may be a key enabler of change and hence greater safety
for California communities in at risk areas," said Michael
Wara, Director of the Climate and Energy Policy Program, Stanford
Woods Institute for the Environment.
To realize the energy vision established in
Building A More Resilient Grid, the company is further urging
California state policymakers to embrace three specific policies:
eliminating the cap for developers on state storage incentives to
allow for community-scale solutions to reduce wildfire risk,
raising storage incentives for lower income Californians in
wildfire prone areas, and passing the recently-introduced
California Solar Bill of Rights.
“Last year’s wildfires are a wake up call. We
all need to come together to deliver solutions that will make our
energy system safer for all. We can do this,” Hoskins
said.
About Sunrun
Sunrun (Nasdaq:RUN) is the nation’s largest
residential solar, battery storage and energy services company.
With a mission to create a planet run by the sun, Sunrun has led
the industry since 2007 with their solar-as-a-service model, which
provides clean energy to households with little to no upfront cost
and at a saving compared to traditional electricity. The company
designs, installs, finances, insures, monitors and maintains the
systems, while families receive predictable pricing for 20 years or
more. The company also offers a home solar battery service, Sunrun
Brightbox, that manages household solar energy, storage and utility
power. For more information, please visit: www.sunrun.com.
Media ContactShane Levy Media
Managerpress@sunrun.com+1 (201) 679-9507 Investor &
Analyst Contact:Patrick JobinVice President, Finance &
Investor Relationsinvestors@sunrun.com+1 (415) 510-4986
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