Charging Forward: Energy Storage in a Net Zero Commonwealth

Recognizing the key role energy storage must play in meeting our energy and climate goals and the ongoing challenges to its deployment and use, Section 80(a) of the 2022 Climate Act authorized DOER and the Massachusetts Clean Energy Center (MassCEC) to conduct a study (“the Study”) to provide:

1. An overview of the existing energy storage market in the Commonwealth;
2. A market report focused on emerging mid- and long-duration energy storage technologies (“MDES” and “LDES,” respectively), and;
3. A study concerning the potential benefits of MDES and LDES technologies to Massachusetts ratepayers as the Commonwealth seeks to achieve its goals under the 2050 Clean Energy and Climate Plan (“CECP”) .

Section 80(b) of the 2022 Climate Act directed DOER to submit a report and recommendations to the Clerks of the Senate and House of Representatives and to the Chairs of the Joint Committee on Telecommunications, Utilities, and Energy based on the results of the Study (“the Report”).

DOER’s recommendations intend to lower the barriers for energy storage deployment and use; improve the siting process; increase resiliency across the Commonwealth, particularly for environmental justice (EJ) and low- and moderate-income (LMI) communities; and spur the commercialization of MDES and LDES technologies, which will provide critical grid reliability in the coming decades as the Commonwealth meets its decarbonization goals.

Joint Committee on Telecommunications, Utilities, and Energy Filing Document

Charging Forward: Energy Storage in a Net Zero Commonwealth REPORT

Charging Forward: Energy Storage in a Net Zero Commonwealth STUDY

DOER invited public comment on its Report and recommendations through Wednesday, January 31, 2024. The comments received may be found below. 

Charging Forward Report Stakeholder Comments

• The deployment and use of energy storage systems is a critical and cost-effective strategy that the Commonwealth should encourage to meet its goals under the 2050 CECP.
• Increasing renewable generation is key to unlocking environmental, economic, and reliability value propositions for energy storage.
• Financial, siting, permitting, interconnection, operational, technological, and supply chain barriers must be overcome to allow for the deployment and use of energy storage systems to the level needed for the Commonwealth to meet its goals under the CECP.
• Energy storage can provide high resiliency value at the distribution circuit level and for end-use customers, particularly critical facilities. Determining the value of resiliency for an energy storage use case requires site-specific investigation.
• Energy storage can help maintain grid reliability as the Commonwealth decarbonizes out to 2050.
• While there are some commercially available MDES and LDES technologies, more technology options will be needed. A variety of MDES and LDES technologies are under development but require further de-risking in order to achieve commercial scale.
• Due to their complementary nature, energy storage systems when paired with renewables can exhibit diversity benefits, where the paired capacity value exceeds the sum of the individual capacity values.
• Long duration energy storage has the ability to supplant significant quantities of dispatchable, thermal capacity in futures with high renewable deployment.

One of the Report’s Key Findings is the deployment and use of energy storage systems is a critical and cost-effective strategy for the Commonwealth to encourage in meeting its goals under the 2050 CECP. To incentivize storage deployment, DOER proposes:

• Procurements or other mechanisms for incentivizing storage deployment;  
• Creating refined interim targets for energy storage deployment that connect the targets to renewable generation deployment; 
• Reviewing existing programs that incentivize storage, including the CPS; and 
• Continued stakeholder collaboration on other issues impacting energy storage deployment. 

During Fall 2022, the stakeholders informed the Study’s Request for Proposals (“RFP”) development via written comments and office hours.

To support the Study, DOER and MassCEC procured the services of Energy and Environmental Economics, or E3, through the RFP process. DOER, MassCEC, and E3 undertook a robust stakeholder process. This included two 90-minute public sessions and over 30 stakeholder interviews with over 50 different organizations.

The first public stakeholder session had over 90 stakeholders in attendance on Wednesday, June 7, 2023 and covered the Study purpose and timeline and provided initial findings while soliciting ongoing feedback. The second public stakeholder session had over 110 stakeholders on Wednesday, August 16, 2023, and provided detailed findings on (1) current energy storage business cases; (2) grid reliability modeling out to 2050; and (3) the potential role of MDES and LDES technologies to help meet grid reliability needs through 2050. Collectively through public sessions, interviews, and written comments, participating stakeholders represented diverse perspectives.

A list of participating stakeholders, recordings and presentations from the Summer 2023 stakeholder sessions, and copies of submitted comments may be found below.

Office Hour List: Please see on MassCEC’s website here under the heading “Engaging Stakeholders”

Fall 2022 Stakeholder Comments for RFP

Stakeholder Session 1 Recording

Stakeholder Session 1 Slides

Stakeholder Session 2 Recording

Stakeholder Session 2 Slides

Charging Forward Study Stakeholder Comments