Grid Flexibility Case Studies

Can site-level flexibility really allow us to connect huge amounts of new datacenter demand to the grid? That question is at the heart of one of the biggest issues in energy, as we adapt our existing energy infrastructure to serve unprecedented load growth. Like many in the industry, we at Camus paid close attention to the Duke report which suggested that we could fit up to 100GW of new load into the existing US grid with a small amount of load flexibility. Our team delivers flexible interconnection solutions for our customers, and we’ve seen firsthand that a little curtailment can massively increase utilization of the grid’s resources. That kind of flexible “fast path” option is not available to large loads today, and up until now, most datacenter power solutions are “either/or”. Either they’re connecting to the grid which will serve 100% of their demand through the existing energy system (but waiting several years for new capacity and upgrades), or they're designing sites to be entirely self-sufficient by colocating with new or existing generation. As timelines increase for new grid connections, and available capacity (and turbines!) are spoken for, the existing options aren’t going to get datacenters connected fast enough. As the Camus team started working with datacenters, we needed to develop a real-world, data-driven blueprint for interconnecting datacenters with site-level flexibility. Whether it’s reducing load, adding onsite generation, or switching to batteries, there are a range of options which enable datacenters to reduce their usage of the grid during key times - depending on how often, how long, and how much curtailment is required. Given the real concerns about datacenters driving up system costs for everyone else, we also wanted to know - can adding site flexibility help manage the costs for new datacenters? With the support of our partners encoord (Carlo Brancucci), the Princeton ZERO Lab (Jesse Jenkins), and financial backing from Google, we were able to dig into these questions. We used real transmission system data to model six sites in PJM, to first understand whether site-level flexibility could speed up their path to power, and then to understand what kinds of flexibility options would best meet their power needs. The answer to whether flexibility can help is a resounding “yes.” Our results showed that a small amount of local flexibility could enable loads to connect 3-5 years sooner. Further, onsite power solutions, when paired with procured capacity from renewable, battery, or VPP resources, can enable sites to entirely offset the additional system costs of adding new loads. The result is a better grid - which can support a lot more load, keep energy and capacity prices stable, and in which new flexibility provides increased system reliability and resilience. Download our whitepaper here: https://bit.ly/4pE5MGM

Virtual Power Plants are making flexibility the new infrastructure. They’re proving the power grid can build less when it gets smarter about what it already has. Peaker plants take minutes to respond and sit idle most of the year. Virtual Power Plants act in seconds, drawing on devices already connected. It’s a faster, cleaner form of reliability—built from participation instead of combustion. Here’s who’s leading across every sector: 🏠 Residential Sunrun operates one of the largest Virtual Power Plants in the U.S., coordinating 75,000 home batteries through California’s CalReady program. Renew Home connects thermostats and appliances people already own—3 GW of flexible load today, 50 GW targeted by 2030. Tesla integrates Powerwalls directly into grid operations in California and Texas. GoodLeap links financed batteries through its GoodGrid program, paying households to participate and building toward 1.5 GW of capacity. 🏢 Commercial & Industrial Budderfly aggregates HVAC, refrigeration, and lighting across restaurants like Taco Bell and KFC into dispatchable capacity. Voltus manages 7 GW across factories, data centers, and large retailers. CPower Energy runs 6.7 GW across 23,000 sites—from hospitals to universities. Its acquisition by NRG Energy shows that distributed flexibility is now part of the utility model. 🌍 Global Octopus Energy’s Kraken UK platform orchestrates more than 2 GW of devices across Europe—from EV chargers to home batteries—creating the world’s largest residential Virtual Power Plant. In Puerto Rico, LUMA dispatched 70,000 home batteries in a single night this summer, delivering 48 MW and preventing blackouts. It showed how distributed energy can keep the grid stable when central systems falter. Virtual Power Plants make every new megawatt more valuable. 🌐 This week, the Supercool newsletter does a quick dive into the power grid’s new orchestration layer—a 21st-century makeover for 20th-century infrastructure. Link in header.

"In a study I led earlier this year, my colleagues and I found that if big new power users curbed demand just 0.25 percent of the time — about 22 hours a year — the United States could accommodate more data centers without burdening household electricity users. Another analysis found nearly the same thing: Cutting grid use during just 10 of the year’s busiest hours provided nearly the same benefit as building a new power plant. For data centers, this flexibility doesn’t have to be a burden — it can be the fastest path to connect to the grid. Some are beginning to use batteries and varied schedules to come online years faster than if they waited for utilities to upgrade the grid to accommodate them. Google has signed contracts in Indiana, Tennessee and Arkansas that commit its data centers to reducing grid demand when supplies run tight, while Iron Mountain Data Centers is deploying batteries in New Jersey that can temporarily power its facility independently from the grid. And in states like Texas, regulators are beginning to require large users to be the first to cut their power use during emergencies, helping spare households from outages." https://lnkd.in/dCEf6X3X

Google Embraces Flexible Loads, Demand Response in New Utility Deals In a meaningful step forward on grid flexibility, Google has signed deals with two utilities to adjust a data center’s electricity demand by shifting the timing and volume of AI workloads. “These capabilities, often referred to as demand response, have several advantages, especially as we continue to see electricity growth in the US and elsewhere,” said Michael Terrell, Head of Advanced Energy at Google. “It allows large electricity loads like data centers to be interconnected more quickly, helps reduce the need to build new transmission and power plants, and helps grid operators more effectively and efficiently manage power grids.” Google has signed new utility agreements with Indiana Michigan Power (I&M) and Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) as its first step on delivering data center demand response by managing machine learning (ML) workloads. Recent research suggests that up to 100 gigawatts of additional headroom could be created on US grids if data centers can be flexible, and limit their power demands for a few hours each year. A key tradeoff is that adopting flexible workloads could allow faster access to power for data centers, a key opportunity in a capacity-constrained landscape. Google says it sees “a significant opportunity” for demand response as AI boosts demand for AI infrastructure. “By including load flexibility in our overall energy plan, we can manage AI-driven growth even where power generation and transmission are constrained,” Terrell writes. Here’s the blog post: https://lnkd.in/eY2B994V