AutoGrid has joined Rocky Mountain Institute’s Virtual Power Plant Partnership to accelerate the scale out of virtual power plants to improve grid reliability, cost-efficiency and sustainability.

Launched in January, the VP3 initiative aims to overcome barriers to VPP market growth by catalysing the industry and transforming policy. Virtual power plants are portfolios comprised of hundreds or thousands of households and businesses that offer the latent potential of their electric vehicles (EVs), smart thermostats, appliances, batteries, solar arrays, and utility-scale energy assets to support the grid.

AutoGrid is a VPP and Distributed Energy Resource Management Solution provider that works with over fifty companies in seventeen countries. With more than 7GW of flexible capacity and an annual average of 1,800 dispatch events, AutoGrid joins other industry champions including Ford, General Motors, and Google Nest in VP3 to advance this technology in accelerating the energy transition.

“VP3’s objectives are closely aligned with AutoGrid’s mission to leverage AI and technological innovation to combat the climate crisis,” said AutoGrid CEO Ruben Llanes. “As a company that has been at the forefront of VPP development, we are excited to collaborate with RMI and other industry leaders to establish a common set of standards and performance metrics for VPPs that will support customers around the world in adopting VPPs and in reaching their decarbonisation goals.”

“VPPs can unlock the full potential of DERs to bring clean energy onto the grid and provide key reliability services in a world of increasingly extreme climate events,” said Mark Dyson, Managing Director of RMI’s Carbon-Free Electricity Program. “VP3 looks forward to working together with AutoGrid and other industry leaders to scale the market for VPPs.”