Greentech Media covered the recent FERC order requiring wholesale markets to embrace DERs, noting AEE's approval. Read excerpts below and the entire Greentech Media piece here.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has passed a long-awaited order to open up the country’s wholesale energy markets to distributed energy resources (DERs) like rooftop solar, behind-the-meter batteries and electric vehicles. Now comes the hard part: creating market rules that allow these DERs to play in bulk energy markets while retaining the role of state regulators and utilities to maintain the soundness of their distribution grid operations and retail DER programs. 

Order 2222, passed by a 2-1 vote Thursday during FERC’s open meeting in Washington, D.C., is the culmination of years of work on how to allow DER aggregations to compete in the energy, capacity and ancillary services markets operated by the regional transmission organizations (RTOs) and independent system operators (ISOs) that manage the transmission grids carrying electricity to about two-thirds of the country.

The new order is an outgrowth of FERC Order 841, passed in 2018 to set similar rules for batteries and other energy storage systems to serve in wholesale markets. But with its much broader scope, Order 2222 could have an even more profound impact on the value of DERs in U.S. markets, as well as the operations of its wholesale markets.  

“DERs can hide in plain sight in our homes, businesses and communities, but their power is mighty,” FERC Chairman Neil Chatterjee said at Thursday’s meeting. Projections indicate that from 65 gigawatts to more than 380 gigawatts of DERs could be added to the country’s power grids over the next four years, he noted...

Clean energy groups including the Solar Energy Industries Association, Advanced Energy Economy and the American Council on Renewable Energy (ACORE) expressed support of FERC’s new order in Thursday statements. 

Read the entire Greentech Media piece here.