{"id":139138,"date":"2025-08-12T07:54:10","date_gmt":"2025-08-12T07:54:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/139138\/"},"modified":"2025-08-12T07:54:10","modified_gmt":"2025-08-12T07:54:10","slug":"nyc-utility-tests-portable-home-batteries-to-dull-acs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/139138\/","title":{"rendered":"NYC utility tests portable home batteries to dull AC\u2019s\u2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

The reason is to protect the heat-strained electric grid, which, when taxed to the point of failure, can lead to blackouts and brownouts.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Addy Spiller, an Upper West Sider and founder of a\u00a0product management business, said those messages from Con Ed drive her bananas.<\/p>\n

\u201cListen, I\u00a0don\u2019t know how to use less electricity,\u201d she said. \u200b\u201cI already have the AC at a\u00a0reasonable temperature. I\u00a0don\u2019t think I\u00a0can do enough to help Con Ed on my\u00a0own.\u201d<\/p>\n

But this summer, Spiller and her dog, Ranger, are among 65 households across the city actually doing more to help \u2014 and they don\u2019t have to stop blasting their ACs on sweltering days. That\u2019s because they\u2019re participating in an experiment that connects their air conditioning units to small batteries in their homes. The batteries, about the size of a\u00a0small microwave oven, plug into wall sockets.<\/p>\n

The pilot program, called Responsible Grid<\/a>, is run by the company Standard Potential in partnership with Con Ed. When demand for energy is high but the utility company needs customers to lay off, the company powers the participants\u2019 AC units with the battery instead of the electric grid.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a\u00a0class of large portable phone chargers almost, and instead of powering a\u00a0whole building, they power a\u00a0single device and take it off the grid,\u201d said Andrew Wang, Standard Potential\u2019s CEO. \u200b\u201cBecause we have the battery, it allows folks to participate in the program without having to adjust their comfort levels.\u201d<\/p>\n

If more New Yorkers were to connect electric appliances to batteries in their homes, this approach could make the city more resilient, add to the stability of the electric grid, and keep people cool. Responsible Grid is one of about a\u00a0dozen programs<\/a> residential Con Ed customers can enroll in to reduce energy during key windows and get financial rewards.<\/p>\n

Participants who have the freely provided batteries in their homes through September will also receive about $100 per air conditioning unit plugged into them from Responsible Grid, as Con Ed pays the company to reduce demand.<\/p>\n

In southeast Queens, participant Farudh Emiel noticed several times over the hottest days of the summer that his three air conditioning units plugged into the batteries he got through the pilot program kept pumping even as he saw lights dimming. It was likely Con Ed reduced the voltage in his neighborhood to protect the electric system, but his AC units, relying on the batteries, were unaffected.<\/p>\n

\u201cI run my ACs 24\/7, three of them at the same time,\u201d Emiel said. \u200b\u201cOne thing I\u00a0will spend money on is electricity because I\u00a0don\u2019t want to\u00a0sweat.\u201d<\/p>\n

Outside the individual homes of the participants, batteries have the potential to reshape the electric-supply system and protect ratepayers\u2019 wallets.<\/p>\n

When demand for power is high, especially in the summer, fossil-fuel-fired peaker plants kick in to meet that need. Those plants, often located in and around low-income neighborhoods, can be highly polluting and costly to rely\u00a0on.<\/p>\n

\u201cBy switching your AC to a\u00a0battery rather than the outlet, you\u2019re providing a\u00a0measure of relief to the grid, avoiding more expensive, dirtier power plants turning on,\u201d said Jamie Dickerson, senior director of climate and clean energy programs at Acadia Center, a\u00a0research and advocacy nonprofit.<\/p>\n

The small batteries in participants\u2019 homes have served as a\u00a0source of backup power in other instances.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The reason is to protect the heat-strained electric grid, which, when taxed to the point of failure, can…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":139139,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5122],"tags":[5229,405,403,5226,5225,5228,5227,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-139138","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-new-york","10":"tag-new-york-city","11":"tag-newyork","12":"tag-newyorkcity","13":"tag-ny","14":"tag-nyc","15":"tag-united-states","16":"tag-united-states-of-america","17":"tag-unitedstates","18":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","19":"tag-us","20":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115014720891570916","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139138","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=139138"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139138\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/139139"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=139138"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=139138"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=139138"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}