Hawaiian Electric Selects Open Access Technology International for Paradigm-Shifting Grid Services Project

Hawaiian Electric Company and OATI are pleased to announce they have signed a Grid Services Purchase Agreement and submitted it to the Hawaii Public Utilities Commission for review.

The Grid Services Program creates a new model for power system operations through a unique design linking the utility, grid service suppliers, and end customers. In this project, OATI heads a team of industry-leading companies to control behind-the-meter distributed energy resource assets such as solar PV, battery systems, and grid-enabled hot water tanks, to aggregate them into Virtual Power Plants, and provide grid services to Hawaiian Electric. This includes recruitment of customer-owned DERs, software to provide aggregation and integration of assets, as well as OATI’s System Operations Center to provide forecasting, dispatch and control to manage the real-time grid service program using secure communications.

Grid services include the ancillary services of fast frequency response, capacity increase, and capacity decrease. OATI will provide these grid services to Hawaiian Electric dynamically, and in real-time, for grid reliability and balancing services in support of grid operations. Grid services will help manage and balance loads with increasing renewable energy sources.

OATI, and its Energy Alliance members, will work cooperatively with Hawaiian Electric to subscribe customers to this program. Customers will receive incentives, directly from Hawaiian Electric, for their participation in the program.

“It is an honor to be part of this ground-breaking, paradigm-shifting project to provide Hawaiian Electric real-time aggregation of assets,” said Ali Ipakchi, Ph.D, executive vice president for Smart Grid at OATI. “Hawaiian Electric is to be commended for its commitment to renewable resources, supply reliability, and its customers.”

“Hawaiian Electric chose OATI through a rigorous selection process,” said Rich Barone, Hawaiian Electric Director of Demand Response. “We are looking forward to working with OATI as the first aggregator in the State of Hawaii to offer customers new opportunities to decrease their bills while supporting our 100 percent clean energy goal by 2045.”

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Also of Interest from SGO: 

4th Grid Modernization Forum, May 20-22, 2019, Chicago  

Utility Cyber Security Forum, June 26, 2019, San Diego

4th IoT Global Innovation Forum, July 9-10, 2019, Chicago 

10th Microgrid Global Innovation Forum, September 10-12, 2019, London

6th Demand Response & DER World Forum, October 16-17, 2019, San Diego