(Walton solar farm. Credit: Duke. )

The U.S. Department of Energy has awarded a five-year, $7.9 million Grid Resilience and Innovation Partnerships Program (GRIP) grant to Pecan Street Inc. and its partners to develop and deploy technology that will allow utilities to manage solar supply and energy demand throughout the grid.

The boom in residential solar installation has created a congestion challenge in several areas. In Delaware, grid operators have prohibited new grid connections for nearly 40,000 homes in these so-called “red zones,” representing thousands of potential solar homes and megawatts of renewable energy.

“Hosting capacity limitations are happening in more areas, precisely at a time when we need to encourage solar investment and expand solar access to more customers, including underserved communities disproportionately impacted by climate change and environmental degradation,” said Pecan Street CEO Dr. Anissa Rodriguez Dickerman.

Pecan Street’s partners include Delaware Electric Cooperative, The Institute of Energy Conversion at the University of Delaware, Clean Energy USA, Imani Energy, and Energize Delaware.

Launched in 2009, Pecan Street has developed various communication and metering technologies that power its residential energy research network. Across nearly a dozen states and Puerto Rico, Pecan Street collects energy use data from multiple circuits of volunteers’ homes every second. The resulting data has spurred research on solar generation, electric vehicle charging behavior, home energy storage, and potential load-balancing opportunities, the company said.

“Our electricity system requires real-time balancing of energy supply and demand,” said Scott Hinson, chief technology officer of Pecan Street and the project lead. “That becomes a problem for the grid if too much solar is produced when there’s not enough demand. Our technology will manage how much solar energy enters the grid to match current demand.”

DOE’s GRIP program funding, announced in October, began with a $3.46 billion investment for 58 projects across 44 states to strengthen electric grid resilience and reliability, invest in microgrids, and enable more renewable energy generation across America.

Funded by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, these projects will leverage more than $8 billion in federal and private investments to deliver clean electricity and ensure the grid is prepared for extreme weather worsened by the climate crisis.

The program funds activities meant to modernize the electric grid to reduce the impacts of natural disasters and extreme weather worsened by climate change; increase the flexibility, efficiency, and reliability of the electric power system with a particular focus on unlocking more solar, wind, and other clean energy and reducing faults that may lead to wildfires; and improve reliability by deploying innovative approaches to electricity transmission, storage, and distribution.