After years of staying flat, U.S. electricity demand began to rise in 2024. Commercial energy consumption accounted for 60% of that growth. Many of these companies with growing energy use are aiming to cut their carbon emissions, reduce their electricity bills, and enhance energy resiliency. For these businesses, renewable energy solutions like onsite solar are an essential piece of the puzzle.
Even with solar, however, businesses must navigate grid interconnection delays, intermittent solar electricity generation, and volatile energy prices during peak demand periods. Battery energy storage is a solution that can help bridge the gap and deliver consistent, cost-effective power to maximize the value of solar installations.
Many businesses realize this and are opting to pair energy storage systems with their solar arrays. Battery energy storage installations in the community-scale, commercial, and industrial segments increased by 61% between 2023 and 2024, and the cost of these systems has been falling precipitously, making them much more affordable.
Here, we briefly go over how combining solar and energy storage (solar + storage) works and what specific benefits companies can expect from their energy storage systems.
One key advantage of onsite solar systems is their ability to connect with the grid, allowing surplus electricity to flow back during periods of excess production. This process bolsters grid stability and creates revenue streams for renewable energy facility operators. However, grid interconnection can pose challenges, particularly during blackouts, leaving solar owners without energy storage vulnerable to disruptions.
Solar + storage provides a solution by creating an onsite destination for surplus electricity. The stored energy can be deployed later as backup power, ensuring uninterrupted power even when your solar panels are not producing energy (say, on cloudy days or after sunset). Modern storage systems also integrate advanced monitoring tools and AI-powered software, giving facility operators a continuous, real-time view of their energy use and optimizing the value of stored energy.
Beyond simply storing the solar electricity generated onsite, solar + storage gives businesses a number of advantages, including increased operational efficiency, lower electricity bills, a higher value of solar electricity, and increased facility energy resilience.
The ability of the storage system to track continuous, real-time energy use allows you to identify and time high-energy operations to take advantage of energy price fluctuations. Taking into account data points like historical and current energy usage of the building (across various systems like HVAC, lighting, and appliances), local weather, market price forecasts, and details about site operations, AI software can predict usage patterns and automatically save the most amount of money on your electricity bill. This data can also allow businesses new insight into their operations, creating opportunities for more proactive decision-making.
Your peak usage interval, or the 15-minute window when your energy consumption is the highest during a given billing period, determines your monthly demand charges. This utility-imposed cost is non-negligible for many organizations, typically accounting for 30% to 70% of a commercial customer’s total electricity bill. Reducing peak demand is achieved by reducing peaks in energy consumption. Onsite energy storage can be intelligently discharged to flatten out “peaky” patterns and reduce monthly grid consumption and load usage spikes.
Another important component of typical utility bill structures is time-of-use; commercial customers pay different electric rates for electricity during on-peak (typically during the day) and off-peak (typically at night) periods. Without storage, a customer can avoid paying expensive on-peak rates by concentrating all consumption to off-peak periods. However, shifting consumption patterns is not always possible or ideal. With energy storage, facilities can circumvent high rates during peak periods without disrupting operations. By intelligently storing energy when it is cheap and discharging it when it is most expensive, customers can reduce costs. The bigger the gap, the more they can save.
By capturing and storing excess energy during periods of high generation, solar + storage enhances the profitability of your solar energy system by ensuring each kilowatt-hour generated is used to its full potential. Stored solar becomes another resource for storage software to consider when choosing the lowest-cost energy option, turning it into a valuable operational asset. This approach maximizes returns by prioritizing self-consumption over grid export, with potential additional earnings that can be achieved by strategically deploying stored energy.
The success of your business extends beyond cost savings; energy resilience is vitally important, especially as electricity grids are increasingly strained by reoccurring heatwaves and wildfire events. Serving as a buffer against grid instability, energy storage can hedge against regional power outages by reducing demand when it is highest. Energy storage can be leveraged in the event that your facility does lose power, with critical operations prioritized. This resilience is crucial for maintaining continuity and protecting essential functions, even during power outages.
Businesses can lean on Pivot Energy’s experienced in-house team of solar and energy storage professionals to design and deploy fully integrated solar + storage systems. With Pivot as your renewable energy advisor, you can confidently select an energy storage system tailored to your facility’s needs, backed by customized financing options and access to our extensive network of hardware and software partners.