A recent announcement by electric utility Arizona Public Service could mark the tipping point in the way utilities think about building resources to meet peak demand.
Historically utilities built “peakers,” usually gas turbines fueled by natural gas, to meet spikes in demand, but in recent solicitations Arizona Public Service chose battery storage projects over peakers. “This is a watershed moment that the utility is signaling,” says Manish Kumar, managing director for energy storage at AES Corp.