ARLINGTON, Va.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Lightshift Energy, a leading energy storage project developer, owner, and operator, today announced its participation in two initiatives that provide critical pathways to granular energy attribute and emissions accounting: the creation of the Power Emissions Certificates Alliance (PECA) and the signing of the United Nations 24/7 Carbon-Free Energy Compact. Both initiatives are designed to help organizations meet their clean energy and climate targets by focusing on the link between time- and location-based energy use, clean energy generation, and carbon emissions.
From Renewable Energy Credits (RECs) to Power Emissions Certificates (PECs)
As a founding signatory and an advisory board member of the Power Emissions Certificates Alliance (PECA), Lightshift is working with Clean Incentive and other industry leaders to pioneer a new methodology to accurately quantify and certify companies’ emissions impacts from clean energy generation or storage discharge. PECA was established by Clean Incentive, which operates the PEC registry. This registry reflects a pivot from Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs) that are issued when one megawatt-hour of electricity is generated and delivered to the grid from a renewable source – and toward PECs that combine hourly Granular Certificates (GCs) with marginal avoided emissions.
“We’re happy to play a role in bringing new accounting, certification, and market tools to the buyers of clean energy attributes. Leveraging these innovative solutions will create a huge opportunity in the emerging PECs market,” said Michael Herbert, Managing Partner and Co-founder of Lightshift Energy.
PECs are a novel approach to quantifying the greenhouse gas emissions that are avoided by renewable power generation or storage discharge. In doing so, PECs provide a more enhanced solution for corporate clean energy buyers to track and analyze the environmental benefits of renewable energy generation or storage projects by verifying the benefits of such projects. At the same time, it provides consumers with a reliable means of measuring their emissions reductions and creates a market incentive for clean energy projects that achieve higher emissions reductions.
Lightshift plans to utilize the PEC registry and Clean Incentive marketplace to showcase how an operational standalone battery storage project can be dispatched to maximize carbon reductions and produce PECs. These PECs can then be utilized by companies to offset the emissions associated with their energy consumption and demonstrate impact-based carbon accounting.
“Our partnership with Lightshift Energy has played a vital role in developing the innovative PEC methodology. Their knowledge of energy storage ensures that PECs not only accurately measure avoided emissions but are easy to use in forward carbon contracts,” said Casey Martinez, CEO of Clean Incentive.
Scaling 24/7 clean energy to meet energy demands
To help accelerate the decarbonization of electricity systems globally, Lightshift has joined the United Nations 24/7 Carbon-Free Energy Compact, which is committed to advancing procurement practices, policies, tools, and data necessary to promote clean energy deployment. To date, the Compact counts more than 140 entities among its members, including Google and Microsoft. Lightshift’s participation in the Compact is the company’s latest commitment to helping deliver carbon-free energy sources.
“We’re seeing growing demand for 24/7 clean energy and the need for more granular carbon accounting, but we’re also seeing an increase in opportunities for what these solutions and services can look like,” said Rama Zakaria, Director of Analytics at Lightshift Energy. “What sets Lightshift apart is our ability to analyze the grid holistically and determine the best use case, location, size, and emissions impacts for our projects – delivering a solution to the problem upfront with the analytics to back it up.”
In addition to enabling 24/7 carbon-free energy and maximizing emissions reductions, Lightshift is helping to enhance grid capacity and democratize access to clean, affordable power for municipal utilities, electric cooperatives, and corporate buyers. Today, Lightshift has more than 20 grid storage projects under contract and a pipeline of over 4,000 MW, largely in small towns and rural communities.
“We are encouraged by the incredible community of partners and peers we work with, who are equally committed to accelerating innovative grid decarbonization solutions,” continued Herbert. ”By joining with PECA and the UN’s initiative, we’re able to support meaningful progress in accessible and affordable clean energy for all.”
About Lightshift Energy
Lightshift Energy is a utility-scale energy storage project developer, owner, and operator with headquarters in Arlington, Virginia. Founded in 2019, Lightshift is developing a diverse, multi-gigawatt pipeline of energy storage projects, located throughout the U.S. With leading energy storage analytics, application design, finance, and development expertise, Lightshift deploys dynamic, multi-use energy storage projects that maximize value for utilities and other partners. Lightshift is a member of the UN 24/7 Carbon-Free Energy Compact, the Energy Storage Solutions Consortium (ESSC) and the Power Emissions Certificates Alliance (PECA). For more information, please visit www.lightshift.com.
