Decarbonization and multilateral clean energy efforts to address climate change have created a shift toward an increasingly intelligent, resilient, and distributed energy ecosystem. According to the International Energy Agency, global electricity demand is set to rise 2.5 times by 2050 , driven by a shift to EVs. Additionally, wind, solar, bioenergy, geothermal energy, and hydro energy are expected to account for two‐thirds of total energy supply by 2050. Solar will likely become the largest source, accounting for one‐fifth of energy supply. As the electric power generation industry is accelerating toward diverse generation sources and asset ownership, incremental research, and innovation, the share of intermittent renewable energy technology will likely require the electric grid to resolve the question of real-time supply and demand balancing.

Peaking plants across dispatchable power sources such as gas gensets, microturbines, and biomass deployments can help regulate the production and integration of solar and wind power sources on the grid. Guidehouse Insights defines virtual power plants (VPPs) as systems that rely on software and a smart grid to remotely and automatically dispatch distributed energy resources flexibility services to a distribution or wholesale market via an aggregation and optimization  […]