Featured in Factor This: Utilities and the distributed solar turning point

Utilities are running into a reality that has been building for years: distributed solar and storage are becoming a structural part of the energy system, not a side category.

In a new contributed article published by Factor This, Deep Patel lays out why that shift is creating a clear choice for utilities. They can continue pushing back through interconnection delays, design restrictions, and policies that make customer adoption harder, or they can begin treating distributed energy as a real grid resource.

The article explores both sides of that divide. In some markets, utilities are making residential solar and storage more difficult to deploy. In others, early programs around batteries, virtual power plants, and non-wires alternatives show what a more integrated model could look like.

The bigger takeaway is that this is not just a policy story. It is a business model story. As homeowners gain more control over how they produce, store, and use electricity, utilities will need to evolve from one-way power providers into more flexible platform operators.

Read the full article here: https://www.renewableenergyworld.com/solar/residential/utilities-at-a-crossroads-adapt-to-distributed-solar-or-risk-becoming-the-backup-plan/