Google and Voltus have agreed to build a 1 gigawatt virtual power plant in the PJM Interconnection grid region, expanding a three-year agreement the companies announced on June 2 to aggregate up to 100 MW of distributed resources each year. Voltus said the new agreement adds 1,070 MW of capacity and called it one of the largest known distributed capacity portfolios deployed by a hyperscaler.
Under the arrangement, Voltus aggregates flexible capacity from local businesses and homes into a virtual power plant funded by Google. When the grid is under strain, Voltus signals participating sites, which can draw on batteries, smart thermostats, adjustments to industrial processes and other flexible equipment to reduce their electricity use.
Participants receive bill savings and direct payments, according to Voltus. The company runs the deal through its Bring Your Own Capacity program, which it says brings new flexible capacity to the grid. Voltus cited a Brattle Group report estimating that US consumers could save more than $100 billion over the next decade through better grid utilization.
“Expanding our initial commitment tenfold demonstrates our core effort to actively bring our own capacity to the grids that serve us,” said Ellen Zuckerman, Google’s head of energy market development for North and South America. She said procuring the capacity through a virtual power plant ensures Google’s operations in PJM “support regional reliability and deliver direct economic benefits to local communities.”
Voltus chief executive Dana Guernsey said the expansion “translates data center growth into direct economic benefits for businesses and homes.”
PJM serves 67 million customers across 13 states and the District of Columbia. The companies did not give a timeline for bringing the added capacity online or disclose financial terms.
PJM’s planned reliability backstop procurement, intended to buy new capacity as large users including data centers increase demand, did not begin as scheduled on September 30. Federal regulators suspended the proposal for five months to examine how its costs would be divided.
Earlier in October, Google signed a deal with Constellation that includes 890 MW of new nuclear capacity, and in September it joined Nvidia and Emerald AI in launching an alliance advocating for data centers that can reduce their demand when grids are strained.
In August, Sunrun agreed to provide capacity from a portion of its residential solar-and-storage systems in the PJM and MISO regions for Voltus’s hyperscaler programs. On October 8, Voltus said it had raised $225 million in a Series D round led by Generation Investment Management, with Activate Capital and Vitol as co-leads, and expects to grow its platform to 20 gigawatts by 2030.
Sources: Voltus, Voltus (June)
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By the Control Plane Editorial Team