Utility firm SSE has selected Origami Energy to support the launch of a new virtual power plant (VPP) which will provide flexibility services to its C&I customers.
SSE is to use the VPP to offer real-time, flexible energy management services and has selected Origami’s technology platform to provide the service following a competitive tender process.
The VPP professes to ‘knit together’ distributed energy resources such as demand side response, generation, energy storage, combined heat and power and electric vehicles to provide capacity and flexibility for different markets.
SSE said the collaboration with Origami would provide a “significant enhancement” to SSE’s supply proposition while helping C&I customers access new revenue streams.
“Flexibility is an increasingly valuable part of the GB electricity market and SSE is delighted to be working with Origami Energy as we deliver our new SSE VPP product. We believe Origami Energy’s technology is market leading and will help us provide significant value to our customers,” Finlay McCutcheon, director of SSE Business Energy, said.
SSE will also use some of its own embedded generation assets on the platform.
The company isn’t the first major utility to explore the potential benefits of VPPs and local energy markets. Centrica is currently running a much-vaunted trial of a local energy marketplace in Cornwall which connects homes and businesses with decentralised generation assets and battery storage projects.
Peter Bance, CEO at Origami Energy, said the deal offered further validation for the “new opportunities” created by real-time energy marketplaces.
