(Credit: Pixabay)New carbon emissions data from WattTime that can help renewable energy investors see how much carbon can be avoided by participating in certain projects will be added to an Edison Energy platform that helps organizations with decisions to support their net zero goals.
WattTime, which was founded by University of California Berkeley researchers, has developed ways to analyze what will happen on the grid — specifically, which power sources will be turned off — in response to different renewable energy projects being built. This, according to WattTime, allows renewable energy investors to support projects in areas where there were previously high emissions sources.
A study by National Renewable Energy Laboratory found a 35% adaptation of wind or solar energy could cut emissions by up to 45%. The idea behind the WattTime data, according to the partnership, is to increase the impact of such renewable energy additions in areas where they maximize those benefits, such as replacing coal as an energy source.
“Seeing the emissions impact of renewable energy projects will add a critical and deeper layer of insight to our existing platform marketplace capabilities,” says Joey Lange, managing director of energy supply advisory at Edison. “It’s part of a shifting conversation from just a focus on the best economics to a broader focus that also includes the biggest impact from a greenhouse gas emissions perspective.”
The added information to the Edison Insights platform will include real time and historical carbon data. Information on how carbon reductions can take place can vary depending on energy sources on a region’s grid, how well supply matches demand, access to power lines, weather, and the time of day energy is generated.
The data will be added to the Edison Energy platform as part of the avoided carbon emissions metric, which can also help users optimize the resources they choose as well as add transparency to their efficiency efforts, among other benefits.
Edison, which has predicted prices will ease in the renewable energy sector in 2022, provides data and analytics that examines the long-term implications of energy and sustainability goals and the value and risks of such investments. The company and Renew Energy Partners also introduced a $300 million financial program to help commercial and industrial organizations tackle the cost of carbon reduction projects.
WattTime is a member of Climate TRACE, an emissions monitoring coalition, and has developed algorithms to model regional marginal emissions rates across markets in North America, Europe and Australia.
