Incentives for Smart Thermostats and Heat Pump Water Heaters Now Available Through Sonoma Clean Power

Sonoma Clean Power (SCP), the public electricity provider for Sonoma and Mendocino counties, has added two new smart devices to its demand-response program, GridSavvy.

SCP first launched GridSavvy in 2017 to experiment with the unique opportunity that smart home devices present for controlling the local demand for electricity during hours of the day when California’s grid is stressed.

“Through GridSavvy, we’re able to partner with, and provide financial incentives to, Sonoma Clean Power customers that use their smart devices as a resource, working to get the last bit of carbon out of SCP’s electricity portfolio,” says Rachel Kuykendall, Senior Programs Manager with SCP.

In addition to free electric vehicle chargers, SCP will now offer generous incentives for smart thermostats and heat pump water heaters. The new options include two thermostat products by ecobee and a heat pump water heater by Rheem.

Once any of the three technologies are installed in an SCP customer’s home or business, they are eligible to join the GridSavvy Community and receive a $5 per month bill credit.

Demand-response programs, like GridSavvy, have the ability to serve as a major tool for accelerating the use of renewable energy and balancing California’s electricity load.

In partnership with its program administrator, Olivine, Inc., a company which assists utilities, Community Choice Aggregators, and other energy service providers in designing, developing, and operating community-based distributed energy resources (DER) programs, SCP can manage multiple technologies and remotely control when these smart home devices use electricity.

When there is excess energy on the grid, primarily during the middle of the day when solar generation peaks, SCP can encourage the smart devices to charge or pre-heat themselves. When there are spikes in the demand for electricity and non-renewable energy sources are being used, SCP can delay the devices to operate when the grid is cleaner.

Not only does GridSavvy provide a solution for stabilizing the state’s electricity grid, but it can also help local households save a significant amount of energy each month. Heat pump water heaters, in particular, can be up to two or three times more energy-efficient than conventional gas or electric resistance water heaters, which can immediately reduce utility bills.

As smart home devices continue to rise in popularity, SCP hopes to expand and utilize GridSavvy’s capabilities to the fullest potential.

To learn more about GridSavvy and the integrated technologies, visit www.scpgridsavvy.org.