Maryland-based distributed energy resources (DERs) company CPower Energy has entered a partnership with Consumers Energy to deliver grid services across the energy provider’s Michigan service territory.

Consumers Energy is Michigan’s largest energy provider, providing natural gas and electricity to 6.8 million of the state’s ten million residents in all 68 Lower Peninsula counties.

Through the partnership with CPower, big-box retailers, healthcare, manufacturing, education and other commercial and industrial organisations in Consumers Energy’s service territory will have an additional avenue to participate in Consumers Energy’s demand response programme, making them eligible to earn money back on their bill by conserving energy when demand peaks. Last year, CPower paid its customers across the USA approximately $230m in grid revenues.

“Dispatching demand response is a reliable and efficient way to address supercritical peaks and other grid resource needs,” said Mathew Sachs, senior vice president of CPower. “Organisations that participate in demand response receive monetary value out of their investments, and the community at large also benefits from a reliable grid. We’re proud to work with Consumers Energy to help its customers unlock the full value of their DERs, as the utility is focused on a flexible and clean energy transformation.”

CPower has grown its footprint considerably in MISO and across utility markets this year. In addition to the Consumers Energy programme, CPower is expanding access to demand response for commercial and industrial organisations in the Ameren Illinois territory. Across the USA, CPower manages approximately 6.3GW of DER capacity at more than 17,000 sites.

CPower increases the value of its customers’ electricity loads, facility assets and DERs while delivering flexibility, capacity and other ancillary services to the grid. With more than two decades of experience, it has grown to offer more than 60 local energy programmes, partnering with grid operators and utilities to serve more than 17,000 sites, delivering approximately 286,000 metric tons of CO₂ reductions in 2021 alone. CPower is based in Baltimore, Maryland, and is owned by LS Power, a development, investment and operating company focused on the power and energy infrastructure sector.