Our Innovation Analysts recently looked into emerging technologies and up-and-coming startups in the energy industry. As there is a large number of startups working on a wide variety of solutions, we decided to share our insights with you. This time, we are taking a look at 5 promising decentralization solutions for the energy industry.
Heat Map: 5 Top Decentralization Startups
For our 5 picks of decentralization startups, we used a data-driven startup scouting approach to identify the most relevant solutions globally. The Global Startup Heat Map below highlights 5 interesting examples out of 450 relevant solutions. Depending on your specific needs, your top picks might look entirely different.
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Blueprint Power – DERs Management System
Distributed energy resources (DER), such as solar panels, wind turbines, batteries, and other decentralized energy storage devices, can be digitally combined and managed by a utility or a facility manager with the help of a DER management software. US-based startup Blueprint Power develops a DERs management system to enable real estate companies to become clean energy suppliers by transforming their portfolios into power plants. Blueprint Power creates software to manage these power plants in order to use the excess supply that can be further sold to customers demanding clean energy.
Redback Technologies – Distributed Energy Generation (Prosumers)
Solar panels and wind turbines enable households and enterprises to produce their own energy, which can be used immediately, stored for future consumption or sold to neighbors. Such households and enterprises are called prosumers because they are both producers and consumers of energy. Australian startup Redback Technologies develops an all-in-one solar and storage solution for households and small businesses. Redback’s Smart Hybrid System uses machine learning to predict the power generation of solar panels, as well as the amount of energy a customer will use. This hybrid technology manages and stores solar energy, which prosumers can save for their personal use or sell back to the grid.
Brightmerge – Microgrids
A microgrid is a small-scale power grid that can integrate various DERs, especially renewable energy sources, such as solar and wind power. It operates independently and can collaborate with other power grids. Microgrids are used to provide electricity supply to islands, remote and/or rural locations, especially in developing countries that are not connected to a centralized grid. Israeli startup Brightmerge empowers local entrepreneurs and communities to build independent commercial-grade microgrid systems by offering the Microgrid as a Service (MaaS) package, which includes a full range of options, from designing a micro-grid through operating a micro-grid on a daily basis.
WePower – Platforms For Trading Energy
Energy trading platforms are like Airbnb for the electricity supply market. Providers of this platform don’t produce energy themselves but sell energy produced by solar and wind farms, individual prosumers, and small businesses with solar panels installed on roofs. Such a platform empowers prosumers to sell surplus energy within local communities. Energy producers set their own prices, and users of the platform can choose which producer they wish to be supplied by. Lithuanian startup WePower builds a decentralized marketplace that enables renewable energy prosumers to transact electricity amongst each other without the need for a middleman. The company directly connects customers with green energy producers so they can contract green electricity at competitive rates with full transparency through digitally-enabled PPAs (power purchase agreements).
Elemize – Utility As A Distributed Network Integrator
More and more electricity consumers are becoming producers themselves (“prosumers”), thereby radically changing the traditional model of energy supply. Responding to these disrupting changes, startups in the energy sector offer solutions that enable utilities as distributed network integrators. Italian startup Elemize creates an open control platform to help energy utilities and aggregators to boost their distributed energy business by unlocking all the potential of solar systems, energy storage and flexible loads. The company brings together data science and the Internet of Things (IoT) and enables utilities to remotely control and effectively manage their aggregated DERs.
What About The Other 445 Decentralization Solutions?
While we believe data is key to creating insights it can be easy to be overwhelmed by it. Our ambition is to create a comprehensive overview and provide actionable innovation intelligence for your Proof of Concept (PoC), partnership, or investment targets. The 5 decentralized startups showcased above are promising examples out of 445 we analyzed for this article. To identify the most relevant solutions based on your specific criteria and collaboration strategy, get in touch.
