Boston Medical Center: New England’s Largest Safety-Net Hospital Installs Energy Storage

A battery storage installation at Boston Medical Center demonstrates how hospitals can integrate energy storage into an efficiency or sustainability program to better manage peak demand and lower costly demand charges. The project is profiled in this case study by Clean Energy Group.

Boston Medical Center (BMC) is the largest and busiest trauma and emergency services center in New England. Over 50% of its patients come from underserved populations. As a safety net hospital, BMC serves all patients who come through its doors, including those without insurance and those who are publicly insured.

In 2022, BMC installed a 572 kW …

Future-Proof AI Data Centers, Grid Reliability, and Affordable Energy: Recommendations for States

Artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming industries, but its rapid expansion is already causing a significant increase in electricity demand. Data centers that support AI model training and inference require immense computational power, putting pressure on the electric grid and raising concerns about sustainability, energy costs, and reliability. Recent projections suggest that AI-driven data centers could consume up to 9% of U.S. electricity by 2030 (equivalent to the electricity needed to power 20–40% of today’s vehicles if they were EVs), highlighting the need for policies that ensure energy-efficient, socially responsible, and environmentally sustainable development.

The emergence of DeepSeek, a highly efficient …

Energy Transition Outlook: Germany 2025

Germany has long been a front runner in the energy transition and has established a national target to achieve a net zero energy economy by 2045. This investigation finds that Germany will miss this target — but by a narrow margin. We forecast that emissions will fall by 95% by 2050. That is a very big step towards decarbonization and is largely facilitated by a more than doubling of electricity use across the country in the next 25 years. Electrification brings efficiency benefits, which can be seen in the energy intensity of the economy (i.e. energy use per unit of …

Inclusive Utility Investment Guide for Distributed Energy Resources

Inclusive utility investment is a financial solution for distributed clean energy upgrades – including DERs and energy efficiency – via a tariff for site-specific utility investment and cost recovery, approved by the utility’s regulatory authority and designed to ensure net annual cost savings for participants. SEPA partnered with Clean Energy Works to raise awareness of the value and use cases of inclusive utility investment programs, such as Pay As You Save® (PAYS®). These programs can provide financial benefits to utilities, utility customers, and building owners. Inclusive Utility Investment Guide for Distributed Energy Resources – developed with extensive contributions from industry …

Applying Discount Rates in Energy Utilities’ Benefit-Cost Analyses

Selecting the proper discount rate is a critical choice when state regulators assess whether utilities’ alternative investments—like electrified heating programs or energy-efficiency incentives—will generate benefits greater than their costs. The discount rate is the metric used to translate costs and benefits that occur in the future into equivalent “present values,” reflecting the fact that society typically prefers to have a dollar now rather than later. This issue brief gives a menu of options that state regulators can choose from when deciding which discount rate they will use in benefit-cost analyses. …

Solar+Storage+Electrification: A Clean Energy Equity Model For Massachusetts

A Massachusetts pilot program provides a replicable and scalable model for bringing renewable energy, battery storage, and electrification to low-income households. The Cape and Vineyard Electrification Offering (CVEO) is run by the Cape Light Compact, an energy services provider serving 210,000 customers in 21 towns on Cape Cod and Martha’s Vineyard. The CVEO pilot is profiled in this case study by Clean Energy Group.

The CVEO pilot program offers whole-house electrification and backup power to up to 100 low- and moderate-income households currently reliant on oil, propane, or electric resistance heating. Participants receive incentives and financing options to replace their …

Sustainable Energy in America 2025 Factbook

The Sustainable Energy in America Factbook – produced annually for the Business Council for Sustainable Energy by BloombergNEF – provides valuable year-over-year data and insights on the American energy expansion.

In 2024, U.S. power generation reached its highest volume in two decades, driven by growth in renewable energy technologies and by stable natural gas generation capacity. These energy growth sectors face favorable market conditions as the United States eyes rising energy demand.

The 2025 Sustainable Energy in America Factbook covers the progress of the energy efficiency, natural gas, and renewable energy sectors. Download the report to find the latest data …

Low Carbon Thermal Energy Roadmap for Textile Industry

The textile and apparel industry is a significant contributor to global greenhouse gas emissions, accounting for approximately 2% of annual emissions. A major challenge is its reliance on fossil fuel-based thermal energy for process heating, such as steam production and thermal oil heating, which contributes to substantial carbon dioxide emissions. The industry increasingly recognizes the need to decarbonize, especially as global demand for apparel grows.

This report, commissioned by the Apparel Impact Institute (Aii) and authored by Global Efficiency Intelligence, focuses on strategies to transition textile plants in five key textile-producing countries (China, India, Vietnam, Bangladesh, and Indonesia) to low-carbon …

Risk-Constrained Participation of Virtual Power Plants in Day-Ahead Energy and Reserve Markets Based on Multi-Objective Operation of Active Distribution Network

This study presents an optimal approach to integrate flexible-renewable virtual power plants (VPPs) into the operation of active distribution networks (ADNs) with multi-criteria objectives for day-ahead energy and reserve markets. The level of interaction with VPPs is determined through a risk model. The proposed framework adopts a bi-level structure. In the upper-level model, the Pareto optimization strategy, based on the weighted sum method, is utilized to minimize the AND’s predicted operating costs and voltage deviation. The network’s optimal AC power flow (AC-OPF) equations serve as constraints for this level. The lower-level model intends to maximize VPPs’ expected profits while incorporating …

Case Study: Thermal Energy Storage at Purchase College, State University of New York

Purchase College partnered with RTC Solutions Provider Brenmiller Energy and the New York Power Authority (NYPA) to implement thermal energy storage (TES) at Purchase College’s physical education building. Completed in 2023, this $2.5 million project features a Brenmiller bGen™ TES unit paired with a combined heat and power (CHP) microturbine and equipped with electric heaters for supplemental heat during peak demand, resulting in an efficient, flexible heating system that meets nearly 100% of the building’s heating needs. The case study examines how this integrated system improved the building’s energy efficiency from 28% to 60%, reduced annual emissions by an estimated …