For those of us in the energy space, we’re all familiar with the big trends and imperatives we experience every day: Electrification, decarbonization, the potential impact of all those IRA dollars, and others. We put our experts in a room and asked, “yeah, but what will actually happen this year?” Presenting our first annual official clean energy predictions. Feel free to reach out to chat more with any of our experts!
Macro Trend: Electrification
“Experts” will continue to be really bad at forecasting the adoption of renewable energy sources. Historically, people have been bad at predicting the adoption of new technologies, and the energy space is no exception. McKinsey found that projections for 2030 in 2021 were 30 times higher compared with projections in 2006. So don’t put too much weight on what we said last year.
- Uplight expert: Hannah Bascom, Chief Market Innovation Officer
Marco Trend: Rise of the Prosumer
2024 will be the year of the prosumer, in a couple of ways. We predict that in this next year, we will see a large community go off-grid in their own microgrid and create a micro economy around monetizing their energy. These prosumers will be significant contributors to the grid, not just around the edges. This will be driven by not just a desire for the financial benefits, but an increased desire from consumers looking for ways to live sustainably and give back.
- Uplight expert: Hannah Bascom, Chief Market Innovation Officer
Macro Trend: IRA Clean Energy Funding
The deployment of IRA rebate programs will be a state-by-state, haphazard affair with minimal utility coordination. Each of the state energy offices (SEOs) will create their own unique Home Electrification and Appliance Rebate program, and we predict that most SEOs will unfortunately not require the program to align with utility energy efficiency or grid plans–contributing to the growth of seasonal peak demand. Spoiler alert: 2025 and 2026 will be very different as we pay the price for not managing new electric load at the time of installation.
- Uplight expert: Neil Veilleux, Senior Director of Market Development and Regulatory Innovation
Macro Trend: EV Acceleration
This year, a car company will launch the first EV with over 600 miles of range. The 2023 Lucid Air redefined the range record with just over 500 miles. We predict that other EV makers will be putting in the work to quickly claim the top spot in an industry where range is king.
- Uplight expert: Erin D’Amato, Partnerships Director
Macro Trend: EV Acceleration
2024’s trendiest cities will be those with the EV Halo. As EV adoption starts to take off, we start seeing the prevalence as “halos” around the cities – not in downtown areas that lack car- & home-owners, nor the outer suburbs where people are typically more middle class and not early adopters, but the wealthy homes in between with higher incomes. The Halo is the circle around the downtown where these adopters of EVs exist.
- Uplight expert: Erin D’Amato, Partnerships Director
Macro Trend: Electrification
In 2023, heat pumps overtook gas furnace sales by 3%, after years of parallel growth. In 2023, heat pumps will beat gas furnace sales again, this time by 5%. 81% of customers are considering adopting at least one energy-related product and service in the future. We predict the most popular of those devices will be heat pumps, EVs and induction stoves.
- Uplight expert: Neil Veilleux, Senior Director of Market Development and Regulatory Innovation
Macro Trend: Electrification
In 2024, there will be a continued push against gas stoves from a policy level. But don’t worry chefs – induction cooking is better anyway. We interact with our stoves every day and switching away from gas in kitchens will be a catalyst for other appliance switches. Policy can be the biggest driver or hindrance to electrification (and decarbonization). In this case, it will propel the adoption of these eco-friendlier appliances.
- Uplight expert: Hannah Bascom, Chief Market Innovation Officer
Marco Trend: VPP Liftoff
2024 will see the first 100MW DR event offset. Uplight’s best event in summer ’23 was 70.7 MW, up from 55.4 in 2022. With this rate of increase, a 100MW event will be easily achievable in 2024. We also predict it will occur in the summer when, due to extreme heat, DR events are especially critical.
- Uplight expert: Don McPhail, Vice President of Product
Macro Trend: VPP Liftoff
Thinking longer term, 10-20% of U.S. peak demand will be served by VPPs by 2030. This will save the US $10B. More immediately, in 2024 we predict at least one instance of a VPP saving the day during a grid emergency.
- Uplight expert: Don McPhail, Vice President of Product
Macro Trend: Electrification
Energy will be a top-of-mind concern going into this year’s presidential election. Decarbonization will be a central issue in various state elections, but not just for democrats. Red states, which are among the most prolific adopters of clean tech, will focus on the economic development of the energy transition.
- Uplight expert: Hannah Bascom, Chief Market Innovation Officer
