Turning on Batteries for Resilient Homes and a Cleaner Grid

Holy Cross Energy's Power+ program provides residential customers in Colorado with distributed battery storage through a tariff-based on-bill financing model. By leveraging USDA loan capital, the program eliminates upfront costs for participants and allows the utility to manage peak demand and integrate more renewable energy. The program aims to support the utility's goals of 100 percent renewable energy by 2030 and net-zero emissions by 2035, while providing homeowners with backup power during climate-driven outages.

• Holy Cross Energy launched the Power+ program in spring 2021 to provide distributed stand-alone battery storage to its members using tariff-based on-bill financing, which removes upfront costs and spreads repayments over 10 years via utility bills.
• The program has financed 111 battery packs across 26 residential locations, totaling over $1 million in investments, supported by $11 million in zero-percent loan capital from the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Rural Energy Savings Program (RESP).
• The utility uses these distributed batteries as a tool to manage energy demand and reach its targets of 100 percent renewable energy by 2030 and net-zero emissions by 2035; currently, 47 percent of its energy is from renewable sources.
• The program utilizes Tesla Powerwall battery packs, typically installing five per site to achieve better economies of scale. While the total cost is $50,000, participants pay approximately $55 per month after utility incentives and monthly benefits provided in exchange for the co-op's control of the batteries during peak demand.
• To increase equity and access, Holy Cross Energy evaluates participants based on their 12-month utility bill-paying history rather than using credit scores.

APA

Yañez-Barnuevo, M. (2022). Turning on Batteries for Resilient Homes and a Cleaner Grid. Environmental and Energy Study Institute. https://www.eesi.org/articles/view/turning-on-batteries-for-resilient-homes-and-a-cleaner-grid

Chicago

Yañez-Barnuevo, Miguel. Turning on Batteries for Resilient Homes and a Cleaner Grid. Environmental and Energy Study Institute, 2022. https://www.eesi.org/articles/view/turning-on-batteries-for-resilient-homes-and-a-cleaner-grid.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Yañez-Barnuevo |first1=Miguel |title=Turning on Batteries for Resilient Homes and a Cleaner Grid |publisher=Environmental and Energy Study Institute |date=11 April 2022 |url=https://www.eesi.org/articles/view/turning-on-batteries-for-resilient-homes-and-a-cleaner-grid |access-date=23 October 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{yaezbarnuevo2022turning, author = {Yañez-Barnuevo, Miguel}, title = {{Turning on Batteries for Resilient Homes and a Cleaner Grid}}, institution = {Environmental and Energy Study Institute}, year = {2022}, month = apr, url = {https://www.eesi.org/articles/view/turning-on-batteries-for-resilient-homes-and-a-cleaner-grid}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }