BATTERY STORAGE FOR ELECTRIC COOPERATIVES

BESS projects built around cooperative needs.

EIP Storage develops battery energy storage projects that help electric cooperatives manage peak demand, relieve local or system congestion, improve reliability, and support load growth. The cooperative can contract for services from an EIP Storage-owned asset or retain EIP Storage as owner’s representative for a project the cooperative will own and operate.

DISCUSS A COOPERATIVE PROJECT

Storage sized for the cooperative use case

Cooperative storage projects are often smaller than wholesale-market projects and must be designed around the cooperative’s specific wholesale rate, delivery points, substations, operating practices, growth plans, and member needs. EIP Storage evaluates the operational and economic use case first, then develops the project, site, interconnection, controls, and commercial structure around it.

Priority applications

PEAK SHAVING

Discharge during the cooperative’s most expensive coincident or non-coincident peak periods to reduce wholesale demand costs, subject to the cooperative’s tariff and operating requirements.

RELIABILITY

Provide local capacity and operational flexibility during defined outages, constraints, or abnormal system conditions, coordinated with protection, controls, and the cooperative’s reliability plan.

CONGESTION RELIEF

Use targeted storage dispatch to reduce loading at constrained substations, feeders, delivery points, or upstream system interfaces where the battery can provide measurable operational value.

LOAD GROWTH

Create time and flexibility for new member loads, commercial and industrial expansion, or constrained areas of the distribution system while permanent infrastructure plans advance.

Two delivery models

MODEL 1: EIP Storage-OWNED AND OPERATED

EIP Storage develops, finances, owns, and operates the BESS. The cooperative contracts for defined capacity, availability, dispatch rights, peak-management services, or other agreed performance. EIP Storage assumes project capital, ownership, and long-term operating responsibility.

MODEL 2: COOPERATIVE-OWNED WITH EIP Storage AS OWNER’S REPRESENTATIVE

The cooperative owns and operates the BESS. EIP Storage serves as the cooperative’s development representative, managing the work required to move the project from concept through development, procurement, construction, and commissioning support. EIP Storage’ compensation is fully transparent and based on agreed time and materials – not an embedded developer fee.

Owner’s representative scope

  • Use-case analysis, sizing, site screening, project schedule, and development budget.
  • Utility, power supplier, transmission provider, interconnection, and permitting coordination.
  • Engineering management, equipment and EPC procurement, bid evaluation, and contract support.
  • Project controls, third-party consultant coordination, owner decisions, construction oversight, testing, and commissioning support as agreed.
  • Transparent invoices showing agreed labor rates, time incurred, approved expenses, and third-party costs, rather than a percentage-based or embedded developer fee.

Which model fits?

EIP Storage-OWNED MODEL

Best when the cooperative wants the storage capability but prefers not to supply project capital, take BESS development risk, take ownership, or build an internal BESS operating platform.

OWNER’S REPRESENTATIVE MODEL

Best when the cooperative wants long-term ownership and operational control, has access to capital or grant/loan funding, and wants an experienced storage developer to act solely on its behalf under a transparent compensation structure.

Choose the ownership structure that serves the cooperative.

Let’s discuss your cooperative’s wholesale power structure, delivery points, peak periods, congestion or reliability concern, growth forecast, and ownership preference. EIP Storage will help define the project and the appropriate delivery model.

START A COOPERATIVE STORAGE DISCUSSION