In a groundbreaking development, Bandera Electric Cooperative consumer-members stand to reap significant financial benefits as participants in a real-time wholesale electricity market on a platform built by their co-op to aggregate behind-the-meter resources.

BEC's virtual power plant qualified to join the Electric Reliability Council of Texas on Aug. 20 and has since been called on to contribute half a megawatt to the supply pool. By year's end, the Bandera, Texas-based co-op anticipates its VPP selling up to 1 MW into ERCOT and eventually up to 6 MW as it aggregates more participating members' distribution resources.

“With about 140 employees serving over 29,000 members, what BEC has been able to achieve is nothing short of spectacular," said Lidija Sekaric, vice president, innovation and emerging technology, for NRECA's Business and Technology Strategies department.

“They have been able to build and maintain a world-class product with very little resources compared to private companies. I can't wait to see what they will achieve with the ERCOT integration."

BEC is the first electric co-op to build a VPP to sell into a real-time energy market, which includes mega-players like Tesla Electric. BEC also is provisionally qualified to participate in ERCOT's ancillary services market, which supports grid reliability.

So far, the VPP includes 26 participants from BEC's residential battery lease program. The co-op expects many more of its members with rooftop solar, smart thermostats, electric vehicles and even connected pool pumps to enroll and grow the system's supply.

“We're actually empowering the member so they can participate in the wholesale market directly," said Bill Hetherington, Bandera EC's CEO. “For the first time they have a financial incentive to conserve electricity. Before, it's always been, 'Conserve for the good of the cause.' Now you will be paid market price if you conserve. That is a substantial change."

“This is a whole new way of using electricity," where participating members can weigh the reward of reducing consumption and being part of the generating fleet, said John Padalino, BEC general counsel and chief administrative officer. “And it's not just a little rebate but real revenue."

The system operates using a device-level meter and a hardware and software platform custom-built by BEC and dubbed Apolloware. Last year, the co-op began exploring how this aggregated DER could respond in real-time with energy supplies. This summer, BEC met ERCOT's 14 rigorous requirements and was certified to join the market.

“They treat this virtual power plant with the same protocol as it would a nuclear power plant," Hetherington said. “I've got to basically be able to control and move the load just like any other generation plant. We're not given any break just because we have distributed resources."

This success began seven years ago when BEC developed Apolloware to help members who were misinformed by third-party solar installers that rooftop panels would eliminate electricity bills. In 2019, BEC required members to access the platform as a part of its interconnection policy on all the solar and storage devices in the co-op's territory.

“We just wanted to create a real-time energy monitoring platform that could show our members how solar and storage were really interacting with the grid in real-time," Padalino said. “Sometimes it serves your house; sometimes there's a little extra going to the grid."

And all the work is paying off.

“This is actually generating revenue," said Hetherington. “It contributes to the margin. It allows us to keep our rates lower; it allows us to pay back to our members through their patronage capital quicker.

“It's been an investment of time and effort, but we believe firmly that it's been beneficial both for BEC and our members."