Resilience Policy Roadmap
Published in the wake of devastating wildfires and extreme weather impacts, this report provides a framework for policymakers to put states on a path toward a resilient electrical system.
Policymakers, especially utility regulatory commissioners and staff, struggle to formulate a comprehensive response to strengthening the grid against climate-driven weather while increasing reliance on clean energy technologies and ensuring energy transition benefits are shared equitably.
Affordable, reliable “clean resilience” solutions have emerged that are already protecting communities across the nation. Through studies and pilots, states and cities have demonstrated the ability of solar-plus-storage systems to provide safe, clean, and continuous backup power following natural disasters and outages.
Comprehensive policy support is needed to scale implementation. Even in the most at-risk states, the policy landscape is a piecemeal collection of pilots, small grant programs, and catastrophe response – not a systematic and proactive approach to ensuring widespread energy resilience for all.
While each state’s specific needs, challenges and opportunities are unique, the EPDI team shows that all policy roadmaps can share a common structure and consider common design questions. Accordingly, the report provides templates for:
A roadmap destination
An equity framework
Component definitions
An organizational approach to categorizing a wide range of resilience needs
A methodology for valuing resilience
And five example policy timelines that outline approaches to kickstarting, supporting, and optimizing a sustainable market for resilience services that drive investment towards the roadmap destination.