Advanced Clean Communities Collaborative (AC3)

Up to 1,000 new and existing single-family and multi-family homes will be connected through the EnergyHub DERMS platform to serve utility peak capacity and resource adequacy needs in Duke Energy’s service territory in North Carolina. Data will be collected on a range of residential dwelling types, end uses, and technologies and analyzed to determine the value of grid connected homes and help identify the best approaches for delivering flexible distributed capacity at scale.

Illustrative Schematic of Project
Illustrative Schematic of Project
Map of Connected Communities in North Carolina
Map of Connected Communities in North Carolina
Schematic of Data Flows and Real-Time Decisions
Schematic of Data Flows and Real-Time Decisions
CURB HEM Install
CURB HEM Install
Project Lead
IBACOS, Inc.
Planned Location of Buildings
Greater Raleigh and Charlotte in North Carolina
Partners

Tierra Resource Consultants
National Renewable Energy Laboratory
Energy and Environmental Economics (E3)
Duke Energy
Meritage Homes
Mattamy Homes
American Homes 4 Rent
Elevation
EnergyHub
Shifted Energy

Building types
Up to 1,000 buildings total representing a mix of 500 new homes and 500 existing single-family properties, including both owner-occupied and rental homes
New or retrofit buildings
New and existing homes
Energy Efficiency Target
New construction homes achieve ENERGY STAR compliance and/or average HERS scores in the low- to mid-50’s.
Total load
N/A
DERs planned

Smart thermostats (1,000+), water heater controllers (800), battery storage systems (13.5kWh on some homes), EV-ready charging infrastructure (200+ units)

Flexible Loads
Up to 3.8 MW of aggregated flexible load from 'smart' grid-connected DER technologies including water heating, smart thermostats, solar PV systems (some homes), storage (some homes), and electrification technologies (ASHP w/ backup electric resistance); existing homes only targeting smart tstats, water heaters
Grid issues addressed
This project will focus on defining and addressing winter peak capacity challenges caused by electric heating in the residential sector.
Grid services planned
Winter peak demand side capacity, system peak capacity/energy, local T&D capacity, load shifting and curtailment to manage variable renewable energy integration, frequency and voltage support, and improved resilience and resource diversity to help defer major infrastructure capital investments.
EV Charging
Many new project homes will be EV-ready. Anticipating five to ten EV chargers located in the Mattamy Homes Riverfall new home community in Angier, NC to provide flexible capacity linked to the “most innovative home in NC” concept, including behind-the-meter battery storage, PV, smart electrical panels, high efficiency electric heat pumps with smart thermostats, and managed heat pump water heaters.
Affordable Housing
Currently collecting submeter data on 28 mobile homes, all of which are low-income residents in rural locations in North Carolina with a focus on defining energy efficiency and demand response retrofit packages based on energy usage and grid impact metrics.
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