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How Electric Co-ops Drive Tennessee Solar + Battery Storage Growth · Clean Power Hour

• 0:50
  Brandon Wagoner: I don't know if you ever watched Moneyball. You remember on Moneyball, he said, All I care about is if they get on base. For me, the thing I look at all the time is load factor. How can I get my system load factor higher, higher, higher. And to me, that means I'm utilizing my infrastructure at the most I can, which has downward pressure on rates. It has a climate and renewable sustainability target, because it prevents peaker plants from having to come on. If we can shape that with batteries. So to me that what I'm looking at is that load factor all the time.
• 1:21
  Brandon Wagoner: How can I get it higher and higher and higher with this technology?
• 1:25
  intro: Are you speeding the energy transition here at the Clean Power Hour, our host, Tim Montague, bring you the best in solar, batteries and clean technologies every week. Want to go deeper into decarbonization.
• 1:36
  intro: We do too. We're here to help you understand and command the commercial, residential and utility, solar, wind and storage industries. So let's get to it together. We can speed the energy transition.
• 1:51
  Tim Montague: We're here at Tennessee in Nashville, Tennessee 2025 and my guest today is Brandon Wagoner. He's the Vice President of Strategy for Middle Tennessee Electric Co Op. Middle Tennessee Electric Co Op is the largest co op in the Tennessee Valley, or the TVA, and it is the second largest co op in the United States. So it's pretty cool. And as I was telling him in the pre show, this is a first for the Clean Power Hour to have a co op on the show. So
• 2:16
  Brandon Wagoner: welcome, yeah, well, great. Thank you for having me. Appreciate you inviting me to be a guest.
• 2:20
  Tim Montague: It's really great to meet you and learn about your work in the TVA. You know, the TVA serves 10 million people over a huge swath of the state of Tennessee, but also six other states. Many people don't realize that Mississippi, Alabama,
• 2:39
  Brandon Wagoner: some into Kentucky, I guess North Carolina a little bit Georgia
• 2:45
  Tim Montague: and Virginia, Virginia, yep. So anyway, the TV A's responsibility is very similar to an ISO, an independent system operator. It is unique because it is a federal entity. So that has some and I don't know if you want to speak to that, but tell us a little bit Brandon about your work and who you serve, and what your role is at the utility Yeah.
• 3:10
  Brandon Wagoner: Well, so we MTE, we serve about 350,000 meters, and we're just to the south and east of outside of Nashville. So we're, you know, right here in Nashville today, this is natural electric system that we happen to be on today, but right down the road, you'll start seeing the MTE infrastructure. So we, as you mentioned, we're a local power company of TVA. TVA serves as our regulator and our GNT as well. So they generate and transmit to us, and they they do have a very unique formation.
• 3:43
  Brandon Wagoner: They are a self funded organization, but started as part of the New Deal. So they are a federal organization. The President United States appoints those board members that are part that sit on the TVA board, so it's but we've had a very good relationship with him. And I know we'll talk a little bit about some of the things we're doing, but I can't help but just go ahead and say a lot of what we'll talk about is in direct correlation to the great relationship we have with TVA.
• 4:16
  Tim Montague: Cool, yeah, the grid is changing. There's growing demand or load on the grid, because the population is growing, right? We're doing development the sub the suburbs, as we were talking of Nashville, are expanding, and that's part of your territory. So there's growth of the grid, there's growth of AI data centers and data centers at large, but AI data centers are the big dog now. And then there's electrification of everything, electric vehicles, electric heat pumps for heating and cooling and electrification of everything. But from your perspective, what's going on in your territory. How do you guys see things
• 4:53
  Brandon Wagoner: with changes rapidly? We have a especially one specific demographic in our in our service area is a first adopter on a lot of these technologies, and in fact, we're the third largest utility that TVA serves. But I found out that we actually have more electric vehicles on our system than any other local power company in the state of Tennessee, so we feel like our members are calling on us to be experts and as they help adopt these new technologies and learn how to figure them out and be good stewards of their trust to be able to leverage those and I tell you, not a lot of utilities have a strategy department, and we've had one now for about eight years. And when our CEO started it, he told me one thing, he said, the industry is changing, and I want to be opportunistic about those changes and leverage the benefits of all these new changes and technologies for our members. So that's that's what we're trying to do.
• 5:49
  Tim Montague: Loads are a blessing. And a curse, I learned by talking with Peter Kelly Detweiler earlier this year, that, for example, when a gigawatt scale data center goes offline, that can also be a crisis for a utility operator, right? You're you're trying to manage these ups and downs of the load. And it's not just that there's more loads coming.
• 6:10
  Tim Montague: Sometimes loads go away. And of course, we all know about the duck curve in California, where you get a lot of solar generation in the middle of the day. And what that means is the grid operator has to ramp down the resources. Now, you're not in the business of operating those power plants. That's the TV A's job. But where does the where does the TVA stop and Middle Tennessee start?
• 6:35
  Brandon Wagoner: So that's where I think it's so important for us to have that good relationship with TVA, because we're not vertically integrated, but we have a lot of the same challenges. And I think over the last few years, we signed on to be long term partners with TVA, and when that changed from just being a G and T and a distributor to being partners.
• 6:56
  Brandon Wagoner: That's when we had to say, Okay, now we've got to put all of our problems on the table, all of our opportunities on the table, and figure out we can't have those things where we say, well, that's your problem. We're going to build we're going to put the power transformer there, build the line, and you have to worry about it. We've got to share that responsibility. Because ultimately, if you do, even if I don't have to operate the asset, if the asset is built and it's not utilized, or it's has heavily maintenance, it's a heavily maintenance to asset because it has a wild, low profile, well, ultimately that's going to cost money, and that's going to show up in rates. And we want low rates and downward pressure on rates. We believe that these technologies that you've referenced have the opportunity to have downward pressure on rates, but that doesn't happen unless we have that good partnership with our G and T and realize your problems are our problems and vice versa.
• 7:44
  Tim Montague: So you mentioned that you have a density of electric vehicles in your territory, which says something about your demographics. Tell us about your demographics.
• 7:53
  Brandon Wagoner: Sure, we have a really broad range. I mentioned earlier. I think one of the counties we serve, I think, is fifth or sixth in the US and per capita income. And then we have other counties that are on the other end of that spectrum. And so we have members who are very passionate about EVs, for instance, and we have others that maybe they don't, they're not ready for that. And so what we've got to do is figure out, well, we've got, for instance, we have a we call it night flex.
• 8:20
  Brandon Wagoner: It's a rate that is popular with our EV owners, but anyone can take it, and it incentivizes folks to charge those overnight when there's abundance of power generation. It lowers our cost.
• 8:32
  Brandon Wagoner: Saves them money. But that additional cost savings that we have, it gets to go ahead and benefit everyone in the in the valley, whether you're pro EV, anti EV, or somewhere in the middle. So that's where we're trying to figure out, is our members, they want to engage us differently. In fact, we have a Strategy Compass, and at the at the outside of it, we kind of identified how we want our members to perceive us, and we struggled with, do we want to be the provider? Do we want to be their partner? And we realized we want to do all of it. We want to be their partner, provider advocate. And that's what we're doing here, is trying to advocate on behalf of our members, their advisor and their expert, and each one of them wants a different relationship, and we feel like we're called to serve in whatever role they're asking us to
• 9:18
  Tim Montague: serve. The Clean Power Hour is brought to you by CPS America, maker of North America's number one three phase string inverter with over 10 gigawatts shipped in the US. The CPS product lineup includes string inverters ranging from 25 kW to 350 kW, their flagship inverter the CPS, 350 KW is designed to work with solar plants ranging from two megawatts to two gigawatts. CPS is the world's most bankable inverter brand, and is America's number one choice for solar plants now offering solutions for commercial utility ESS and balance of system requirements go to Chint Power Systems com or call 855-584-7168, to find out more. Now, in many parts of the country, we would have what's called time of use rates. Is that being implemented in Tennessee. So
• 10:16
  Brandon Wagoner: the night flex rate I mentioned is, is our version of time of use, and it's a non traditional it doesn't follow the peak cost, the high cost, peak hours. All it basically does is, we evaluated our low profile, and we realized that sometimes those those on peak hours change depending on if it's a hot month or a cold month, that's going to be too much for our members to try to keep up with. What we did find is there's a six hour window overnight that is always a cost saving benefit to us, and so for now, this is kind of maybe a step one. We're going to try to funnel more energy into that six hour window. Know, and then if we get have to reevaluate, you know, one of the things about the industry today is that you you have to make decisions and then be able to reevaluate in five years and and modify them.
• 11:00
  Brandon Wagoner: So we're trying to put as many arrows in our quiver as we can, because there's not a that we're not in a situation where there's a silver bullet for any of these things. So, so that's sort of our version of time of use for our members.
• 11:16
  Tim Montague: So what are some of the other arrows in your quiver you can control rates and do time of use. But what is it?
• 11:23
  Tim Montague: Is it all about technology, or is it also about just like building out the distribution grid, for example? Yeah, yeah,
• 11:31
  Brandon Wagoner: no, it's great question. And I think there's, there's, we probably have a programmatic approach that is, I would say, the next arrow in our quiver, where we can incentivize folks to do things and give them a financial incentive. So for instance, if you were to put an EV charger in your home, we'll give you a $50 rebate on your electric bill. And I know it's not a lot of money, but it allows us the flexibility that someone says, Well, I missed the six month window. Well, we're we can work with that. The other thing is, was we have a pro solar team where folks, they're engaging with different solar developers, but they want that trusted resource to come in and say, Am I missing anything? And so we have because we're not, you know, as a distributor, we don't really care how our members get it. We want them to get it the way they want to get it, but we feel like we need to be that resource for them. So we have some programmatic and relationship building arrows.
• 12:26
  Brandon Wagoner: And then another thing that I'm really excited about is, as a part of our long term partnership agreement with TVA, we just announced that we have turned on a 3.25 megawatt tracking solar array in our service area, and then at the first beginning of 2028 we're gonna have another 110 megawatt solar tracking array right outside our service area, and that's going To be a direct TVA project. So, so those are some of the things that we're doing, and it's the rate for some folks, it doesn't work, right?
• 12:57
  Brandon Wagoner: Because it's like, well, I work from home, so I can't, I can't funnel energy. So that's okay.
• 13:03
  Brandon Wagoner: We're going to try to find other things that we can do that are going to meet your, meet you where you're at
• 13:08
  Tim Montague: in this day and age. It's all about solar and batteries and EV infrastructure, but talk, talk to me about solar and batteries, and what is it that your clients are looking for?
• 13:23
  Brandon Wagoner: You know, I think it's a it's real interesting, because a lot of our programs are residential, but we do have a team for commercial and industrial, and that's where they want to be, that partner, they say we have a carbon goal. Help us meet it. So we have a team that's designated to sit with them, and sometimes we have to be very creative on how can we do that to help them meet their goal? But I want to kind of go back to the residential piece. The residential landscape is changing drastically. We have more and more of our members that rent versus own their home, and they're also very passionate about their renewable goals. And so it's kind of hard, though, if you're renting an apartment, I can't, you know, you can't go out and put solar on your rooftop. And so we've got cooperative solar programs, the program, the developments I just mentioned to you, those are opportunities where we're bringing on new the World Solar, and we can retire those wrecks on behalf of our membership, so that they can have that benefit, even if they can't do it in a traditional rooftop
• 14:22
  Tim Montague: way. Sure, we would call that community solar in Illinois. Is that how?
• 14:26
  Brandon Wagoner: That's right?
• 14:26
  Brandon Wagoner: Yeah, yeah. And I'll tell you mentioned batteries. I want to show share one more thing. I just got an email. We're going to get our first delivery of a eight megawatt two hour system that will be delivered December 12, talking about a battery, talking about a two hour battery, eight megawatts, but it's one of four. So when we're done, we should by q1 2026, we should have 32 megawatts of two hour batteries in service across our service territory.
• 14:56
  Tim Montague: Very cool, very cool. And when you think about batteries as a grid operator, what is the service that the battery is providing you?
• 15:03
  Brandon Wagoner: So for me, the one thing I don't know, if you ever watch Moneyball, you remember on Moneyball, he said, All I care about is if they get on base. For me, the thing I look at all the time is load factor. How can I get my system load factor higher, higher, higher. And to me, that means I'm utilizing my infrastructure at the most I can, which has downward pressure on rates. It has a climate and renewable sustainability target, because it prevents peaker plants from having to come on. If we can shape that with batteries. So to me, that that what I'm looking at is that load factor all the time. How can I get it higher and higher and higher with this technology?
• 15:41
  Tim Montague: Well, what else should our listeners know about your co op? I really appreciate this conversation, and it's great to see how much dG is happening in tennis. See, you're not a top 10 state yet, but there's glimmers of hope, I think. And there's been a lot of talk here at Tennessee about batteries, I have to say, both within the Nashville municipal utility, excuse me, and and then other rumblings from other developers and asset operators.
• 16:10
  Tim Montague: But what else should our listeners know that we may not know otherwise?
• 16:17
  Brandon Wagoner: Yeah, you know, I guess all I can really say is that deep down, our heart is in service. We want to serve our members. We feel like we owe it to them, and this is a really fulfilling job. What we get to do, you know, it's not just a job. You go punch the clock and get paid and go home. It's a calling. And I think, I think when I love these kind of conferences, because I get to meet people like yourself that understand that we're called to serve, and so that's how we're serving today. Let's connect again in a few years and see what else changes, but as things develop, and now you know a little bit more about what we've got going on. I hope you and your listeners will reach out with things, because we're trying to learn and listen as much as we can.
• 16:59
  Tim Montague: Yeah, I really want to emphasize that Co Op operators around the country have a lot to learn from each other. And before we go, what is the context that you all have, like, is there an association that you belong to where you come together and share ideas and best practices?
• 17:17
  Brandon Wagoner: We have several. So we have our statewide Co Op Teca. We also have a nationwide co op in our ECA. So we have different groups of co op members that share things. But then also, just here in the valley, there's several Valley associations that we're a part of where we share that's one great thing about our industry, where I came from, a place where it was all about trade secrets, you couldn't talk about it. And here we get to share best practices and sometimes, even more importantly, lessons learned, things that we should have done we messed up, and we don't want others to go make that mistake.
• 17:50
  Brandon Wagoner: So none of these things happen in a vacuum, and I'm very thankful for that, because we get to build on the momentum that others make, and hopefully people can build on the momentum that we're making.
• 18:04
  Tim Montague: Check out all of our content at cleanpowerhour.com please tell a friend about the show. That's the best thing you can do to help others find this content.
• 18:12
  Tim Montague: Check us out at Clean Power Hour calm and on YouTube. Connect with me on LinkedIn. I love hearing from my listeners, and with that, I'll say I'm Tim Montague. Let's grow solar and storage and thank you so much.
• 18:22
  Tim Montague: Brandon Wagoner with Middle Tennessee Co Op. Thank you so much. Appreciate it. Thanks. You.