Energy Sector Market Analysis and Business Strategy Development
Even the most sophisticated of clients benefit from our insider knowledge of energy and environmental markets. We provide analyses tailored to our clients’ needs and interests, mapping broad market developments and flagging specific dynamics that can be the difference between success and failure.
Our work with clients has provided us with opportunities to gain deep insight into the portfolio of clean energy technologies necessary to achieve long-term global decarbonization, as well as policy efforts to address key barriers to their broader deployment.
Representative Case Studies:
- Demand Response: For a major energy company looking to make an acquisition to enter the demand response (DR) market, we provided a detailed analysis of DR revenue opportunities, policy opportunities and risks, and created a benchmarking analysis of all relevant market players.
- Shale Gas: For a major overseas oil and gas midstream infrastructure company, we did a comprehensive analysis of the U.S. shale gas sector, identifying potential entry points, risks, and potential partners.
- Distributed Energy Resources & Customer Expectations: For a large U.S. company entering the distributed energy resource (DER) market, we did analyses of customer expectations and needs; novel financing mechanisms driven by state policies; and the value and risks of markets for environmental attributes;
- Grid Modernization: For a data analytics company, we did a deep dive into the changing role of data in the retail electricity sector, analyzing the impact of state-level grid modernization efforts, and identifying potential customers.
- S. Markets Explained: For a large Asian capital provider, we provided analyses of markets in the U.S. and Latin America for geothermal energy, carbon capture and sequestration technologies, electric vehicles, nuclear energy, and wind power.
- Water Conservation: On behalf of a multinational consumer goods company seeking to promote water conservation, we surveyed federal and utility-level water conservation incentives and regulatory structures to identify policy best practices. Our analysis informed the company’s advocacy strategy regarding water conservation in countries around the world.
Areas of Expertise:
- Electric Grid. Green Strategies actively tracks the rapid evolution of the electric grid, working with clients focused on transmission and distribution grid markets. Green Strategies routinely prepares market analyses of topics such as renewables integration, high-voltage direct current transmission, grid modernization, and utility distribution grid planning initiatives to accommodate the increasing penetration of distributed energy resources (DERs), including distributed generation, energy storage, demand response, and electric vehicles (EVs). Green Strategies is well-versed on emerging utility capabilities with smart metering, data analytics, and DER management (distributed energy resource management systems and virtual power plants).
- Renewable Energy. Green Strategies has worked extensively on policy frameworks and market transactions across the renewable energy sector, including: on-shore and off-shore wind; solar photovoltaic and solar thermal; hydropower; biomass energy for heat and electricity; biogas/biomethane; geothermal; and renewable hydrogen. Roger Ballentine co-founded the American Council on Renewable Energy (ACORE) in 2001 and served on the Advisory Board of the U.S. National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL).
- Hydrogen Economy. Green Strategies has advised companies spanning the range of the potential hydrogen economy value chain. We advise clients envisioning the production and use of large volumes of carbon-free hydrogen to decarbonize the power, transportation, and industrial sectors.
- Energy Efficiency. Green Strategies has a deep familiarity with energy efficiency policy mechanisms including federal and state appliance standards (and the standards-setting processes); state and local building efficiency standards and codes; federal and state vehicle efficiency standards; utility incentive programs; and financing tools (e.g., property assessed clean energy (PACE) funding).
- Electric Vehicles. Green Strategies has worked with clients spanning the EV marketplace — including major automakers, EV service equipment manufacturers, battery manufacturers, and transportation fleet managers — advising on policy developments and market trends. We have recently focused on utility efforts to manage EV charging to mitigate the potential need for new infrastructure, to align EV demand with periods of high renewable generation, and to increase customer satisfaction with EVs.
- Nuclear Power. Green Strategies has advised clients on U.S. policy development in the nuclear power sector. We track and monitor stakeholder efforts to reform the federal licensing process for next generation advanced reactors and the development of new federal-level RD&D efforts.
- Carbon Capture Utilization and Storage. Green Strategies has advised the developers of CCUS projects in the United States and helped in the development of business strategy and policy engagement. Green Strategies has helped these companies work with environmental and other industry stakeholders to successfully secure new and higher value federal tax incentives from Congress and the implementation of workable federal regulations for long-term underground carbon storage.
- Bioenergy and Biomaterials. Green Strategies has worked with suppliers of bioenergy – forest, renewable natural gas, biogas – and customers looking to substitute fossil-based inputs with bio-based inputs. Most of these markets rely on supportive policies, and we actively engage in policy development.
- Microgrids. Green Strategies has worked closely with a leading microgrid manufacturer to assess the public policy landscape to identify opportunities for microgrid deployment and needed policy support. We have assessed how electricity markets and policymaker interest in grid resiliency can effectively compensate microgrids and justify private investment.
- Energy Storage. Green Strategies has worked with energy storage (battery and non-battery storage) providers, analyzing how public financial incentives and electricity market revenue can support project development. Most recently, Green Strategies has explored how battery storage in conjunction with other DERs can deliver “non-wires alternatives (NWAs)” to traditional utility investments in transmission and distribution grid infrastructure and how regulatory policy could evolve to properly compensate NWA investment.
- Industrial Decarbonization. Green Strategies has worked with multinational corporations and policymakers on solutions to address emissions in hard-to-abate industrial sectors through innovative strategies and emerging green technologies, including carbon capture and hydrogen.
Corporate Energy Strategy and Procurement
For nearly two decades, Green Strategies has been at the forefront of efforts by companies to better manage their energy spend and to reduce their carbon footprints and utilize clean energy in the face of a rapidly changing regulatory and market structures.
Representative Case Studies:
- Energy Procurement Guidance: For a large consumer products manufacturer, we created an energy procurement handbook to guide energy buyers in the changing market landscape, giving them the tools they needed to procure clean energy from utilities and third-party providers, evaluate options for on-site renewable energy, and to identify and exploit opportunities for cost savings through energy efficiency.
- Negotiation: For use in regulated electricity markets, we provided a comprehensive guide for negotiating clean energy procurement options with utilities, identifying key tariff structure elements, summarizing examples of successful clean energy procurement mechanisms, and providing a playbook for successful engagement.
- Benchmarking: For a provider of clean energy development and financing services, we analyzed the state of corporate clean energy procurement, identifying best practices, providing insight into corporate energy procurement processes, and identified project opportunities.
- Siting: For a large corporate with multiple facilities across the U.S., we analyzed and prioritized sites for potential on-site solar development, analyzed relevant policy and subsidy dynamics, examined environmental attribute markets, and wrote requests for proposals (RFPs) for candidate sites.
Partner and Transaction Development
With our insights into market drivers and customer strategies, we help developers and solution providers find go-to-market partners and identify potential transactions.
Representative Case Studies:
- Project Opportunities: For a project developer, we identified specific project opportunities and made introductions to intermediaries running proprietary RFPs for a host of major building asset owners looking to develop on-site solar projects.
- Project Execution: For a renewable energy developer with a site under control for possible project development, we identified potential off-takers, made introductions, and guided negotiations.
- Sustainable Growth Plan: In 2007 KKR, TPG and Goldman Sachs executed the largest private equity transaction in history – the purchase of Texas Utilities (TXU). The private equity buyers knew that their target could only become a valuable investment – and an investment consistent with their own sustainability standards – if a new growth plan was designed. The buyers brought in Green Strategies to help design that plan. Using our extensive knowledge of climate mitigation options, energy efficiency best practices, and energy and environmental markets in general, we designed a far-reaching environmental “turn around” plan for the utility that resulted in greatly reducing the number of coal plants to be built while undertaking a broad program of environmental improvements and commitments. The result was a proposal that, when it went public, garnered the support of the environmental community and that broke regulatory and political gridlock. Green Strategies’ work was noted in the New York Times and The Wall Street Journal.
(*Green Strategies Inc., is not registered as a broker dealer under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 or as an investment advisor under the Investor Advisor Act of 1940).
