Tata Power has joined forces with AutoGrid, a virtual power plant (VPP) and distributed energy management system (DERMS) provider, to deploy an artificial intelligence (AI) enabled smart energy management system in Mumbai.

The smart energy management system will focus on the behavioral demand response across Tata Power’s residential, industrial, and commercial customers in the city.

According to Tata Power, the initiative will help address the challenges of peak demand and underpin the clean energy transition of India as well as its net zero goals.

The demand response management program, which will serve Tata Power’s customers in Mumbai, is aimed at engaging 55,000 residential consumers and 6,000 large commercial and industrial customers to achieve a peak capacity reduction of 75MW within the first six months of the launch, starting from this month. The initiative will continue to scale up to 200MW by 2025 summer, said Tata Power.

Tata Power and AutoGrid have been collaborating since 2021 following the introduction of a demand response program for the former’s Delhi Distribution’s residential customers. After the success of the initiative, Tata Power is said to considerably expanded it within the Delhi distribution region last year.

AutoGrid is now extending the program across the distribution territories of Tata Power to cover all consumer segments.

Amit Narayan — AutoGrid Founder and CEO said: “India and Tata Power can reach ambitious sustainability goals by leveraging the flexible capacity available by adopting innovative approaches to leverage distributed energy resources.

“At AutoGrid, we feel privileged and passionate about supporting Tata Power’s visionary efforts to collaborate with its customers through behavioral and AI-driven demand orchestration.”

Apart from the behavioral demand response (BDR) program, Tata Power will stack on an automated demand response (ADR) program with direct load control supported by the participation of customers with its EZ Home in-house smart plug platform.

With the new demand response program of Tata Power developed on the AutoGrid Flex platform, users can get incentives by opting to curb their load in response to signals relayed through SMS and/or email during times of critical requirement.

Tata Power said that there is a possibility to remove the need for costly and heavy-polluting plants by aggregating small demand adjustments by consumers.

Dr. Praveer Sinha — Tata Power CEO and MD said: “AI-enabled Demand Behavioural Response System has the potential to empower customers and make them join the energy transition journey. Tata Power is committed to make this advanced system mainstream and promote a culture of hi-tech energy conservation.

“Our association with AutoGrid allows us to partner with our customers in load management and help them save on their energy consumption.”

  Amit Narayan, artificial intelligence, AutoGrid, Dr. Praveer Sinha, India, Mumbai, Praveer Sinha, Tata Power