The Riddle of Resilience: What’s important for society and the economy and yet has no value?

How does the power sector incorporate a value for resilience, when many of the benefits are difficult to quantify? This article examines methods of implementing resilience solutions and analyzes a recent NARUC report.

The Union of Concerned Scientists convened a group of diverse stakeholders in Chicago late last year to discuss the equitable deployment of energy storage. The participants developed a set of consensus principles for storage deployment that elevate the critical importance of community-led clean energy solutions. Listed second in those principles was improving resilience. From their report:

“2. Ensure that energy storage helps make residents and communities more resilient to both human-caused and natural disasters — which will become more frequent and severe due to climate change — by deploying local, onsite power to keep essential services operating during extended power outages and by restoring power after a disaster.”

That’s the buzzword in renewable energy now: resiliency.