Thanks to the Utility Relief Act of 2026 and the Next Generation Energy Act of 2026 the Public Service Commission is currently running a utility scale battery procurement that could build roughly 900 megawatts of battery storage. That is great news, and it has gotten a lot of attention, but there is another, lesser known process unfolding in Maryland with the potential to unlock gigawatts of battery capacity.

This effort stems from the fact that batteries weren’t really available when the policies governing our electric grid were put in place, and as a result, our cost allocation systems don’t know how to compensate batteries for the valuable services they provide to the grid. Grid batteries are a new technology that functions very differently from anything we have had before, and now the policy has to catch up to the technology.

To achieve exactly that purpose, the Maryland Energy Storage Program Workgroup of the Public Service Commission recently released their final report, the culmination of years of work bringing together all relevant stakeholders. The result is a detailed plan for how to integrate distributed batteries into the grid and rate structures in a way that recognizes the costs that are avoided thanks to batteries, such as not needed to build or upgrade a substation, and compensates batteries for the precise value of the services they provide.

To talk all about this new model tariff, what it would mean for battery deployment in the state, and when it is likely to be implemented, I am joined by Ted Ko who is the Founder and Executive Director of Energy Policy Design Institute, and Hans Riemer who is a former Montgomery County Council Member and is now the Senior External Affairs Manager at Trajectory Energy Partners.