DERs can provide fast, flexible, and local support in emergencies. But for that to happen, grid operators need reliable, real-time data.

Rethinking Resilience in a Decentralized Grid
As climate-driven extreme weather events pile up, the Texas winter storm of 2021 being a good example, the question of whether our power systems are ready is no longer theoretical. Grid operators have been spending time and money on advanced monitoring, weather modeling, and system hardening to make the grid more resilient. Investment on infrastructure is reaching record levels as demand for resilience and renewable integration grows. Still, these investments are not enough, and one piece of the puzzle is often overlooked: how to integrate and orchestrate the growing fleet of distributed energy resources (DERs).
DERs can provide fast, flexible, and local support in emergencies. But for that to happen, grid operators need reliable, real-time data. The sticking points aren’t technological. They’re structural, regulatory, and political.

Data at the Edge: DERs as Latent Resilience Assets
DERs, solar PV, batteries, EVs, smart thermostats, flexible commercial loads, are no longer fringe technologies. In many places they’re growing faster than centralized generation. In the U.S., residential DER deployment could even outpace utility-scale capacity by 2035¹. Technically, these resources can provide voltage and frequency support, peak shaving, islanding, even black start. But in practice, most of them remain invisible when the grid is under stress. Why? Because operators can’t see them. System operators often don’t have real-time data on DER location, status, state of charge, or ramping potential. Even when data exists, it may be proprietary, inconsistent, or just not compatible with utility systems. Aggregators may have some visibility, but they usually lack data on local grid connditions. And many DERs sit behind the meter, where utilities don’t have access unless it comes through smart meters or explicit customer consent. There are interoperability standards out there, IEEE 2030.5, OpenADR, IEC 61850, but adoption is slow and patchy. Without common communication pathways, DERs can’t be coordinated in a crisis. And if planners don’t see them, they can’t factor them into adequacy or contingency models.

The result? Millions of DERs that could be helping during emergencies end up not seen, not trusted, and not dispatched when it matters most.

Utilities, aggregators, and grid operators often speak different “languages” when it comes to data. What’s needed is a shared framework: open protocols, secure platforms, and systems that actually work across vendors.

Data Access and the Regulatory Divide: U.S.–EU Comparisons
Both the U.S. and the EU see the potential of DERs, but they’ve taken different paths on how to handle data, integration, and market participation.

• United States: Market Access with Friction
In the U.S., FERC Orders 841 and 2222 were landmark rulings. They opened wholesale markets to DERs and said aggregations must be allowed to compete on the same footing as traditional resources. That’s a big deal on paper. In practice, though, implementation is uneven. Distribution utilities, who control interconnection and data, have often resisted, citing cost, complexity, and operational risk. Programs like Green Button Connect were supposed to make customer data access easier. But uptake is voluntary, and in reality patchy. Some utilities have workable systems; others still want PDF letters of authorization. Agreements between utilities and aggregators often get hammered out case by case, which slows things down. And since U.S. energy policy is state-driven, the rules vary a lot depending on where you are.

• European Union: Consumer Empowerment and Data Protection
The EU has leaned more toward empowering consumers and creating energy communities. The Clean Energy for All Europeans package gave individuals the right to generate, store, and sell electricity, which helped push decentralization forward. The unbundling of DSOs from suppliers has also reduced conflicts of interest and, in theory, created a fairer playing field for DERs at the distribution level.
But the EU has challenges of its own. GDPR sets a high bar for privacy, which complicates sharing real time DER data, especially behind the meter. Implementation also varies across Member States, and many DSOs are still modernizing their digital capabilities.

Converging Challenges, Diverging Tools
While the U.S. leans on market-based rules and the EU stresses consumer rights, both face the same bottleneck: a lack of clear data infrastructure. Market access alone won’t deliver resilience. If data can’t flow between generators, operators, utilities, and customers, securely and in real time, DERs will remain underused when emergencies strike.

Unlocking DERs for Resilience: What’s Missing?
If DERs are to play a bigger role in resilience, a few things need to fall into place, in both policy and practice.

1. Standardized, Interoperable Data Sharing
   Utilities, aggregators, and grid operators often speak different “languages” when it comes to data. What’s needed is a shared framework: open protocols, secure platforms, and systems that actually work across vendors. A simple example: real-time load and generation data flowing between DSOs and TSOs to improve forecasting, congestion management, and balancing during stress events.
2. Clear Regulatory Mandates for Data Access
   Markets exist because regulators wrote the rules. The same has to happen for data: who can see what, when, and under what conditions.
   This could include:
   • Requiring DER data-sharing in interconnection agreements
   • Building common APIs for grid edge visibility
   • And most importantly, moving to a single customer-consent system that works everywhere, instead of today’s patchwork of LOAs and failed Green Button attempts
3. Valuing Resilience in Market Design and Planning
   Right now, resilience is treated like an afterthought. DERs don’t get credit for keeping the lights on or reducing peak stress. That needs to change. Regulators should include resilience as a measurable outcome and compensate DERs for it. California is beginning to ask how storage and microgrids should be valued, and European regulators could do the same through their National Energy and Climate Plans, especially in vulnerable areas.
4. Investing in Data Infrastructure as Critical Resilience Infrastructure
   Data isn’t a nice to have. It’s as essential as substations or poles and wires. Governments and operators should fund digital twins, DER registries, and real-time visibility tools with the same priority as physical grid upgrades. Without that digital backbone, the grid won’t adapt fast enough to new threats.
   

Conclusion: Resilience Is a Data and Policy Choice

The grid of the future will be defined not just by where electrons come from, but by where data flows and who gets to use it. DERs are already here. The question is whether we leave them sidelined or make the effort to integrate them as real resilience assets.
The U.S. and Europe each bring something useful. Europe highlights consumer rights and privacy, while the U.S. pushes harder on market access and competition. Both perspectives have value.
Both also hit the same wall: without clear rules and investment in digital infrastructure, DERs won’t deliver on their resilience potential.


At the end of the day, resilience is not just a technical matter. It’s a policy choice. And the systems that choose visibility, interoperability, and trust will be the ones that bounce back faster and adapt better when disruption come

Without clear rules and investment in digital infrastructure, DERs won’t deliver on their resilience potential.

¹https://www.deloitte.com/us/en/insights/industry/power-and-utilities/der-grid-modernization.html

This article was originally published in the November 2025 issue of the Power Systems Technology magazine, which you can access here.

Barbara S. dos Santos, Ph.D. is the Utility Partnerships Lead at Arcadia and a nation, a leader in clean energy policy.

This article was originally published in the November 2025 issue of the Resilience of the Power System magazine.

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