Meet One Of Tesla's Key Battery Partners

EnerNOC, Inc. ENOC is a key partner to Tesla Motors Inc TSLA in deployment of its battery storage units.

The company provides demand response and energy management software to commercial and industrial (C&I) users, according to a Greentech report from Jeff St. John.

CEO Tim Healy said that EnerNOC’s initial Tesla battery deployments were at “select customer sites in California" and he went on to describe EnerNOC’s energy intelligence software (EIS) as the “information layer” between Tesla’s batteries and customer sites, allowing customers to “monitor the batteries and engage in demand-charge management and demand response.”

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It was unclear, however, when the Tesla business would become a significant generator of revenue for EnerNOC as the growth of the market may depend on Tesla Powerpack units coming in at a low cost to customers.

“EnerNOC is using Tesla's 100-kilowatt-hour Powerpack units, capable of discharge over two to four hours at a time, which Tesla has said will come in at a cost of $25,000 apiece, or $250 per kilowatt-hour,” according to the report.

While the above prices may be relatively low for utility-scale lithium-ion batteries, the report added that it was unclear how much more costs would be added “with the addition of bidirectional inverters, other supporting electronics, and installation costs.”

Over the long-term, software for managing batteries, including Tesla’s Powerpack, have a critical role to play from Healy’s perspective.

“Batteries are an important piece of the puzzle in moving from central generation to distributed energy resources and microgrids. And in order for this transition to work, the industry requires software as an important part of the information layer,” Healy concluded.

EnerNOC recently traded at $10.28, down 1.25 percent.