Issues of the Environment : State Senator from Ann Arbor advocates for virtual power plants

wemu.org · Feb 18, 2026 · Collected from GDELT

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OverviewWhen Senator Jeff Irwin talks about virtual power plants, he’s not just talking about clean energy — he’s talking about who controls electricity on Michigan’s grid. The legislation he introduced in December 2025 would allow rooftop solar panels, home batteries, electric vehicles, and smart appliances to be aggregated and dispatched together, effectively shifting some operational control away from centralized utilities and toward customers and third-party operators. Supporters frame this as efficiency and resilience, but structurally, it represents a quiet redistribution of power in Michigan’s energy system. (Source: https://senatedems.com/irwin/2025/12/09/virtual-power-plants/)The push for virtual power plants (VPPs) is happening as Michigan prepares for a wave of new electricity demand that could reshape the grid. Utility planning documents show Consumers Energy evaluating up to 15 gigawatts of potential data center load, with DTE Energy acknowledging interest in roughly 7 gigawatts more. Analysts cited in reporting warn that a single one-gigawatt data center could increase residential electric bills by five to ten percent if infrastructure costs are passed on to customers. Lawmakers backing VPPs argue that coordinating existing distributed energy could help absorb that growth without building new fossil-fuel plants. (Source: https://planetdetroit.org/2025/10/data-centers-michigan-power-costs/)In Irwin’s own district, the virtual power plant concept is already moving from theory to reality. In Ann Arbor, the Veridian at County Farm development was designed as a net-zero, all-electric community that uses solar panels, battery storage, and smart controls to function like a neighborhood-scale power plant. Public radio coverage has highlighted the project as a model for how distributed energy could support climate goals while reducing strain on the grid, aligning with Ann Arbor’s 2030 carbon-neutrality target and Washtenaw County’s broader environmental commitments.Environmentally, supporters say virtual power plants could reduce reliance on fossil-fuel “peaker plants,” which are among the grid’s most polluting generators and are typically used during heat waves or emergencies. That makes VPPs attractive to lawmakers trying to meet Michigan’s mandate for 100% clean energy by 2040. At the same time, critics warn that without careful design, the financial benefits may flow mainly to households that can afford solar panels, batteries, or electric vehicles, raising equity concerns, along with questions about data privacy and consumer control over energy use.Whether virtual power plants become a meaningful part of Michigan’s grid may ultimately come down to utility politics and money. Senator Sue Shink has said publicly that if utilities oppose the legislation, it is unlikely to advance — a reflection of the influence companies like DTE and Consumers Energy hold in Lansing. That influence is under growing scrutiny, with advocacy groups pushing a 2026 ballot initiative to ban political contributions from regulated utilities, arguing that utility money skews energy policy decisions. As a result, the debate over virtual power plants is also a debate over who shapes Michigan’s energy future.(Source: https://www.bridgemi.com/michigan-government/michigan-groups-aim-ban-political-spending-dte-consumers-state-contractors/)TranscriptionDavid Fair: This is 89.1 WEMU, and we continue to look at what our energy future will be and how it's going to be shaped and controlled. I'm David Fair, and this is Issues of the Environment. State Senator Jeff Irwin is an Ann Arbor Democrat and a proponent of virtual power plants. It would shift part of the operational control away from centralized utilities, like DTE and Consumers Energy, and toward consumers and third-party operators. That may sound a bit futuristic, but examples already exist. Now, can it win enough support to be built out to scale? That's a big question! That's why we invited Senator Irwin to be our guest today. And thank you for carving out some time for us! I appreciate it!Sen. Jeff Irwin: No, thank you for your interest!David Fair: Now, for those who are unfamiliar with the term "virtual power plant," what exactly are you referring to? Sen. Jeff Irwin: Well, this just refers to any system or program that is aggregating energy resources or reducing demand in ways that are reliable and deployable. David Fair: So, I mentioned that there are examples. Would you consider Veridian at County Farm as one of them? Sen. Jeff Irwin: Yeah, that's actually a project that's trying to put together that kind of operation on a site. Another thing that people might imagine is if you had a whole bunch of neighbors who all had batteries in their homes or maybe even all had electric vehicles who they were willing to use in a certain way, that battery capacity, if it was all working together and deployable together, could be a resource that could help us save money. David Fair: Now, to look at it in a broader scale, the City of Ann Arbor is ramping up its Sustainable Energy Utility as a supplement to what DTE provides for electricity. Would you consider that a part of the vision? Sen. Jeff Irwin: Well, I think i may be a part of the broader vision of how do we reduce pollution and save money, but I don't think it's necessarily tied to this idea of a virtual power plant. A virtual power plant is really just saying we know that the cheapest energy is the energy we never use. We know that the energy we never use isn't going to pollute our environment, so, let's try to use less. And if we can find a way to be smarter and to deploy our energy resources in ways that just save money and reduce pollution, let's do that! That's what this idea says is let's put together some of these technologies at a use of management techniques to reduce our overall cost and reduce waste. David Fair: Well, let's talk about another component of why the idea of virtual power plants are so attractive to you and some of your colleagues, including State Senator Sue Shink of Ann Arbor. The major centralized utilities have a virtual monopoly at this point. They're guaranteed a profit, they're beholden to shareholders, consistently raise rates and have less than desired reliability records. Have I summed that up correctly? Sen. Jeff Irwin: Yeah, look. I think we've got some of that dirtiest, most expensive, least reliable power companies in the country, and that's been frustrating to the people of Michigan for a while now.David Fair: What concerns do you have about the relationship the centralized utilities have to the explosion of data center businesses here in Washtenaw County and around the state? Sen. Jeff Irwin: Well, data centers already use so much energy. And so, we have to be really, really careful making sure that they don't use so much energy that then the power companies are pushed to go out and invest in a bunch of new power plants that we aren't going to need necessarily long-term. That's how this could become expensive for ratepayers, and we need to make sure that we follow through on the law that says that residential ratepayers can't pay for these data centers. David Fair: So, that leads us back to the question I was actually getting to, which is, by creating then a network of virtual power plants, how great an offset from centralized energy grids is possible? Sen. Jeff Irwin: Well, I think we can bite into bigger and bigger chunks of what's needed by doing these kind of smart-demand responsive systems and the smart energy efficiency and conservation systems and these energy storage systems. All of these can be used to reduce the amount of overall power generation we need in our state. And, look, I've been on your show many times, and you know how frustrated I get about pollution and about the health impacts about how our energy use can destroy our environment, not just for us, but for generations to come. The other thing that really makes people frustrated, though, is looking at their energy bills. We're looking at our energy bills this winter, and we're seeing them go crazy, right? And so, this is a way that we can put people to work in our state, deploying smart technology resources to reduce our energy bill and reduce the amount of pollution that we're putting into the environment. Does that help wean us off of these power companies that we're frustrated with? Yes. But for me, what's most important is this can save people money and reduce pollution.David Fair: Our Issues of the Environment conversation with State Senator Jeff Irwin continues on 89.1 WEMU. Now, there's a cost to everything, including creation and implementation of virtual power plants. Have you done an analysis of upfront cost to launching a viable network? Sen. Jeff Irwin: Well, this is going to save people money. That's the whole point of the legislation. And what the legislation says is that we're only going to deploy and approve these types of investments if they pencil out and they save people money. So, that's what this is all about. Let's find some of these projects that we can do in our communities, whether it's tying together new distributed generation resources, or whether that's tying to gather storage, or whether that's tying together reliable conservation techniques. We need other things you can do that reduce costs, reduce pollution, and put people to work doing it. And we only do the projects if they make sense financially. So, that's what this is all about.David Fair: Is the skilled workforce already available to implement these kinds of networks on any kind of mass scale? Sen. Jeff Irwin: We do have the skilled workforce to get this done, but I think that if we start moving down this road of being smarter and using more technology with respect to energy, then we're going to need even more of that. And I think there are opportunities, through our great trade unions and also through our great community colleges, to