Orchestrating battery storage components, containers, systems and portfolios is key to successful operation, says Ryan Franks, business development manager at Emerson Water & Power Solutions.
Automation solutions provider Emerson brings layers of software-driven control and optimisation to battery energy storage system (BESS) assets that, as Franks says, require increasingly sophisticated real-time asset management across projects and fleets to stay relevant to whichever market they are deployed in.
Ahead of an appearance at next month’s Battery Asset Management Summit USA 2026 in California, Ryan Franks answers our questions about the evolution of the space and the challenges currently preventing asset owners and operators from getting the most from their time, money, and effort. We also discuss artificial intelligence (AI) as both a driver of industry demand and for the suite of smart tools it can put into asset operators’ hands.
How has BESS asset management best practice in the US evolved in the past three years?
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There are two movements that I am seeing in BESS asset management trends over the past three years.
First, while everyone in the industry desires safe and high-performing battery systems, performance is now driving the conversation. Safety is incredibly important, but risk has been mitigated in many ways due to advances in manufacturing, the development of standards such as UL 9540, UL 9540A, and NFPA 855, and more complete hazard mitigation assessments or HMAs. Performance now drives the conversation as BESS revenue has been tighter in the past few years in many markets.
Secondly, there have been so many creative uses of data, and energy storage systems generate a tremendous amount of data. There are now software tools for so many functions, from revenue optimisation and spotting imbalances to warranty tracking and so much more.
What is your current approach to maximising returns from BESS assets, and what key performance indicators drive your operational decisions?
Emerson’s Power and Water business does not own or operate energy storage systems. However, Emerson supports customers in maximising returns by tying energy storage together with other project-site assets, hitting P (active power) and Q (reactive power) setpoints, and especially, by adjusting for imbalance.
Imbalance is really one of the biggest current challenges in maximising revenue. A project needs to identify, isolate, and adjust imbalance issues within containers and racks, as well as between containers.
How do you balance profitable market participation with preserving battery cell health, and what role do optimisation technologies play in this decision-making process?
There is a concept out there of trying to gauge the marginal cost of cycling a battery, or put another way, trying to answer the question: how much lifespan is being spent with every decision to charge and discharge?
Every installation has its quirks, but generally, I think this was a reaction to tight bankability and financing concerns in years past.
Lithium iron phosphate (LFP), in general, appears to be meeting or overperforming cyclic degradation schedules. The bigger picture of aggregating capacity degradation in the long term is more relevant to operators and financing than looking at the marginal degradation of charge and discharge behaviours that are not repeated consistently.
Given that projects have a lifespan of 10 to 20 years, the most important determination is whether augmentation or replacement of the DC block is going to need to occur once, twice or three times.
Revenue optimisation is more about same-day or intraday trade-offs, in other words: If I discharge now, am I missing out on higher revenue later?
Texas has gone from a peak of US$4,853/MWh in 2024 to a peak of US$345/MWh in 2026, as an example, which makes squeezing every bit of marginal revenue more important as markets mature.
What are some of the less well-recognised challenges in communications and interoperability that BESS asset managers might face?
In utility-scale storage, there is a shift accelerating away from BESS being a pilot or one-off installation toward an asset class consistently used in integrated resource planning by utilities and viewed more as a fleet than individual projects by independent power producers (IPPs).
What that means is that owners and operators want a consistent human-machine interface (HMI) and the ability to compare and contrast key performance indicators (KPIs) across different integrators and OEMs. They want to move to one window and view of all their storage assets and make it close to the windows and views they have for any other generation assets they have.
Data centres are also driving the conversation about BESS communications and interoperability. BESS has needed to integrate with DC- and AC-coupled solar for years, but data centres and the imperative to bring your own power (BYOP) are leading BESS to be the focal point of fast-responding and fast-ramping behind-the-meter (BTM) generation, including diesel gensets, natural gas reciprocating engines, fuel cells, gas turbines, wind, and solar.
How is AI changing battery storage asset management, and what challenges and opportunities does this present?
Outside of operations, it makes digital twins much more valuable. I remember when generating synthetic data was an incredibly labour-intensive process. Now, all sorts of scenarios and operational permutations can be tested, making predictions and estimates more robust than before.
Within operations, there are two initial use cases: pattern recognition and response scenarios.
AI and data science techniques are perfect tools for the early identification of patterns in data that could relate to safety and performance. In addition, behind every energy storage system at some level, there is an operator in the loop. AI suggesting ways to tune and operate energy storage systems based on the flexibility of local architecture and external factors like market conditions and weather, makes those operators into super operators.
With the US comprising a patchwork of state-level, RTO, and ISO grids and markets, how adaptable do BESS asset managers need to be to account for differing regulations and opportunities?
The vast majority of BESS is installed in ERCOT and CAISO. However, 47% of BESS capacity is expected to be installed outside of those markets by 2030.
SPP, MISO, ISO-NE, NYISO, and PJM will grow more important every year as deployment in those markets increases.
While all those regions have different market mechanisms for valuing BESS and different operational constraints and conditions, the BESS asset itself is going to be the same. The responsibility of competently operating BESS across regions is going to fall to owners, operators, and their software and control supply chain, not hardware manufacturers.
Battery Asset Management Summit USA 2026 will be held 15-16 September in Garden Grove, California, hosted by Energy-Storage.news publisher Solar Media (part of the Informa Group). dot dot dot.
The agenda emphasises addressing the roles of AI, cybersecurity, and second-life applications, broken down into two tracks: Technical Asset Management and Commercial Asset Management. This year, the conference is also co-located with Solar & Storage Finance Summit USA. Visit the official site for more details.
