While virtual power plants might sound like some made-up metaverse feature, they are very real—and they’re powered by actual homes and businesses.

As more homeowners and business owners invest in technologies that can form the foundation of virtual power plants (VPPs)—like rooftop solar batteries, smart thermostats, or electric vehicles—grid operators are exploring the tech as a potential solution for reliability and demand challenges in strained energy markets, according to Ignacio Guajardo, executive director of the Texas Advanced Energy Business Alliance (TAEBA).

Zoom in: Texas is one region experimenting with VPP tech, which uses software to let a decentralized network of people and businesses distribute power from their own energy systems as needed. 

• In July, the Public Utilities Commission of Texas (PUCT) approved a virtual power-plant pilot project intended to help solve grid-reliability issues.
• At the time, TAEBA called the program “an important step toward a more reliable power grid in Texas.”

“Currently, owners of these systems are able to supply power to their own loads at times, and in general, they receive credits for the excess energy they produce,” Guajardo told Emerging Tech Brew. “But these technologies can actually partake in grid operations much more broadly.”

“It creates massive cost savings [for home and business owners],” he added. “And it also probably contributes toward affordability, reliability, and resilience for the grid.”

Read on about Texas’s VPP experiment here.—GD, JB

Breathe a (tiny) sigh of relief. A recent Gartner survey found that many corporate execs, anticipating a recession and inevitably trying to budget-slash their way through it, see investments in technology as last on the chopping block.

• The June survey of 128 CEOs and CFOs found that 41% would cut mergers and acquisitions first, followed by sustainability, workforce training and talent development, capital expenditure (capex) for physical network expansion, and product innovation.
• “Improvements in technology for improved efficiency and scalability” was dead last overall, with just 23% of respondents identifying it as a top area for belt-tightening.

What’s more: Around 45% of the execs identified the category as the last place they’d seek cuts.

That tracks with previous research by Avasant, which found that IT budgets are generally increasing despite (or even because of) economic uncertainty. Around 80% of the 225 IT organizations polled for their 2022–2023 report planned to increase their spending on IT, while just 11% reported planned cuts.

Read the full story from IT Brew here.—TM

Coworking is a weekly segment where we spotlight Emerging Tech Brew readers who work with emerging technologies. Click here if you’d like a chance to be featured.

How would you describe your job to someone who doesn’t work in tech?

Explaining to banks how to properly assess the creditworthiness of the future of work (aka gig workers and freelancers).

What’s your favorite emerging tech project you’ve worked on?

AI for financial inclusion. At Bankuish, we partnered with Google and Intuit to improve our ML risk models for gig workers that were being denied loans and other financial products because they didn’t fit under the narrow definition of creditworthiness of traditional credit bureaus like FICO, TransUnion, Equifax, or Experian.

What emerging tech are you most optimistic about? Least? And why?

Bullish on human-guided ML because it can help us fight (not amplify) the inequalities our bias and legacy systems already bring about.

Bearish on Crispr, because, well, I’ve watched Gattaca and it seems more and more like a plausible Black Mirror future.

What’s the best piece of tech-related media you’ve read/watched/listened to?

High Growth Handbook by Elad Gil. A bright and insightful take on how to transform your tech startup into a system-changing organization.

One thing we can’t guess from your LinkedIn profile?

For someone who’s devoted his life to risk analysis, you wouldn’t think my preferred mode of transportation in NYC is my electric skateboard.

What do you think about when you’re not thinking about tech?

How to be healthy and still be a local at the bakery around the corner.

Stat: Chip lead times have started ticking down—they were just 26.9 weeks in July, compared to, uh, 27 weeks in June—but not every segment of the semiconductor industry is feeling relief, Bloomberg reports. Wait times for certain chips still increased month over month.

Quote: “Considering it takes seven years to build a mine and refining plant but only 24 months to build a battery plant, the best part of this decade is needed to establish an entirely new industry in the United States.”—Simon Moores, chief executive of Benchmark Mineral Intelligence, told Reuters re: the US’s proposed EV tax-credit requirements

Read: How to tell AI fact from fiction.

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Catch up on the top Emerging Tech Brew stories from the past few editions:

• Jake Paul’s VC fund is backing a startup building attack drones and the virtual border wall
• Shrinking the CO2 footprint of air travel depends on scaling up sustainable aviation fuels
• Inside one battery company’s plan to put the supply chain first