Energy storage is a key part of a future-ready grid. The power grid is getting pulled and pushed in new directions every day from weather, electrification, and renewables.
September 19, 2023
minute read time
Eric Hsieh
Eric Hsieh is the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Energy Storage in the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Electricity (OE), where he leads efforts to accelerate the next generation of energy storage technologies that deliver reliability, resilience, economic, and efficiency benefits. Mr. Hsieh also co-chairs the crosscutting Energy Storage Grand Challenge, which coordinates departmental priorities such as the Long-Duration Storage Energy Earthshot. He is an energy policy, financial, and engineering thought leader with nearly 20 years of experience in improving energy delivery through innovation. Prior to his current role, Mr. Hsieh was the Director of Grid Components and Systems within OE.
As Director of Grid Components and Systems, Mr. Hsieh led strategy development and execution for grid hardware innovations including power conversion, energy storage, and robotics. He has more than 10 years of federal service, having also been the Director of the Office of Finance and Incentive Analysis, where he applied geospatial and computational techniques to modernize utility industry analysis.
Over the course of his professional career, Mr. Hsieh has held executive positions with several industry-leading firms and government associations. Before joining DOE, Mr. Hsieh was the Director of Business and Market Development at Nexans/The Valley Group, a global power transmission solutions provider, where he led worldwide efforts to deploy dynamic line rating technologies. Prior to that, at A123 Systems, a developer and manufacturer of advanced batteries for the electric grid, he helped the company reach its first 100 MW of deployed grid-connected battery storage. He has also held roles at National Electrical Manufacturers Association and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.
Mr. Hsieh authored and co-authored pieces published in journals such as IEEE Electrification Magazine, Electricity Journal, and ElectroIndustry; as well as delivering presentations at respected industry-leading conferences across the country. In 2019, Mr. Hsieh was named one of “Fortnightly’s Under 40” as part of Public Utilities Fortnightly’s “next generation of up-and-comers in the utilities industry.” Mr. Hsieh holds a master’s in public policy from the University of California at Berkeley, as well as a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science and Engineering (with a concentration in AI) from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Energy storage is a key part of a future-ready grid. The power grid is getting pulled and pushed in new directions every day from weather, electrification, and renewables. Maintaining a reliable, resilient, affordable, and secure system requires robust and innovative solutions from the Office of Electricity’s (OE) Energy Storage Division. The division that I lead advances all aspects of grid-scale energy storage, from invention to deployment.
My division’s mission includes empowering the energy community with the ability to analyze and adopt energy storage. We aim to ensure a wide range of technologies are available because electricity usage greatly varies throughout the country. From remote islands and urban settings to electric vehicles and solar panels, we want to maintain dependable solutions that fit all needs by finding ways to harness energy. The Energy Storage Division supports innovations from research to adoption because we know technology evolution requires a spectrum of solutions. Our goal is to equip our researchers and our domestic industry with the most current knowledge to develop new, bigger, lower-cost, and higher-performing battery and storage options. Technology will always improve, so we want to ensure the community can also improve for decades to come.
An example of this forward-looking attitude manifested in the form of the $15 million Storage Innovations 2030: Technology Liftoff (SI Liftoff) funding opportunity we announced this past summer. The objective is to find new technologies and/or innovative approaches to accomplish our goals of low-cost energy storage that can be deployed anywhere.
With this funding, we encourage applicants to solve problems that all Americans share. Projects like this excite me because we’re helping create communities build centers of expertise to deliver new technologies and establish a durable capability for their development, testing, and manufacturing in a way that powers our homes, jobs, and our economy.
We cannot do our work alone. We partner with OE’s two other divisions—Grid Controls and Communications and Grid Systems and Components—to work toward the common goal of a future-ready grid. It’s critical for the storage community to understand how their technologies will integrate with the larger system.
The Grid Controls and Communications Division helps us identify the best locations for energy storage and what kind of grid challenges can be solved with these solutions. They also offer insight into what market operations to consider once we introduce the flexibility of energy storage. Having structures in place—like the Grid Modernization Initiative—connects all grid-related offices in the Department of Energy, including those more focused opportunities and projects looking at grid deployment architectures.
We partner with the Grid Systems and Components Division on R&D for power electronics technologies. These components are a direct enabler and requirement for energy storage, and allow the conversion of battery power to useful, electrical grid-level power. This close collaboration provides the industry with an understanding of how these new technologies can work reliably and robustly in our system.
We also expanded our capabilities and leadership. In August, OE named Dr. Imre Gyuk as the department’s first-ever Chief Scientist for Energy Storage. We also welcomed Dr. Caitlin Callaghan as Director of Storage Materials and Systems and Dr. Mo Kamaludeen as Director of Storage Validation earlier this year. These leaders bring decades of expertise and experience that will guide the development of storage in this critical time.
Energy storage is becoming an increasingly important tool in the electricity ecosystem. As we celebrate World Energy Storage Day this week, it’s a great time to remind the public of the importance of the integration of renewable energy into our everyday life. When pondering where electricity comes from, many instinctively think “power outlet” in one bucket and “gas stove or heat” in another. And of course, fuel—or, in growing cases, electricity for your car—are all different forms of energy. The Energy Storage Division’s goal is to identify safe, low-cost, and earth-abundant elements that enable cost-effective long-duration storage, and our cross-cutting collaboration efforts will ensure that grid-scale energy storage will meet the demands of a new era in electricity delivery.