National Grid residential battery and VPP economics

National Grid runs both territories under one program brand, ConnectedSolutions, but the two states fund home batteries in opposite ways. Massachusetts pays a high rate every summer and no upfront rebate. New York pays most of the money upfront through a state agency and keeps the yearly event payment small.

The difference reflects history and grid needs as much as policy. Massachusetts has paid batteries for summer performance since a 2016 pilot, and the 2025 season still had only 5,251 residential battery participants, about 28.9 MW. The 2025–2027 plan targets 93 MW, so the program is trying to roughly triple enrollment, according to ESS News. Upstate New York’s battery programs are newer and the region is less constrained: New York directs its largest storage procurements toward downstate areas with the greatest reliability needs. Low upstate pay reflects that policy choice and grid position, not a large existing fleet.

Mass Save, the energy-efficiency brand of the state’s utilities, does not offer an upfront battery rebate like NYSERDA’s. Its support is the $275 per kW ConnectedSolutions payment and a 0% HEAT Loan of up to $25,000, as Mass Save’s battery page lays out. Clean Peak certificates earned by enrolled batteries go to the program administrators. Upfront money appears only in National Grid’s ConnectedSolutions+ locations, where local wires need relief.

NYSERDA, the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority, is a state agency that runs statewide clean energy incentives funded by utility customers under Public Service Commission orders. It often designs programs alongside the utilities or offers money that complements theirs. For home batteries, the two are now linked: New York’s 6 GW storage goal funds 200 MW of residential storage by 2030 through NYSERDA’s upfront incentive, and the Commission required each utility to run a bring-your-own-battery program that pays for performance.

Since spring 2026, a new battery in National Grid territory receives the NYSERDA incentive only if it enrolls in National Grid’s ConnectedSolutions battery program, according to NYSERDA’s program overview. National Grid’s own battery page sends buyers to a NYSERDA contractor first.

Why the two states differ by more than five times. Massachusetts pays for ConnectedSolutions through its Mass Save energy-efficiency plans and targets the ISO New England summer peak. New York set a $50 per kW signal for utility bring-your-own-battery programs statewide and shifted most of the subsidy upfront through NYSERDA.

Why bill savings are small in Massachusetts. National Grid households pay about 40¢ per kWh, and net metering credits exports at roughly 33.65¢. Storing solar for evening use saves only the difference, and there is no residential time-of-use rate yet.

Bridgewater comes closest to covering its cost within 10 years, at about 97%. The upfront rebate does most of the work: without one, Nantucket’s higher $400 rate covers about 62% because it lasts only a few summers. In New York, the inclusive incentive covers about 73% if the household also switches to VTOU; the market-rate incentive covers about 52%.

Residential ConnectedSolutions covers two kinds of equipment: batteries and smart thermostats. EVs earn through National Grid’s separate managed-charging programs, though Massachusetts began testing vehicle-to-grid exports inside ConnectedSolutions in 2026. Heat pumps join through the thermostat that controls them and, in Massachusetts, through a lower winter rate.

Consider a hypothetical National Grid home in Lowell, outside the ConnectedSolutions+ areas. It has a 13.5 kWh Tesla Powerwall 3, a Tesla Model Y driven 12,000 miles a year and charged on a ChargePoint Home Flex Level 2 charger, and a Google Nest Learning Thermostat controlling a 3-ton ducted heat pump. Our Residential VPP Calculator puts the home’s VPP value at $10,178 over 10 years, about $1,018 a year, from 4.5 kW of flexible power.

The battery earns almost all of it: $9,055, at 3.6 kW per event with 2% yearly capacity fade. The EV adds $874 from off-peak charging credits, and the thermostat $250. The heat pump’s larger contribution is a rate, not a VPP payment: state officials estimated the seasonal rate would save the average household about $540 in its first winter, as WBUR reported. That adds roughly $5,400 over 10 years, before the deeper 2026–27 cut.

Each path below ends with the household owning the battery, so the 10-year totals compare like with like. The lease has no money down and a low monthly payment, because the leasing company claims the 30% federal credit and the $7,500 rebate. The household still pays a buyout of about $3,650 to keep the battery at the end of the term.

Related: the ConnectedSolutions case study, the hosted battery money trail, the Eversource residential deep dive and the National Grid C&I deep dive.