Magnetic Pull of Microgrids: Global Investment Consensus Expects Surge through 2030s
Financial analysts around the globe may differ on the dollar amounts, but a strong consensus is being built that the microgrid sector’s market value will more than double over the coming decade. This is attracting interest from big investors all around the world.
Various reports from Fortune Business Insights, Grand View Research, GlobalData, StatView Research and others calculate the total market value differently from each other, but nearly all forecast that the microgrid sector will expand between 17% and 19% annually, which essentially doubles it every four years or so.
Global Market Insights puts the biggest number among those analyzed by Microgrid Knowledge. Its market evaluation calculates microgrid sector at about $36 billion and compounding upward 18% a year to $166 billion by 2035.
One can cast a skeptical glance at such nebulous numbers and call it hype, but the smart money is buying in and getting into the mix through numerous major private equity investments, mergers and acquisitions. EQT Group, for one, acquired New Jersey-based Scale Microgrids from its original backer Warburg Pincus last year in a deal valued between $300 million and $500 million.
One of the world’s biggest private equity investors, Blackstone, is committing billions of dollars into potential behind-the-meter solutions for the fast-rising data center and AI demand futures. Blackstone and Halliburton are teaming up to invest $1 billion to fund growth of data center power provider VoltaGrid, and Blackstone also is participating in the $500 billion private equity pool connected to NVIDIA’s plan for building out AI and energy infrastructure.
Brookfield is committing $25 billion to Bloom Energy and advancing the latter’s fuel-cell technologies for digital supercomputing buildout.
Microgrids, behind-the-meter and on-site prime power are seen as attractive options for data center developers trying to find alternatives to long grid interconnection queues.
The growth of microgrids and behind-the-meter solutions will be the topic front and center at next year’s Microgrid Knowledge Conference happening May 5-7, 2027, at the Renaissance Phoenix Glendale Hotel and Conference Center. The MGK Conference Call for Speakers is now open and seeking content session ideas.
About the Author
Rod Walton, Microgrid Knowledge Managing EditorRod Walton, Microgrid Knowledge Managing Editor
Managing Editor
For Microgrid Knowledge editorial inquiries, please contact Managing Editor Rod Walton at [email protected].
I’ve spent the last 18 years covering the energy industry as a newspaper and trade journalist. I was an energy writer and business editor at the Tulsa World before moving to business-to-business media at PennWell Publishing, which later became Clarion Events, where I covered the electric power industry. I joined Endeavor Business Media in November 2021 to help launch EnergyTech, one of the company’s newest media brands. I joined Microgrid Knowledge in July 2023.
I earned my Bachelors degree in journalism from the University of Oklahoma. My career stops include the Moore American, Bartlesville Examiner-Enterprise, Wagoner Tribune and Tulsa World, all in Oklahoma . I have been married to Laura for the past 36-plus years and we have four children and one adorable granddaughter. We want the energy transition to make their lives better in the future.
Microgrid Knowledge and EnergyTech are focused on the mission critical and large-scale energy users and their sustainability and resiliency goals. These include the commercial and industrial sectors, as well as the military, universities, data centers and microgrids. The C&I sectors together account for close to 30 percent of greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S.
Many large-scale energy users such as Fortune 500 companies, and mission-critical users such as military bases, universities, healthcare facilities, public safety and data centers, shifting their energy priorities to reach net-zero carbon goals within the coming decades. These include plans for renewable energy power purchase agreements, but also on-site resiliency projects such as microgrids, combined heat and power, rooftop solar, energy storage, digitalization and building efficiency upgrades.