NRG Energy and Sunrun announced a multi‑year partnership on December 16, 2025 to deploy distributed solar‑plus‑storage solutions across Texas. The collaboration will integrate Sunrun’s home battery and solar systems with NRG’s Reliant retail platform, creating a virtual power plant that can provide dispatchable capacity to the ERCOT grid during peak periods.
The partnership aligns with NRG’s goal of building a 1 GW virtual power plant by 2035 and complements its growing natural‑gas fleet. By aggregating Sunrun’s residential storage assets, NRG can offer customers rate‑plan incentives while simultaneously generating grid‑service revenue, thereby expanding its recurring‑revenue base and reinforcing its integrated retail‑generation model.
NRG’s Q3 2025 earnings beat expectations, with adjusted EPS of $2.78 versus the consensus of $1.83. The beat was driven by strong cost control and the early revenue streams from the new VPP partnership, which added a high‑margin, flexible capacity source. Sunrun’s Q3 2025 results showed a revenue beat of $724.56 million (up 20.64% YoY) but an EPS miss of $0.06 versus the $0.13 estimate, largely due to a decline in solar system sales offset by growth in customer agreements and incentives.
The Texas market for virtual power plants is highly competitive, with Sonnen, Tesla, and an AI‑powered VPP from Google Cloud also operating in ERCOT. NRG’s recent acquisitions—$12 billion for 18 natural‑gas plants from LS Power and $X for six plants from Rockland Capital—demonstrate its commitment to expanding generation capacity to meet the rising demand from data centers and other large consumers.
Management emphasized the strategic importance of the partnership. Brad Bentley, Executive Vice President and President of NRG Consumer, said the deal “unlocks a new source of dispatchable, flexible energy while giving customers the opportunity to unlock value from their homes and contribute to a more resilient grid.” Sunrun CEO Mary Powell added that the partnership “demonstrates the scale and strength of Sunrun’s storage and solar distributed power plant assets, delivering critical infrastructure that gives Texas families affordable, resilient power.”
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