Faraday Microgrid Tiers — Strategic
For organizations treating energy as a strategic asset.
Bespoke microgrid architectures for portfolios, campuses, and process-integrated facilities — engaged with sophisticated buyers who arrive with a defined strategic objective and the in-house technical and financial capacity to execute against it.
If your team includes an energy lead, a treasury function, or a capital allocation group, and your scope sits beyond a fixed-scope productized install, Strategic is the right starting point.
Four markers that say Strategic is your starting point.
The Strategic tier exists because some organizations need outcomes that fall outside what any productized fixed-scope offering — Faraday’s or a competitor’s — can deliver. The defining markers are not industry vertical; they are organizational capability and scope. The four markers below describe the buyer profile this tier is engineered for. Organizations that don’t recognize themselves here are almost always better served by Resilience, Endurance, or Independence.
In-house energy and capital sophistication
The organization has an in-house energy team, a sustainability or decarbonization lead, a treasury function, or a capital allocation group engaged in the decision. The Strategic prospect is not a single facility manager evaluating a backup solution; the prospect is a multi-stakeholder organizational decision with a defined process owner and a defined approval path.
Defined strategic objective
The prospect arrives with a specific objective — coordinated dispatch across a portfolio, decarbonization of a process-integrated thermal system, market participation in CAISO energy or ancillary-services markets, capital-stack optimization through tax-equity or portfolio-level financing — rather than a generic interest in microgrid pricing. The conversation begins with the objective and works backward to the technical scope.
Scope beyond the productized envelope
The technical scope inherently exceeds what Resilience, Endurance, or Independence can deliver as a fixed-scope productized install. Common markers: multi-site portfolios under coordinated energy management; campus-scale systems with combined heat and power, thermal storage, or geothermal integration; advanced forecast-based dispatch optimization across multiple value streams; tenant-level submetering and sub-PPA structures; multi-source resilience with process-integrated heat recovery.
Capital structure beyond standard PPA or equipment lease
Direct ownership with tax-equity partnership, portfolio-level PPA across multiple sites, hybrid structures, or project finance with non-standard capital partners. The Strategic prospect’s capital stack is part of the problem to be solved, not an option chosen from a menu.
If three or four of these markers describe your organization, the next block describes the kinds of work the Strategic tier delivers.
Representative Strategic-tier scope.
These are illustrative examples of past or representative Strategic-tier work — not a menu of options to choose from. Every Strategic engagement is scoped collaboratively to the prospect’s specific objective. The pattern across examples is what to look for: defined objectives, sophisticated stakeholders, scope that exceeds a productized fixed-scope install, and capital structures that fit the deal rather than the deal fitting a financing menu.
Example 1 — Portfolio-level coordination
A 10+ site retail or distribution portfolio under coordinated battery dispatch and utility-program participation. Each site receives a productized install at the appropriate tier; the controls layer above coordinates dispatch, optimizes for portfolio-level demand-charge exposure across utility territories, and structures market participation as a portfolio resource rather than a per-site enrollment.
Example 2 — Campus-scale CHP and thermal integration
An industrial manufacturing campus integrating a microgrid with combined heat and power for both electrical and thermal demand. Scope includes thermal storage, process-integrated heat recovery, and a control layer that optimizes electrical, thermal, and process loads jointly. Capital structure typically includes tax-equity partnership and an extended pre-engineering scope.
Example 3 — Advanced controls and market participation
A facility or portfolio with active CAISO energy or ancillary-services market participation rather than passive demand-response enrollment. Scope includes advanced forecast-based dispatch optimization, multi-stream value-stack optimization, and integration with the prospect’s existing energy management or trading infrastructure where present.
Example 4 — Tenant-level structures in multi-tenant commercial
A multi-tenant commercial property with tenant-level submetering, allocation, and potentially sub-PPA structures. Scope includes the tenant-allocation engineering, the legal and contractual structuring of tenant-level energy services, and the operational handoff to a property manager who will own day-to-day tenant interactions.
Example 5 — Multi-source resilience for process-critical campuses
A healthcare campus, water utility, agricultural operation, or research facility with multi-source resilience requirements — solar, battery, fuel cell or linear generator, plus a connection to the prospect’s existing distributed assets — under a single controls and dispatch layer. Process-integrated heat recovery typical where applicable.
None of these are default projects. The Strategic tier exists because organizations that need these outcomes have the engineering and capital sophistication to buy them, and they are not well served by a productized offering. The next block describes how the engagement actually works.
How a Strategic engagement works.
Engagement begins with the objective, not the install
Strategic engagements begin with the prospect’s strategic objective — the defined outcome the organization is trying to reach — and work backward from there to a bespoke technical scope and a tailored capital structure. They do not begin with a fixed-scope productized concept and a configuration to a site. The opening conversation is with Faraday’s leadership team, not a sales intake — see the consultation request at the bottom of this page.
Pre-engineering scope is expanded
The engagement typically begins with a pre-engineering scope that goes meaningfully beyond a standard Faraday Feasibility Study. Deeper load modeling at the site, building, or process-equipment level. Multi-site or portfolio-level analysis where applicable. Tax and capital-stack structuring with the prospect’s CFO, treasury, and external tax counsel. Coordination with the prospect’s internal engineering, sustainability, and operations teams. The expanded pre-engineering scope is itself a paid engagement, scoped to the project; it is not a standard productized Study.
Pricing and contracting are project-by-project
Strategic projects do not have published price ranges or standard timelines because the scope is defined collaboratively rather than selected from a menu. Pricing reflects the actual technical and capital scope of the deal. Contract structures vary with the engagement: direct ownership, tax-equity partnership, portfolio-level PPA, hybrid capital structures, or project finance with non-standard capital partners. Faraday will recommend a structure based on the prospect’s tax appetite, balance-sheet capacity, control preferences, and the project’s risk profile — and is comfortable working alongside the prospect’s existing financial advisors, lenders, and tax counsel.
Who Faraday engages with
Faraday engages Strategic prospects only after the prospect has articulated a specific strategic objective and demonstrated the internal capacity to buy a non-standard project. The first conversation is with Faraday leadership, and the prospect side typically includes the energy lead or sustainability lead, a treasury or capital allocation representative, and an internal technical owner. If your organization is at that point of definition, the consultation request below is the right starting point.
The capability question, answered.
The hospital pedigree is the closest analog Faraday has to the engineering and capital sophistication Strategic-tier scope demands. A 10-site retail portfolio under coordinated dispatch is a smaller-stakes version of a multi-stakeholder, regulated-environment engineering problem the team has already solved. A campus-scale CHP integration is a smaller-stakes version of the process-integrated thermal and electrical coordination the hospital work required. An advanced-controls and market-participation engagement is a smaller-stakes version of the dispatch-and-resilience optimization the hospital microgrid runs every day. The pedigree translates — that’s what it means to call Faraday’s experience proof of capability rather than a portfolio bullet.
Faraday’s engineering team designed and delivered the first islandable acute-care hospital microgrid in the United States — Kaiser Permanente Ontario Medical Center, a Level 1 trauma center where uninterrupted power is not a preference but a clinical requirement. The team’s contributions to the National Electrical Code shaped the rules that govern how every microgrid in the country interconnects with the utility grid today. The grant track record — California Energy Commission–funded healthcare and institutional projects — is the body of work that proved out the engineering rigor and stakeholder coordination Strategic engagements require.
Not sure Strategic is the right starting point?
If your facility runs a single site with a defined backup-duration target — short-duration, 4–12 hours, or multi-day — and a productized fixed-scope install would meet the requirement without portfolio coordination, campus-scale thermal integration, or non-standard capital structuring, Endurance is almost certainly the better starting point. Endurance is Faraday’s primary commercial tier — the productized solar + battery + automatic islanding install with 4–12 hours of critical-load backup, paid as one operating expense via PPA or equipment lease. See Endurance →
Common questions about the Strategic tier.
Scope elements that fall outside the productized Resilience, Endurance, and Independence tiers. Common markers: a portfolio of multiple commercial or industrial sites under coordinated energy management; campus-scale systems with combined heat and power, thermal storage, or geothermal integration; active participation in CAISO energy or ancillary-services markets rather than passive demand-response enrollment; advanced forecast-based dispatch optimization across multiple value streams; capital-stack structures beyond standard PPA or equipment lease — tax-equity partnerships, portfolio-level financing, or hybrid structures. Strategic prospects typically have an in-house energy team, treasury function, or capital allocation group engaged in the decision, and they arrive with a specific strategic objective rather than a generic request for microgrid pricing.
Representative examples include: a 10+ site retail or distribution portfolio under coordinated battery dispatch and utility-program participation; an industrial manufacturing campus integrating a microgrid with combined heat and power for both electrical and thermal demand; a multi-tenant commercial property with tenant-level submetering, allocation, and potentially sub-PPA structures; a healthcare campus with process-integrated heat recovery and multi-source resilience; or a water-utility or agricultural operation with variable load profile requiring forecast-based optimization against CAISO prices. None of these are default projects — the Strategic tier exists because the organizations that need these outcomes have the engineering and capital sophistication to buy them, and they are not well served by a productized offering.
Strategic projects do not have published price ranges or standard timelines because the scope is defined collaboratively rather than selected from a menu. Engagement typically begins with an expanded pre-engineering scope that goes beyond a standard Feasibility Study — deeper load modeling, multi-site or portfolio-level analysis, tax and capital-stack structuring, and coordination with the prospect’s internal technical and financial teams. Strategic projects are quoted on a project-by-project basis. Contract structures vary with the deal: direct ownership, tax-equity partnership, portfolio-level PPA, or hybrid. Faraday engages Strategic prospects only after they have articulated a specific strategic objective and demonstrated the internal capacity to buy a non-standard project. These conversations start with Faraday’s leadership team, not with a standard sales intake.
Have a Strategic-tier question that isn’t answered here? The consultation request below is the right place to ask it.
If your organization is ready to scope a Strategic engagement, the next step is a leadership consultation.
The Strategic-engagement consultation is a conversation between Faraday leadership and the prospect’s energy, technical, and capital decision-makers. Allow 60–90 minutes. We’ll cover your strategic objective, the scope shape, and the engagement and pre-engineering process. There is no productized agenda — the conversation works backward from your objective.