Who can get a free home battery from Pacific Gas and Electric for medical equipment
A free home battery for medical equipment is still available from Pacific Gas and Electric, but the utility warns free units for 2026 are almost gone. The program is called the Residential Storage Initiative. It installs a battery outside a qualifying home at no cost, wired to power lighting, a refrigerator, medical devices and a few outlets during an outage, not the whole house. The utility states the same warning twice on its own program page, apply now because free batteries are almost gone for 2026, and batteries go first come, first served, while supplies last, source 1. To qualify, a household needs 5 or more outages tied to the Enhanced Powerline Safety Setting the utility uses since January 1, 2024, service on a circuit that setting affects, and enrollment in 1 of 4 programs, CARE, FERA, Medical Baseline or Self Identified Vulnerable, source 1.
How the program has grown since Pacific Gas and Electric started it in 2022
The program began as a small pilot in December 2022, limited to El Dorado, Napa and Nevada counties and open only to customers enrolled in California Alternate Rates for Energy, the discount program known as CARE, source 4. At launch, the utility and its battery partner Enphase Energy had contacted about 1,000 prequalified customers, completed about 100 site assessments and actually installed about 20 systems, source 4.
We expect this initiative will help build resilience, enhance reliability, and make life easier.
Aaron August, Vice President of Utility Partnerships and Innovation, Pacific Gas and Electric. Source 4.
PG&E is taking bold action with this home battery initiative to provide customers with innovative resiliency options.
Dave Ranhoff, Chief Commercial Officer, Enphase Energy. Source 4.
This is a December 2022 snapshot from when the program launched, not a current 2026 figure. The program has grown substantially since, shown in the next chart.
Show the numbers
| Prequalified customers contacted | 1000 |
| Site assessments completed | 100 |
| Systems actually installed | 20 |
By 2026, the program had reached 3,800 customers, a roughly 190 fold increase from the 20 systems installed at launch. That comparison is MAOWCE own calculation, not a growth rate the utility states, since the 20 figure is a December 2022 snapshot and the 3,800 figure is a later, undated cumulative total, source 1, source 4.
The December 2022 figure is from the program launch release, source 4. The 2026 figure is a later, undated cumulative total from the program own page, source 1. The 2 are not perfectly comparable, one is systems physically installed at a moment and the other is a running total, so this chart shows scale, not a precise yearly growth rate.
Show the numbers
| Systems installed December 2022 | 20 |
| Customers served by 2026 | 3800 |
Why one Pacific Gas and Electric battery program has already run out for 2026
Pacific Gas and Electric runs 2 other free battery programs, and 1 has already closed. The Reliability Battery Initiative gives a 10 to 15 kilowatt hour system worth more than 10,000 dollars to customers on unreliable circuits generally, and the utility states plainly this separate program is full for 2026 and is not accepting new applications, source 3. The Portable Battery Program gives a smaller, portable battery sized for a medical device, aimed at Medical Baseline and Self Identified Vulnerable customers, and requires at least 1 Public Safety Power Shutoff since 2024 or 3 or more Enhanced Powerline Safety Setting outages, source 2.
What Medical Baseline adds on top of a battery
Medical Baseline is a separate program for a household with 1 full time resident who has a qualifying medical condition or device, such as an oxygen concentrator, a dialysis machine or a respirator, and it is not based on income, source 5. It adds 500 kilowatt hours of electricity, or 25 therms of gas, a month at the lowest available rate, or instead a 12% discount for customers on certain rate plans, on top of anything a battery program gives, source 5. Enrollment also brings enhanced outage warnings before a shutoff, described by the utility as multiple texts, phone calls or even a doorbell ring, source 5.
Applying to the Residential Storage Initiative takes 6 to 9 months from application to activation, so the utility own timeline argues for applying now, source 1. Every figure here comes from Pacific Gas and Electric own program pages, checked across 4 years, since no independent count exists.