Utility-focused technology and service provider Itron has announced a partnership with Sonnen, a German solar and storage provider that has made hay in Europe and Australia. The deal will see Itron integrate Sonnen’s SonnenBatterie Eco unit with Itron’s Demand Response Management System (DRMS), a system it hopes to sell to utility customers that are trying to use demand-response (DR) to smooth out their grid loads and cut their energy purchasing costs. Essentially, this gives Itron access to the Sonnen batteries installed in a utility’s market, so that Itron can aggregate the batteries to form a larger system. The batteries can be used to store or draw energy when needed, so that the utility can avoid buying or firing up the…