Watch BRIDGE discussion panels at ENLIT 2021
BRIDGE and ETIP SNET representatives appeared and spoke at ENLIT’s EU Project Zone throughout the 3 day conference devoted to collaboration and innovation to solve the most pressing energy-related issues. You can now watch the event recording online.
Despite the uncertainty due to COVID-19 and the surging Omicorn variant, this year’s ENLIT conference (formerly known as the European Utility Week and POWERGEN Europe) went ahead, attracting over 9000 energy stakeholders throughout the 3 day conference that took place between 30 November and 2 December 2021 in Milan, Italy. Conference attendees took advantage the opportunity to meet face to face with other energy stakeholders from across the smart utility sector and beyond, to learn about the latest trends, innovations and policies shaping up the future energy system.
The EU Project Zone at Enlit
The BRIDGE and ETIPSNET Initiatives worked with ENLIT for the 4th consecutive year to provide a space to present the initiatives and the numerous EU funded projects working on Smart Grid, Energy Storage, Islands, and Digitalisation Projects and contributing to the deployment of renewable sources of energy as well as the digitalisation of the energy system.
The effort of this collaboration resulted in the EU Project Zone – a meeting place for all energy related projects, including stands of 38 BRIDGE projects, that have received EU funding. The Zone hosted a series of talks and panel discussions, organised by the BRIDGE secretariat with the participation of several representatives of BRIDGE working groups and projects as well as ETIP SNET working group chairs who spoke on the following topics:
1 -Flexibility market mechanisms across Europe. In this session, moderated by Manuel Serrano, chair of the BRIDGE Regulation Working Group, the panel discussed the challenges to reach the 2030 climate goals (Fit for 55). It provided feedback from several EU funded projects, including Trinity, Phoenix, Coordinet, INTERFACE and EUniversal as well as input from ETIP SNET’s Working Group on Reliable, economic and efficient energy system. It also invited participants to discuss on preparatory work for a possible network code on flexibility markets.
Watch video HERE ; Download the slides HERE
2-The role of the business models in provision of flexibility. Moderated by Dr. Tomi Medved of the University of Lubljana, standing in for Andrej Gubina, chair of the BRIDGE Business Models Working Group, the session presented several EU funded projects including: XFlex, Merlon, E-land, Coordinet, Trinity and Flexistranstor. The project coordinators shared their experiences in relation to energy system digitalisation, the barriers faced and how the projects’ business models could benefit.
Watch video HERE ; Download the slides HERE
3-Citizens at the center: Creating a consumer-centric digitalization strategy. This session, moderated by Stanislas D’Herbemont, chair of the BRIDGE Consumer and Citizen engagement Working Group invited the panellists – consisting of representatives from the E-land, MERLON and FITGEN projects as well as a representative from the ETIP SNET Working Group on Digitalisation of the electricity system and Customer participation to highlight how citizens can be better integrated into the European digitalisation strategy, what opportunities digitalization represents for consumers and how it allows them to take an active role and ownership of the energy system, and what barriers need to be broken down to allow for more collective action (energy communities) to be better integrated in the market.
Watch video HERE ; Download the slides HERE
4-Network code on cyber-security in energy. In this session, Olivier Genest, chair of the BRIDGE Data Management Working Group invited representatives from the European Commission, ETIP SNET and the PHOENIX project to highlight the new digital data flows in energy transition technologies and, crucially, what new cyber-risks must be accounted for when filling in policy and innovation gaps to ensure energy system resilience.
Watch video HERE ; Download the slides HERE
5-Interoperability and data exchange to support the digitalisation of smart energy systems. One of the largest sessions of the EU project and moderated again by Olivier Genest, included the participation of representatives from 12 EU funded projects and ETIP SNET. The session invited panellists to share their thoughts on data sharing to enable flexibility markets and interoperability across projects focusing on 3 specific topics: big data and data spaces, data exchanges and cooperation between stakeholders and tools for smarter more resilient grids.
Watch video HERE ; Download the slides HERE
6-EIRIE Platform. Venizelos Efthymiou, PANTERA project Coordinator and ETIP SNET chair of the Innovation implementation in the business environment Working Group, presented the EIRIE platform which has been developed to be a sustainable multifunctional platform and a single point of reference for the EU Research & Innovation family in the field of Smart Energy Systems and technologies, in support of the energy transition and the low carbon economy.
Watch video HERE ; Download the slides HERE
7-How to promote energy storage. The last session at the EU project Zone was dedicated to Energy Storage. Moderated by Patrick Clerens, Secretary General – European Association for Storage of Energy (EASE), the session explored to what extent BRIDGE projects, and EU funded projects more broadly, embrace sustainable or longer duration electricity storage technologies, how much novel heat storage technologies are integrated into the mix, what impact location has on storage facilities, what regulation (regulatory sand boxes) can accommodate the requirements of the multiple storage technologies on offer, and finally, to better understand what that storage investments are cost-efficient.
Watch video HERE ; Download the slides HERE
For the full video playlist to all 7 sessions click HERE ; EU Project Zone Agenda available HERE
ENLIT 2022 – bigger, better…and Covid free?
Given the exceptional circumstances, ENLIT 2021 was a success, after a long time working remotely and with minimal opportunities to meet face to face, ENLIT was a welcome opportunity to bring people of the energy industry back together. Behind smiling eyes, many intersting trends, discussions and developends on the future of the energy sector were shared.
ETIP SNET and BRIDGE secretariats would like to thank ENLIT organisers Clarion Events for hosting this event and supoporting the creation of the EU Project Zone. We will look forward to taking part, through BRIDGE and ETIP SNET to the next edition to be held in FRANKFURT 29 November – 1 December 2022, where hopefully 18.000 attendees will gather.