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Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates; 07, 2020: Masdar, host of Abu Dhabi Sustainability Week (ADSW), today announced that Abu Dhabi’s Department of Energy (DoE) will support the global platform for accelerating sustainable development as ADSW’s Principal Partner. The partnership with the DoE will support ADSW’s initiatives and events, which are bringing global leaders together virtually from 18 – 21 January 2021, to engage in dialogue and take action to advance the global sustainability agenda. 

“As the entity tasked with leading the energy sector in the emirate, the Abu Dhabi Department of Energy is always present at major local and international events in search of opportunities to showcase its vision for promoting sustainability in the sector,” said DoE Undersecretary His Excellency Mohammad bin Jarsh Al Falasi. “Our participation in Abu Dhabi Sustainability Week as a key partner paves the way for the exchange of expertise, allowing us a glimpse into the latest developments from major international players in the fields of sustainability and energy. This, in turn, offers a significant boost to our efforts to create a global model for clean and renewable energy in Abu Dhabi.”

“We are delighted to partner with Abu Dhabi’s Department of Energy for the third year in a row. In 2021, ADSW will be one of the first major international events of the year and the agenda will focus on drawing up a roadmap for a green recovery,” said Mohamed Jameel Al Ramahi, Chief Executive Officer of Masdar.  “We are proud to have the continued support of the Department of Energy, which is driving Abu Dhabi’s energy transition efforts and supporting the UAE’s Energy Strategy 2050.”  

H.E. Eng. Awaidha Murshed Ali Al Marar will be highlighting the importance of sustainable water at the ADSW Summit, taking place virtually on Tuesday 19 January 2021. The Summit will, over three two-hour sessions, focus on the pillars of “Live & Move,” “Care & Engage,” and “Work & Invest,” with each pillar exploring social, economic and technological opportunities to achieve a ‘green recovery’ post COVID-19.  

As a global leader in tackling climate change, the UAE and Abu Dhabi has for over a decade, provided a platform to bring together the world’s policy makers, industry specialists, technology pioneers and the next generation of sustainability leaders to engage in dialogue and take action to advance the global sustainability agenda. ADSW has grown through its initiatives and events to emerge as a catalyst for accelerating sustainable development around the world. 

ADSW 2020 welcomed 45,000 attendees from over 170 countries, including the UAE’s leadership, 10 heads of state, 180 international ministers, and over 500 representatives from the world’s media.

To register for the ADSW Summit 2021, visit http://www.adsw.ae

The Basics

The energy that the Earth receives from the Sun in just one hour is equal to the total amount of energy consumed by humans in one year. Part of this energy can be converted into electricity by photovoltaic systems. The basic unit of these systems is the light-absorbing solar cell, also called a photovoltaic (PV) cell. Conventional solar cells contain a rigid semiconductor wafer made of crystalline silicon as the PV material, although other PV materials are now in use as well.

Solar cells are usually about four inches square, and can be connected together to form a solar module or solar panel. Solar modules, in turn, can be combined with the necessary wiring, support structures, and other electronic components to create a complete solar installation, able to supply electricity for various purposes, such as direct use in appliances, lightning, battery charging, or to feed the grid.

Solar PV technologies

Solar panels can be classified into various key technologies depending on the type of solar cell material employed. Each technology has specific characteristics that optimise it for different applications in the solar market.

Crystalline silicon. Crystalline silicon, the semiconductor familiar from the electronics industry, is also the most conventional PV material. Higher efficiencies make it favourable for utility-scale applications, but also for residential and commercial rooftop markets. Nowadays, crystalline silicon accounts for more than 90% of the PV market. In the last 10 years, the efficiency of average commercial silicon modules increased from about 12% to 17%. In the laboratory, best performing solar cells are based on silicon heterojunction with an efficiency of 26.6%. Record efficiencies demonstrate the potential for further advances at the production level.

Inorganic thin-films. Inorganic thin-film PV use lightweight, flexible materials like amorphous silicon – which has been in the marketplace for over two decades – cadmium telluride (CdTe) or CIGS. Overall, the flexibility of thin-films makes them a good fit for consumer electronics and building integration. Thin-films can also be used in utility-scale projects in remote areas. The current lab record efficiency for thin-films is 23.3%, and belongs to CIGS solar cells. Unfortunately, most commercially available thin film panels have modest efficiencies of around 15%, which has led to a poor market share (around 5% of the current PV market).

Perovskites. Recently, the discovery of perovskite solar cells has drawn the attention of academia and industry due to the potential for low-cost manufacturing and high conversion efficiencies. Perovskites are essentially a type of inorganic thin-film solar cells, which show favourable properties like transparency and flexibility. Currently, pure perovskite solar cells have a record efficiency of 24.2%, but suffer from poor stability, which means they will struggle to make a dent in the market. Tandem solar cells combining perovskites and silicon constitute a more promising alternative, thanks higher record efficiencies (28%) and greater stability.

Multi-junction and high-concentrating PV (HCPV) systems. Multi-junction (MJ) PV cells use various layers of solar cells in a sandwich-like structure to achieve high power output, with staggering record efficiencies of 46%. Initially developed to power satellites, MJ solar cells are still prohibitively expensive, but are starting to be used in conjunction with concentrated mirror systems at small utility scale for peak-load assistance.

Organic PV (OPV) and Grätzel PV. Organic PVs use thin films of polymers or organic molecules to convert sunlight into electricity, while Grätzel PVs (named after Prof. Michael Grätzel and also known as dye sensitised solar cells-DSSC) employ a cell structure that contains an electrolyte, like a battery. Both offer light weight and flexibility, making them a potential good fit for a range of personal electronics applications. Though OPV and Grätzel cells offer similar advantages to inorganic thin-films, their overall stage of development is much more immature, such that their current efficiencies lag behind all other technologies, with a record of 15.6%. Their contribution to the overall solar market share is negligible, and is expected to remain in the background as perovskite solar cells gain more traction.


Solar installations

Solar cells and panels are rarely used in isolation. They need to be combined with the necessary wiring, support structures, and other “balance of system” components, to create a solar-power system with the desired voltage. Solar-power systems can be used to charge batteries for energy storage, to power motors, and/or to provide electricity for appliances and lighting. They can either be used independently or be connected to a central utility grid. In the latter case, power can usually be shared back and forth between the grid and the site of the solar-power system: When the solar-power system generates excess power, it can send it to the grid, and when it generates insufficient power, the user can pull reserve power from the grid. This arrangement with a local utility is referred to as net metering.

New developments

• Bifacial solar panels: Bifacial modules offer a simple approach to improve the energy generation of a solar installation. By collecting light from both front and rear sides of the panel, manufacturers claim bifacial modules can provide up to 30% more energy than conventional panels in optimal locations with high reflectivity; depending on the design and layout. Motivated by their simplicity, many tier-one manufacturers like Jinko or Panasonic have started to offer bifacial panels as part of their portfolio. In the coming years, performance data from the first utility-scale installations will determine the real-life efficiency gains of bifacial panels.
• Perovskite tandems: Perovskite tandems are a type of multi-junction structure where perovskite cells are combined with more mature photovoltaic technologies, such as crystalline silicon, enabling improved utilisation of the solar spectrum. To date, laboratory tandem cells from leading developer Oxford PV hold a record efficiency of 28%, already outperforming the best-in-class silicon heterojunction cells (26.7%). This landmark result sets high expectations for perovskite-based tandem cells to enter the market in the next two years.
  Floating solar installations: Over the past 10 years, floating PV projects have moved from niche deployments to large-scale utility applications. Floating solar systems are already competitive with utility-scale installations when land acquisition costs are high. In the coming years, new deployments and competition from novel start-ups aside from market leader Ciel et Terre will further drive down costs.

The global economy today is mostly linear in nature: products reaching their end-of-life are disposed of in landfills or converted to a lower-quality product that can no longer have high value in the economy. As waste accumulates, both the private and public sectors have shown interest in utilising waste as feedstock to create higher-value products for a circular economy. 

Different waste streams – including municipal solid waste, plastic waste, organic waste, and waste textiles and tyres – require different processes to regain value. Such processes can convert waste to fuels, chemicals and materials, feed, fertilizer, food, cellulose pulp, and carbon black. Depending on the waste stream, sorting and sensing technologies are required to enable waste conversion into products with improved quality.

Today’s global economy generates more waste than can be handled by existing waste management systems. Of the 6.3 billion tons of virgin plastic produced before 2015, only 9% was recycled, and 0.9% was recycled multiple times. In addition, approximately one third of the food supply is wasted each year - totaling 1.3 billion tons. However, the overabundance of waste – including ocean bound waste – has led to increased scrutiny in recent years, and puts growing pressure on municipalities running out space for landfills. 

This is aggravated by the recently established waste import bans by countries such as China and Thailand, key waste outlets for many Western countries. As such, governments and companies alike have started to look for ways to convert waste to either a virgin-quality feedstock or a higher-value product than existing waste conversion technologies.

Today, aggregates of post-consumer waste, whether it be residential waste, residual materials from material recovery facilities, or compost, end up in landfills. Landfill taxes have been implemented in a few countries to incentivise the use of alternative waste disposal services. Countries with well-regulated waste management systems typically require pre-treatment of toxic waste, covering of waste layers to control odours and prevent scavenging, and lining to prevent groundwater contamination. 

Alternatively, incineration represents a low-cost alternative to reduce waste volume by about 95%, and can be implemented with or without energy recovery. On the other hand, incineration faces criticism due to the emission of environmentally harmful gases.

Landfilling is a well-established practice that has seen various regulations over the past 50 years to help secure public safety and health; however, space becomes a constraint. In developed economies, waste treatment strategies to limit the amount of MSW in landfills have been mandated. In developing countries, on the other hand, waste disposal in landfills without any pre-treatment remains the dominant solution, resulting in the release of gases such as methane, contributing strongly to the greenhouse effect. 

While not necessarily an issue in geographically larger and lower-population-density countries like the UK, landfills are rapidly filling up in countries like the UK. As landfills reach capacity, municipalities must pay to have their garbage and construction debris shipped somewhere else. In 2017, New York City signed a contract with Waste Management to ship waste to Virginia for a value of $165 million per year. Nevertheless, the costs incurred by municipalities to handle their waste bring about opportunities for companies seeking to extract value from it. 

At the end of 2017, Enerkem started up a facility in Edmonton, Canada to produce ethanol from municipal solid waste (MSW). The city pays Enerkem a $45/MT tipping fee to take the waste, which together with the credits that its carbon-negative ethanol generates, help offset its high production costs.

New innovations to manage MSW include gasification processes to produce chemicals such as hydrogen, methanol, ethanol, as well as biojet fuel, and diesel. Other compounding technologies break down the cellulosic components of MSW under high heat to create a matrix between the organic and inorganic parts. 

Difficulties to recycle plastics mainly arise from certain plastic form factors that inhibit recycling. These form factors include mixed or dyed plastics, which reduce the quality of recycled plastics to the point of economic unfavourability, and flexible plastics, which clog incumbent sorting technologies. Moreover, the plastic that is recycled is generally used for applications that prevent further revalorisation, such as textiles or dyed plastics.

Alternative methods to improve the quality of plastic recycling include thermal processes that target the decomposition of unrecyclable plastic to synthetic crude oil, which can then undergo refining into higher value hydrocarbons. Other methods include the depolymerisation of plastics into monomers that can be repolymerised to virgin-quality plastic, or oligomers to produce waxes.

Food waste can be composted, both industrially and in home settings. In addition to strategies to minimise food waste via supply chain management, new technologies – including aerobic digestion, fermentation, and insects such as mealworms and black fly soldier larvae – are being developed to convert food waste to higher-value products, such as animal feed, polymers, fertilizer, fiber, and other food products.

Waste fats, oils, and greases (FOGs) are physically separated from aqueous waste streams and disposed of. Existing FOG waste management is expensive and inefficient, while any uncollected FOG waste poses an environmental threat, thereby increasing the urgency of improved waste FOG management. Technologies are being developed to chemically convert waste FOGs into fuels, either via transesterification or hydrotreatment.

While there have been some efforts in Western countries to separately collect textile waste, the overwhelming majority ends up in the MSW stream. Collected mono-material textiles are shredded, cleaned, and either re-spun (organic) or re-granulated (petroleum) for reuse. While mono-material textiles can be reused for a moderate range of applications, blended fabrics cannot be separated and can only be used for low-value applications like mattress filling. 

New technologies focus on solvent-based systems, specifically targeting the recovery of the cotton component of blended fabrics, even with high amounts of impurities. Existing solvents that can recover the polyester component could be added within the next five years to recover a larger portion of the waste stream.

In addition to the mentioned types of waste, there are other streams such as construction waste, hazardous waste, medical waste, or industrial waste. Each of these waste streams has a unique set of characteristics – e.g. infectious materials in the case of medical waste, or toxic content in the case of hazardous waste – that require a customised treatment to clean the waste for disposal or conversion into usable feedstock.  

Technologies to convert waste streams into higher value products generally require relatively pure, single-material waste to improve conversion efficiencies and quality. However, single-stream curbside collection of material has been shown to maximise recyclable content collected on a per-unit-mass basis, which results in lower-quality recyclates at a higher cost. 
While newer innovations can produce virgin-quality product from a mixed waste stream, impurities result in a decreased yield and higher operation costs. Therefore, improvements in sensing and sorting technologies are critical to enable a circular economy. 

Although there is some level of automation  of waste with technologies such as magnetic separators or floatation systems, hand sorting remains an integral component of waste recovery. Combined with existing imperfections in incumbent separation technologies, this results in errors with a significant labour cost at slow processing speeds. As such, full automation is a key area of improvement. 
New technologies seeking to improve sorting efficiency rely on a combination of infrared and colour optical sensors, 3D cameras, multispectral and hyperspectral imaging, and metal detectors together with advanced computer vision software. Robotic systems to pick specific waste elements are being developed along with the mentioned sensing innovations, but their low separation speeds and high costs will remain an adoption barrier for such technologies.

Pay-as-you-go (PAYG) energy is a prepayment system that allows the user to pay upfront for a set amount of power, avoiding complexity with billing afterwards. While available in countries in the developed world, such as the UK, its main value is electrification of rural regions.
 
The PAYG model avoids high upfront costs for small-scale off-grid PAYG solar-diesel or solar-storage hybrid systems for houses or small businesses in remote regions. PAYG energy developers are mostly SMEs, initially supported by impact investors. These include Angaza, BBOXX, FuturePump, M-Kopa, Mera Gao Power, Off-Grid Electric, SharedSolar, and Solshare. Larger companies have also started to form strategic partnerships in an effort to enter the sector, including Engie, which acquired Fenix International in 2017, Sumitomo, which invested in M-Kopa, and Mastercard’s PAYG solar pilot with M-Kopa in Africa.

A 2017 World Bank report estimated that 1.1 billion people live without access to electricity. PAYG systems can be installed in remote regions to give homes or small businesses access to renewable electricity systems without high initial purchasing costs.
 
With the means for lighting and/or mobile phone charging, PAYG enables study in the evening and access to mobile services such as community banking or group buying of crops. Access to clean, affordable and reliable energy is one of the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals and is critical for eradicating poverty, and improving the health, education, and livelihood of millions. As such, PAYG service providers can be a force for poverty reduction in villages while sustaining a profitable business.
 
Although small-scale solar PV costs continue to drop, it is still too high for large parts of rural, unelectrified regions in, for example, Africa or India. PAYG technology provides the following:
 
1. After a small down payment of USD 10 to USD 40, customers receive a system that has an integrated mobile connection. A basic system can comprise, for instance, an 8 W solar panel, lead-acid or lithium battery, two LED light points and a phone charger. More elaborate systems may include multiple solar panels and LED lights, a flat-screen TV or radio (for bars), fridge, or inverters, distribution board, wiring, and smart meters to set up small microgrids and peer-to-peer energy trading.
2. Once installed, the customer pays a periodic flat-rate charge, often equivalent to the cost of using fuel for lighting for a basic setup (~USD 0.50/day). Simple prepayment is the core of PAYG, drastically reducing financial risks from billing complexity or missed payments. A customer buys a token in a shop or, more commonly, makes a mobile payment via the PAYG’s partnership with local telecom companies and/or banks. By typing a received code on a keypad of the PAYG system, it unlocks power for a preset amount of time. If credit is depleted, the system will lock out power. Companies use mobile web platforms, apps, unique device identifiers, and two-way SMS to communicate with customers and manage system access and operations.

With several providers, after one to two years, the user can unlock the system once it has been paid in full for the remainder of its lifetime (five to 10 years) by buying a final code.
 
PAYG companies generally bear most or all the CAPEX cost of a system, often acting as retailer with investment funding. Considering the low achievable margins in PAYG, reliable yet low-cost components are key; some will purchase components such as solar panels and  inverters directly from the market and assemble in-house, while others will purchase full systems from other PAYG suppliers and re-sell. The key unique system for PAYG is the mobile connected controller to restrict power usage when customers are late to pay, which is often supplied by a contract manufacturer.
 
PAYG operators generally address a large customer base, each with a small power consumption, in rural or peri-urban regions, making rural “last mile” distribution a challenge. It requires local knowledge to sign up any new homes or villages for installation. Many will use informal local supply chains to deliver products at the lowest possible cost, and operators have to manage local politics and payment collections to successfully implement microgrids. However, effective service management can be an enabling force and a competitive advantage. Dozens of PAYG companies have established themselves in East and West Africa, and have raised in excess of USD 360 million in financing, providing energy services to more than 700,000 customers. By October 2017, cumulative sales by PAYG operators reached 1.5 million products, from 0.3 million in December 2014. Recognising a growth opportunity with more than 1 billion currently unelectrified customers, large companies have started forming strategic partnerships.

As market traction and confidence with the PAYG business models grows, companies are expanding their product portfolios to increase market reach. Many expand their portfolio of appliances combined with higher-out solar systems, adding, for example, satellite TVs, computers, hair clippers, or fridges to become relevant for small commercial business in larger communities. A number of companies, including Victron Energy, SharedSolar  and SOLshare, are evolving technology offerings and adding the likes of smart meters, DC inverters and energy trading systems to enable community-shared solar systems with microgrids. As these offerings mature and power output increases, PAYG will evolve into a large-scale distributed energy system, enabling small-scale industrial usage via microgrids, while secured energy trading systems using blockchain will start creating hyperlocal utilities.
 
As PAYG companies generally source components or full systems from other suppliers, UAE companies can partner with existing PAYG solar players to expand their product portfolios and, critically, tap into an entry point for new markets in countries such as India or Africa, with a potential customer base of more than 1 billion people. For the UAE, this provides an opportunity for diversification of technology investment and development in the near term. In the longer term, PAYG, micro-grids and similar distributed energy systems will likely become a major component of the energy system in these currently unelectrified markets. Participation in the early stages will thus create a foundation for UAE companies to develop distributed or centralised utility-scale projects as the energy markets in these countries mature and grow.
 
Indeed, the 2019 Energy Category winner of the UAE’s Zayed Sustainability Prize, PAYG developer BBOXX, will use its prize money to further expand its customer base in Africa and the Philippines. Other PAYG winners of the Zayed Sustainability Prize, Off-grid Electric and D.Light, are also looking to expand their product portfolios and market reach. By contributing to the development and growth of PAYG energy solutions, UAE energy companies can promote sustainability and drive an energy revolution in developing economies and expand their commercial footprint in major growth markets outside the UAE.

In the long term, PAYG developers are creating an untraditional residential power generation dynamic, where distributed solar is becoming the incumbent technology competing against a growing grid. Projecting PAYG’s growth since 2010, the installed base will exceed 6 million by 2020; in comparison, the largest sub-Saharan utility, Kenya Power, served 6 million in the fourth quarter of 2017. Kenya is rapidly becoming the PAYG leader; Azuri Technologies partnered with Unilever Kenya for distribution of its systems, tying into the Kenyan government’s goal to raise population electrification from its current 75% to 100% by 2022, with PAYG as a major contributor.

Given proper funding and the projected energy demand growth in countries such as Africa or India, PAYG providers are poised to become the future energy providers of unelectrified regions by fostering grid independence via residential solar power systems – and eventually community-level solar and microgrid solutions.

Top 3 PAYG Innovations to Watch

1. Extension of PAYG models to other utility services. Early examples include FuturePump, paid by pumped irrigation water volume, and HTX Solutions’ modular wastewater treatment system, paid per volume of treated water reused.
2. Blockchain energy trading integration with PAYG. Though basic PAYG systems are cheap, investors remain wary of potentially insecure payment systems in rural regions, hampering large-scale investment. Integration of blockchain for energy trading, as demonstrated in LO3 Energy’s Brooklyn Microgrid Project, can bolster security.
3. Adoption of novel sales and marketing models, in particular internet shopping, as this starts becoming available in rural regions, to drive faster adoption and growth.

The Basics

Wind power generation relies on special turbines to convert the kinetic energy of the wind into electrical energy. Because of its dependence on wind, which experiences fluctuations due to gusts and temporary calms, wind power has an intermittent power output. A well-sited wind turbine can reach a “capacity factor” of above 40% – that is, it will produce about 40% as much energy as a generator that was able to run 24 hours a day.
 
The amount of power produced by a wind turbine also depends on the strength of the wind at a particular site: doubling the wind speed increases the power output of a turbine by a factor of eight. However, for a wind turbine to attain its highest performance, its design must match the weather conditions it will face during its lifetime. Three dimensions, including wind speed, extreme gusts and turbulence, determine the wind classes for which turbines are designed for. The International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) sets international standards for the conditions each wind class encompasses.

Wind power generators can either be connected to the local power grid (“on-grid” systems), or used as standalone systems with a backup generator that runs on diesel (“off-grid” systems). More recently, wind power projects are being commissioned, together with energy storage systems, in an effort to manage the intermittency of wind power and secure the stability of the electrical grid.

Wind turbine operation

At very low wind speeds, there is insufficient torque exerted by the wind on the turbine blades to make them rotate. As the speed increases, the wind turbine will begin to rotate and generate electrical power. The speed at which the turbine first starts to rotate and generate power is called the cut-in speed. As the wind speed rises above the cut-in speed, the output power rises until it reaches the limit that the electrical generator is capable of. The limit to the generator output is called the rated power, and the wind speed at which this occurs, is called the rated wind speed.

At higher wind speeds than the rated speed, the design of the turbine limits the power to this maximum level and there is no further rise in the output power. As the speed increases above the rated power wind speed, the forces on the turbine structure continue to rise and, at some point, there is a risk of damage to the rotor. As a result, a braking system is employed to bring the rotor to a standstill. This is called the cut-out speed.

Onshore systems

Onshore wind power systems consist of a turbine positioned on top of a tower, placed on land. A turbine is a device in which a bladed wheel is turned by a force (i.e. the wind) and connected by a shaft to a generator to produce electricity. Currently, approximately 560 GW of installed capacity exists worldwide for onshore wind systems. Onshore wind power systems typically cost about USD $1.6 million per installed MW. They consist of the following components:

Rotor: the rotor is at the hub of a wind turbine, attached to the blades. The rotor converts the linear motion of the wind into rotational energy, which then drives a generator. Nearly all commercial wind turbines in use today are horizontal-axis wind turbines (HAWTs), with a propeller-type rotor.
 
Blades: the rotor blades capture the wind and transfer its power to the rotor hub, causing it to rotate and drive the generator. Doubling the length of the blades can produce a fourfold increase in power. However, lengthening the blades also increases their weight, making them harder to move, less stable and more expensive to produce. Advances in blade materials and manufacturing have enabled the production of lightweight blades more than 80 metres long. High-stress areas of the blades are often composed of costly carbon fibre composites, among the strongest lightweight materials available. The rest of the blade is usually composed of less costly fiberglass composite. Today, most turbines contain three blades due to considerations around cost performance, power rating, tip speed, loadings on the hub, and aesthetical preferences.

Drivetrain: the drivetrain is the heart of a wind system’s mechanical-to-electrical conversion machinery, and costs almost as much as the blades. The drivetrain connects the rotor to a gearbox, increasing the rotational speed by about a ratio of 100 to 1. The output shaft on the gearbox drives a conventional synchronous generator. In most modern turbines the drivetrain is variable speed, so that the output speed can vary with the speed of the wind, resulting in more efficient conversion and lower dynamic loads on the turbine systems. The drivetrain is a source of major operational challenges with wind systems due to gearbox failure. As such, direct drive systems, i.e. using no gearbox at all, have started gaining traction in the market recently.

Nacelle: the nacelle is the outer covering containing the key components of the turbine, including the drive train.
Tower: a typical commercial-size wind turbine will sit atop a tower that is 70 metres to 150 metres high. Current designs usually use a single tubular (solid) tower.

Ancillary components: turbines also include other components involved in the production and transfer of power, such as a brake, a yaw mechanism that moves the rotor to face into or out of the wind, electronic controllers, a hydraulics system, a cooling unit, a wind vane, sensors and power converters that convert the turbine’s variable-output DC (direct current) electricity to constant-frequency AC (alternating current).

Balance of system: in the context of wind power, the “balance of system” refers to everything in the windfarm outside of the turbine towers – such as transformers, cables, and substations.

Offshore wind turbines

Wind turbines can also be installed in the ocean where winds are stronger and more persistent, and where more room exists for large-capacity wind farms. Offshore systems employ similar turbine technology to their onshore equivalents, with the exception that the offshore systems are installed on a support structure and they are designed to withstand the higher-speed wind environment and the added wave-induced loading on the turbines. Offshore wind is the anticipated approach for future wind deployment in Europe, where there is less land area rich in wind resources than in the US. Currently, there is an installed capacity of offshore wind farms of approximately 20 GW, predominantly in Europe. Offshore systems currently cost about a third more than their onshore equivalents – USD$2.3 million to USD$2.6 million per installed MW.

New developments

A major drawback of wind power systems is the intermittent nature of the wind. In many regions, there simply is not enough wind close to the ground to make wind competitive with standard forms of power generation.

At higher altitudes – hundreds or thousands of feet in the air – there are almost always steady winds that blow at relatively constant speeds. Some companies are developing “flying” or “lighter than air” wind turbines, which are tethered to the ground via a cable that conducts the electricity generated by the turbine back to earth. The hope is that these systems will be able to operate at peak capacity between 70% and 90% of the time.

Offshore wind installations have started moving away from shore motivated by the shortage of locations with shallow waters. As such, new floating structures are emerging to overcome restrictions around water depth and ground conditions, while enabling the exploitation of larger wind resources.

Small-scale wind turbines are also attracting interest from developers due to their potential to supply electricity at scales under 50 kW. This could potentially enable novel business models for wind-based distributed generation for commercial and even residential buildings.

Under the theme ‘Industry Convergence: Accelerating Sustainable Development’, Abu Dhabi
Sustainability Week (ADSW) 2019 gathered to explore how industries are responding to the digital
transformation underway in the global economy, which in turn is giving rise to new opportunities to
address global sustainability challenges. With this in mind, Masdar has produced the Future of
Sustainability whitepaper report – in partnership with The National – based on information provided by
students, individuals, companies and governmental organisations actively driving sustainability-related
innovation across the planet.

SAVING THE CLIMATE THROUGH BIOTECHNOLOGY
Under the theme ‘Industry Convergence: Accelerating Sustainable Development’, Abu Dhabi
Sustainability Week (ADSW) 2019 gathered to explore how industries are responding to the digital
transformation underway in the global economy, which in turn is giving rise to new opportunities to
address global sustainability challenges. With this in mind, Masdar has produced the Future of
Sustainability whitepaper report – in partnership with The National – based on information provided by
students, individuals, companies and governmental organisations actively driving sustainability-related
innovation across the planet.

SOLVING THE PLASTIC PROBLEM
A Biotech-Now article suggests that biotechnology might be key to solving the world’s plastic problem,
an issue that contributes significantly to the world’s climate challenges. The article claims that there are
“12.7 million tons of plastic floating in our oceans alone”, not counting the tons on our streets and in
landfills. It adds that “most of the 300 million tons of plastic manufactured each year are harmful to the
environment because they aren’t biodegradable and are made from chemicals derived from oil, natural
gas and coal – otherwise known as petroleumbased plastics – which release Greenhouse Gases (GHG)
into the environment”. Thanks to biotechnology, however, new bio-based plastics derived from
renewable biomass sources are being developed as viable replacements. These bio-based plastics are
recyclable and often biodegradable, breaking down naturally in the environment and leading to fewer
greenhouse gas emissions. Coca-Cola and Ford are already investing in bio-based plastics, using the
plastic alternatives for items such as drink bottles and foam for car seats.

DRIVING DECARBONISATION
According to the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), transportation fuel is the biggest
contributor to GHG, making up over a quarter of total emissions in the US alone. In total, the world uses
50 million barrels per day of carbon-emitting fossil fuels to power cars, planes and ships. Unlike
transportation fuels that come from fossil fuels, biofuels are manufactured from living matter – usually
corn – and don’t emit as much carbon. By boosting our use of biofuels, for example ethanol, we can
make massive progress in lowering the transportation sector’s impact on the environment. Biofuels can
also be produced from sources that would otherwise emit GHG, for example, factory or animal waste.
Innovations like this allow biorefineries to transform waste into cleaner fuel.

EFFICIENT AGRICULTURE THAT FEEDS THE WORLD
Biotechnology innovations can also help us grow food on a larger scale and in a more environmentally-
friendly manner. Biotechnology – including gene editing tools like CRISPR – have enormous potential
regarding the creation of drought-tolerant or disease-resistant crops. Since biotech crops were
introduced in 1996, pesticide use has dropped by over 8%. In one year, the use of biotech crops and no-
till farming systems saw CO2 emissions falling by 27.1 billion kg. That’s equal to removing 16.7 million
cars off the road. To stop the planet from overheating, however, innovations are needed – especially in
areas where most food is grown. Ag microbial technology is a new biotech innovation that might help.
There are billions of microbes – tiny organisms like bacteria and fungi – in a plant’s soil. These exist to
give the plants the nutrients they need to grow. Through biotechnology, microbes can be engineered to
enhance a plant’s growth to the desired effect.

MICROBES HELPED CLEAN UP BP’S OIL SPILL
An article in the Scientific American reveals how microorganisms were “a big reason why BP’s 2010 oil
spill in the Gulf of Mexico was not far worse”. According to Chris Reddy of the Woods Hole
Oceanographic Institution, “The microbes did a spectacular job of eating a lot of the natural gas.” The
article states that the small hydrocarbon molecules in natural gas were the easiest for the
microorganisms to eat, with the microbes getting help from the nature of the oil spill: so-called
Louisiana light, sweet crude mixed with natural gas, as opposed to bitumen or other heavy, gunky oils.
“More than 150 different molecules make up the toxic stew of hydrocarbons that spewed from BP’s
Macondo well on the Gulf of Mexico seafloor,” the piece reported. “The microbes chewed through the
smaller, dispersed hydrocarbons (and the dispersants themselves) relatively quickly, helped by the fact
that these molecules can dissolve in water. Ocean currents, in addition to keeping the spilt oil offshore,
spurred microbial activity amidst the oil spill. That continuous mixing of the water allowed a bacterial
bloom to turn millions of barrels of oil into an estimated 100 sextillion microbial cells of
ethaneconsuming Colwellia, aromatic-eating Cycloclasticus, alkane-eating Oceanospirillales, oil-eating
Alcanovorax, methane-loving Methylococcaceae and other species, including at least one previously
unknown to science. But even the ravenous microbes could not clean it all—and much of what they
consumed (natural gas components like methane, ethane, butane, propane and pentane) does not
legally count as part of the oil spill. Plus, plenty of tarlike hydrocarbons—which are far too big for
microbes to chew up—spilt, too.” Scientists are still trying to understand the impact of this oil spill, and
the role that nature itself plays on helping to clean it up today.

THREE BIOTECH PRODUCTS WE COULD BE USING SOON
1. Cow-free milk Singularity Hub reports that “cellular agriculture uses biotechnology to develop
proteins and biomolecules that are usually derived from animals. These distributed cellular
factories let us brew food and beverages more locally and sustainably, creating synthetic dairy
and other food items. It is believed that this technique could alleviate the environmental impact
of livestock farming and improve food security.” The piece reveals that food company Perfect
Day’s cow-free milk contains the same proteins that are produced by an actual cow, just without
any cows involved whatsoever. The brand’s cow-free milk does not have any lactose either, and
boasts a shelf life of six months.

2. No-animal meat Clean meat startup Memphis Meats recently made waves bringing lab-grown
beef and chicken to the masses, according to a piece in Singularity Hub. The article says that the
company has raised $17 million from investors, including Bill Gates and Richard Branson, to transform
the way we eat meat. With some aspects of livestock farming being problematic – contributing to
around 18% of global greenhouse gas emissions (although some scientists claim the figure is much
higher), fostering deforestation and habitat loss, encouraging routine antibiotic use, and causing large-
scale animal suffering – inexpensive, scalable, and locally brewed meat could be a transformative
solution, with only small animal biopsies required to extract the cells needed to grow edible meat.
Singularity Hub adds that, in the future, programmable food – constructed molecule by molecule in
cellular factories – could metamorphose what we eat, and how we eat it. Egg-free egg whites, shrimp-
free shrimp, and sushi-free sushi are being developed too.

3. Open-source biology
A startup, Cell-Free Tech, “is breaking a billion-year-old processor out of the cell to let anyone,
anywhere, build biomolecules with easy-to-use kits – only without the actual cells”. That’s according to
Singularity Hub. “This renders biology more user-friendly as it eliminates the need for microbial
culturing, training, and equipment. Making cell-free systems available to all could kick off a new era of
‘decellularised’ do-it-yourself biology.” Interested open-source biologists get access to plasmids carrying
the genetic software instructions, similar to an app. They then programme the ribosome, essentially a
3D-protein printer, to produce different proteins. Singularity Hub says they “could be custom-
fluorescent colours, vanilla smells, glow-in-the-dark ink” or something else. One day they could even be
medicines. Along with an open-source tool, the cell-free kit allows people to make biopixels so they can
follow the production of their mini biofactories via an app.

Under the theme ‘Industry Convergence: Accelerating Sustainable Development’, Abu Dhabi Sustainability Week
(ADSW) 2019 gathered to explore how industries are responding to the digital transformation underway in the
global economy, which in turn is giving rise to new opportunities to address global sustainability challenges. With
this in mind, Masdar has produced the Future of Sustainability whitepaper report – in partnership with The
National – based on information provided by students, individuals, companies and governmental organisations
actively driving sustainability-related innovation across the planet.

A 2018 article written for the Abu Dhabi Sustainability Week website by H.E. Dr Ahmad bin Abdullah Humaid
Belhoul Al Falasi, Minister of State for Higher Education and Advanced Skills and Chairman of the UAE Space
Agency, considers the connection between space exploration and sustainability on Earth. In his piece, His
Excellency Al Falasi writes, “Some may wonder why a space agency, which focuses on furthering human
knowledge of the universe, is concerning itself with environmental protection. One of the biggest differences we
can make − whether on an individual or a global scale − is to improve efficiency in the way we use resources. By
reducing the amount we consume, we decrease both our net waste and emissions. Here, we have already
learned a great deal from space exploration, which requires highly efficient processes as a result of strict weight
limits applied during launches.”
His Excellency Al Falasi cites an example from the University of Kenitra in Morocco, of an organisation filtering
and purifying nearby groundwater supplies using techniques that were initially developed for recycling
wastewater into drinking water for astronauts. He says, through its far-reaching impact, the space sector
operates at the intersection of other key industries related to sustainability − from renewable energy and oil and
gas to logistics and construction. According to a 2017 article in The Ethicalist, the space technologies industry is
estimated to be worth around $300 billion globally and is growing by around 8% annually. The UAE’s
investments in space technologies have exceeded AED20 billion ($5.5 billion), with players including satellite
data and TV broadcast company Al Yah Satellite Communications Company (YahSat), mobile satellite
communication company Thuraya Satellite Telecommunications, and Earth-mapping and observation systems
DubaiSat-1 and DubaiSat-2.

THE NEXT FRONTIER: MARS
Dubai’s Mars City
In 2017, His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Dubai Ruler and Vice President and Prime
Minister of the UAE, announced plans to construct a Martian city in the desert. The project is part of the UAE
Mars 2117 Project, which sees the nation aiming to establish the first human settlement on the Red Planet by
2117.
According to a piece in The Ethicalist, the construction of the Mars Scientific City – where engineers aim to
replicate conditions on the Red Planet for research purposes – will be designed by Danish architect Bjarke Ingels
in partnership with Emirates scientists and engineers. It will be made up of a series of futuristic glass domes that
could house up to 600,000 people. The Mars colony plan is being implemented by the Mohammad bin Rashid
Space Centre, where scientists began preparing a 100-year plan for the project’s implementation in 2017.
According to government documents, “the centre’s plan will focus on preparing specialised national cadres and
developing capabilities in the fields of space science, research, artificial intelligence, robotics and advanced
space technologies”.
Specifically, the site will allow scientists to solve some of the technical problems that must be overcome for
colonists to survive on our neighbouring planet, and will act as an enormous living laboratory that will simulate
conditions Mars settlers will face. The city, which will be spread across 177,000 square metres (1.9 million

square feet), is set to cost around AED500 million ($137 million). Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid calls it “an
extraordinary national project”, one that will also be open to the public, once complete. Several other manned
missions to Mars are in place globally, but the UAE is among the top nine national investors in space sciences,
aiming to attract the world’s top space scientists, designers and engineers to develop the Mars 2117 Project.

The Hope Mars Mission and other UAE space achievements
In order for the UAE’s Mars 2117 Strategy to work, scientists and planners will also need data from the Red
Planet. That’s where the Emirates Mars Mission comes into play. The UAE developed the Hope space-exploration
probe mission to Mars, and it is set for launch in 2020. The nation hopes that the probe will reach Mars in 2021,
the UAE’s 50th anniversary.
According to The Ethicalist, the probe will study the atmosphere around Mars and design complex models to
predict the climatic conditions settlers will face. The Hope programme − the first space mission by an Arab-
Islamic country − will be managed by the UAE Space Agency with support from international partners. The data
collected by the car-sized probe will allow scientists to create a model of conditions on the planet’s surface, with
data shared freely with over 200 global academic and scientific organisations. Earth and Mars only align once
every two years. To take advantage of this proximity and reach the destination by the target date, the craft will
have to launch in July 2020 to reach Mars in 2021. As the UAE Space Agency states: “The UAE government sees
the Red Planet project as a turning point in the nation’s development. It will establish the space technology
sector as a key economic sector for years to come. The UAE aims to be among the top countries worldwide in
the field of space technology by the time the orbiter arrives at Mars in 2021.”
The UAE also launched MySAT-1, a small cube-shaped satellite (‘CubeSat’) built by students at the Khalifa
University of Science and Technology, in 2018 − just weeks after the first-ever Emirati-designed satellite,
KhalifaSat, was launched from Japan.
MeznSat is another UAE space project in the pipeline. According to the MeznSat website, UAE university
students are primarily involved in developing 3U CubeSat, which is being built and tested primarily to detect
Greenhouse Gas (GHG) concentrations. The project aims to offer the UAE space industry qualified, well-trained
graduates who have gained hands-on experience through projects like this. In addition, the CubeSat project
opens windows for advanced space-oriented research relevant to the UAE. In terms of sending people into
space, the ambitious UAE Space Agency aims to send the first Emirati astronaut to the International Space
Station in 2019.

A piece in Science Daily covers studies by the Botanical Society of America, with its researchers trying to
understand how plants respond to the space environment. This information is critical to successfully providing
fresh food to astronauts.
Science Daily reported on researchers who compared two methods of analysing which genes are expressed (the
‘transcriptome’) in plant tissue, specifically in the root tip. The results reveal how plants adapt to the
microgravity space environment and can help guide the research needed for the successful utilisation of plants
in future exploration initiatives. Both techniques – which are called RNA-Seq and microarray – quantify mRNA
transcripts, the intermediary molecule between genes and the proteins those genes encode. This provides a
wealth of information about how an organism is responding to environmental cues.

Under the theme ‘Industry Convergence: Accelerating Sustainable Development’, Abu Dhabi
Sustainability Week (ADSW) 2019 gathered to explore how industries are responding to the digital
transformation underway in the global economy, which in turn is giving rise to new opportunities to
address global sustainability challenges. With this in mind, Masdar has produced the Future of
Sustainability whitepaper report – in partnership with The National – based on information provided by
students, individuals, companies and governmental organisations actively driving sustainability-related
innovation across the planet.

TECHNOLOGY FOR GOOD encompasses the idea that tech boasts vast potential to do good for society,
and can enhance people’s living conditions. The term was first coined in the 1990s when web
developers joined forces with everyday people at events, often on weekends, where they worked
together to hack solutions to social challenges, seeding hundreds of ideas and prototypes. Today, tech
for good covers a community of people, projects, organisations and funders promoting the role of
technology to improve social, environmental and economic outcomes – and it’s bigger than ever.
Companies use something called the Triple Helix of social innovation to enhance tech-for-good’s value.
According to the Nominet Trust paper, The Triple Helix of Social Tech Innovation, the word ‘triple’ covers
the types of value (economic, social and user) that social-tech ventures need to articulate, develop and
evidence in order to blossom into successful, sustainable social ventures operating at scale. The word
‘helix’, meanwhile, describes the way these values converge at different stages of the venture’s
development, pointing to the ever-changing nature of the ways in which these values are shared and
showcased as time progresses. There are now numerous accelerator programmes for social-tech
startups, as well as funding for charities and organisations that want to use their tech to benefit power,
water, people, and the earth. The tech-for-good ecosystem has grown into a bustling marketplace of
needs, problems and solutions and, far from being static, as it progresses it will change. That is why
many active developers, researchers, scientists and engineers stress the importance of continually
asking ‘what is tech for good?’ as this will help society ensure that the field remains inclusive and
continues connecting people and projects.
A CHEAP WAY TO REDUCE WASTEWATER
In 2018, AbilityNet’s Tech4Good Awards revealed the Water Watcher, developed by four home-
educated students, Alex Lynch (16), Elye Cuthbertson (14), Atticus Ticheli (12), and Saul Cuthbertson (9).
Looking to offer an easy, inexpensive solution to running taps and water wastage, the device was part of
an engineering competition, with the students inspired to find a solution to a problem that one of the
team was experiencing. Being dyslexic and encountering memory lapses, one of the boys behind the
design forgot to turn the tap off once, flooding a friend’s bathroom. A small device that fits on any tap,
the Water Watcher is activated by the vibrations of the water, using a timer and alarm system to alert
the user if the tap is left on too long. Using a BBC Micro:bit with an accelerometer to sense vibration, a
battery pack, a simple speaker and a silicone coin purse (to protect it from water), the device doesn’t
need plumbing and can be strapped onto any sized faucet. The device’s potential to save water and
prevent flooding has been recognised by organisations such as Thames Water, WaterWise and the
Alzheimer’s Society, with a company interested in taking the Water Watcher into production.

SOLAR MICROLEASING
A 2018 Business Tech article reported on a South African buy-to-lease solar startup that recently
received a $500,000 seed investment from Alphabit, a multi-million dollar hedge fund. The Cape-Town
based business, Sun Exchange, announced a partnership with the UN Development Programme to pilot
blockchain-based finance for solar in Moldova in May 2018, and a partnership with Leonardo DiCaprio-
backed Powerhive in July 2018, with the latter facilitating funding for “six fully operational solar projects
in South Africa through its solar micro-leasing platform” according to the article. “The projects power
organisations such as schools, small businesses, wildlife protection parks and non-profits,” the article
continues. “The company is currently running a crowd-sale for its seventh project, which will solar
power Sacred Heart College in Johannesburg, South Africa. By leveraging the borderless, decentralised
nature of cryptocurrency, Sun Exchange enables practically anyone, anywhere in the world, to buy into
their solar projects and receive a stream of monetised sunshine from the power generated by the
projects.” The article adds that “Sun Exchange also recently introduced SUNEX, its own digital rewards
token, which can be earned to get discounts on the Sun Exchange marketplace and can be staked into a
ground-breaking solar project insurance fund”.
In a 2018 article, Felicia Jackson, author and founding editor of Bloomberg New Energy Finance, says
that local data is key to future sustainable development, with our focus needing to “urgently shift
towards providing investors with the information they need to commit sufficient funds and create
conditions within which local markets can grow to rise to the challenge” of climate change, keeping the
United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in mind.
“First and foremost,” Jackson writes, “this means providing stable, reliable, standardised and
comparable data to guide investment decisions. Second, it means taking a more holistic approach to
how we assess the impact of business decisions, looking across the pillars of action to achieve the SDGs
and accelerating domestic ownership of knowledge and entrepreneurial growth in local markets.
Evidence, knowledge and local understanding are critical to achieving this.”
Jackson adds, “Recognition of the systemic impact of our economic choices is also vital. That means
building knowledge of investment and performance in energy and climate change, water, agriculture,
electrification and mobility, biotech, as well as facilitative technologies from the Internet of Things (IoT)
to Artificial Intelligence (AI). The only way to really do this effectively over time is at a local level, where
people have a visceral understanding of how the world around them is changing. We cannot succeed at
this without finding new ways to access, analyse and assess the data underlying financial decisions and
their impact.”
“At SOAS University of London, we are developing a project that aims to transform that situation, with
the launch of the non-profit Climate and Sustainable Finance Data Initiative,” Jackson, who is a teaching
fellow at the university, writes in her article. “This initiative is intended to be a global network, owned
and operated by research centres in member countries around the world (from Burkina Faso to
Bangladesh).”
A standardised database will be shared between members, ensuring the robust and methodical
collection of data in domestic markets. The initiative will provide up-to-date tracking of the developing
stock of private and public actors’ commitments in sustainable and climate finance. The database will
include both quantitative and qualitative data, providing researchers around the world with a wealth of

original data to research and analyse. The Climate and Sustainable Finance Database will enable
researchers, practitioners and others with an interest to see not only how much public and private
money is flowing to and from developing and transition economies, but also understand both positive
and negative impacts, enabling factors, and barriers.
“This information can, in turn, be used to accelerate further flows of finance and enhance the
effectiveness of existing investment,” Jackson writes. “Critically, the initiative will provide database and
research training as well as digital learning on climate and sustainable finance to centres in the
developing world. The long-term goal is for domestic research groups to become centres of climate and
sustainability entrepreneurship, sharing financial and business models which work for specific markets.”

Historically, electric utilities were large, publicly owned entities, operating in a highly regulated environment, whose main function was to ensure the consistent and regular delivery of electricity. Recent advancements in digitalisation, however, and an increase in renewable energy and distributed generation, are challenging the traditional utility business model.

Traditionally, multiple power generation assets would sell generation capacity on the wholesale market. A transmission system operator (TSO) then handles the transport via high-voltage power lines of the transmission grid. Because of the large capital investments and the impracticality of having multiple transmission grids in one country, a TSO often holds monopolies in the country they serve.

Recent decades have seen the rise of two transformational forces in the utility sector – market deregulation or privatisation, and distributed generation.

More and more countries are deregulating, or privatising, parts of the utility sector. While strict regulations with regard to power delivery are still upheld, many retail utilities have lost their protected, often monopolised position. Utilities now operate in highly competitive markets with dozens of players, where barriers for a consumer to switch to a different utility are very low.

Historically, a utility’s business was geared towards meeting power delivery regulations and measuring power meters to ensure customers pay their invoices. Now, customer retention has become a major focus, and many utilities struggle to convert their business focus from energy delivery with high operational efficiency to energy services with added value to their customers.

The rise of distributed generation poses similar challenges. A legacy electricity grid is linear with one-way power flow, built with the purpose to transmit power from large central power plants to the end-users. Today’s power grid no longer looks like this. Incentivised by regulators pushing energy efficiency and renewable energy with strong subsidies and new policies, more and more large scale renewable generation assets, like solar and wind, are being added. Energy storage systems are being installed, in front of and behind the meter, to help deal with the challenges that come from decarbonising the energy mix. These types of assets, collectively known as distributed energy resources (DERs), are transforming the complexity of power grids.

Power grids weren’t built with DERs in mind. Renewable energy’s intermittent nature can cause frequency or voltage destabilisation on the grid, requiring utilities to curtail renewable generation on a cloudy day with gusty wind, and use installed back-up generation capacity, like expensive natural gas peaker plants, to meet their mandated peak power demand.

Renewable generation assets added at the end-user (e.g. rooftop solar) adds further complexity, changing the one-way power flow mantra into one where electricity can now flow back into the distribution line from the consumer side, increasing the risk of damage to transformers due to reverse power flow. The expense of managing this growing grid complexity forces grid operators to install new equipment and upgrade power lines, raising their share on the end-user’s electricity bill.

Besides technical challenges, distributed generation affects power demand curves and poses a threat to incumbent utilities. As customers generate more of their own power behind the utility’s meter, they use less and less power from the central grid, eroding the utility’s primary revenue stream. This threat is aggravated by utilities facing increasingly stringent renewable mandates, changing regulations, and an increasingly complex grid to manage.

The outlined challenges have created a need for tools that optimise DERs to balance the diverse needs of their owners with those of the connected grid operators like TSOs, which need to adhere to strict regulations on power quality and reliability. These software tools are called Distributed Energy Resource Management System (DERMS). Their initial function was strictly to manage DERs on electrical grids, connecting equipment into an energy Internet-of-Things (IoT) system for central management and optimisation. As the technology matured, developers started adding further functionality for market participation.

DERMS can now aggregate multiple generation and storage assets into virtual power plants that can bid into wholesale power markets, offering energy management in multiple commercial buildings, or enabling consumers to use on-site generated power for peer-to-peer trading with neighbours.

The growing challenges of market deregulation and distributed generation create opportunities for utilities to deliver on the increasing need for grid services. By leveraging their experience in energy management, they can capitalise on DERs to tackle the challenges the grid is facing.

Rather than own generation capacity, the utility of the future will increasingly look to purchase renewable power and flexible DER capacity from companies able to construct and operate capital-intensive wind, solar, and energy storage farms, while shifting the utilities’ business model to energy management and services. While renewable generation will be a qualifier to enter the market, services will become the differentiator for the utility of the future.