Review of PreCOP28
Last week, one of Enoda’s Founders and Chief Policy & Global Affairs Officer, Paul Domjan, attended the PreCOP28 conference in Katowice, Poland. Paul joined Leszek Jesien, Agnieszka Okonska, Piotr Tomczyk and Grzegorz Wisniewski for a panel discussion on “Energy grids and the electricity system in the face of the challenges of transformation”, hosted by Jakub Wiech.
Paul shares his key takeaways from this session with us – all of which are crucial to a successful energy transition – both in Poland and beyond.
There is now a general consensus among politicians, regulators and utilities, that the pace of the energy transition will largely be governed by the challenge of balancing an energy system with high levels of renewable energy
Thermal power plants can only be phased out when alternative technology for balancing is available
The imminent global stocktake at COP28 will highlight that the world has not fully delivered on the commitments of Paris. This is because the technology for grid balancing did not exist until now. Policymakers should not assume that the disappointments of the past will continue
This is particularly relevant for Poland, but why? Poland is committed to learn from the experience of other countries’ energy transitions, most notably Germany, to avoid a renewables rollout that leads to higher consumer prices and disappointing progress on decarbonisation. However, as a leader in energy security, Poland is even more focused than most countries on ensuring that the energy transition delivers security as well as decarbonisation
This context led the panel to explore several fundamental questions:
The old era of centralised grids is over. The challenge for the future will be how to ensure that grid operators, both DSO and TSO, have the data and tools to manage a much denser and much more complex system. Indeed, it was argued that the war in Ukraine has shown that decentralisation is necessary for security as well as for decarbonisation
New technologies, new regulations that enable them, and market innovations are going to be key to delivering the transition. The old work in which a centralised producer provides energy to the system and forgets about what happens next is over
This requires all energy system participants to think both about the system that they must manage today and the ways in which that system is changing. Grid operators will continue to be critical, but they will have new tools and need to work in new ways
This will mean the integration and harmonisation of different energy systems. For example, dispatchable district heating can play a powerful role as an energy storage system to help balance the electricity grid
The only successful energy transition is one that delivers affordability and security for the consumer
Areas of consensus emerged, pointing towards the role of technology and systems thinking to deliver a solution:
The old era of centralised grids is over. The challenge for the future will be how to ensure that grid operators, both DSO and TSO, have the data and tools to manage a much denser and much more complex system. Indeed, it was argued that the war in Ukraine has shown that decentralisation is necessary for security as well as for decarbonisation
New technologies, new regulations that enable them, and market innovations are going to be key to delivering the transition. The old work in which a centralised producer provides energy to the system and forgets about what happens next is over
This requires all energy system participants to think both about the system that they must manage today and the ways in which that system is changing. Grid operators will continue to be critical, but they will have new tools and need to work in new ways
This will mean the integration and harmonisation of different energy systems. For example, dispatchable district heating can play a powerful role as an energy storage system to help balance the electricity grid
The only successful energy transition is one that delivers affordability and security for the consumer