Energy transition

Related publications (100)

Potential and uncertainty of wind energy in the Swiss Alps

Albertus Christiaan Kruyt

Switzerland has committed itself to an ambitious energy strategy. It aims to replace the exist- ing nuclear generation capacity with predominantly indigenous renewable resources. Wind power could play a significant role in this transition, yet the wind resource in the mountainous terrain that makes up most of the country is poorly understood. There are indications that this resource could be significant, but studies undertaken so far acknowledge large uncertain- ties. This is because the complex topography of the mountains influences the flow patterns significantly, and these can become partially decoupled from the synoptic flow aloft. This thesis aims to improve the understanding of the wind resource in highly complex terrain, and thereby contribute to a well informed energy transition in Switzerland. We start out by investigating the characteristics of the Swiss wind resource based on data from two meteorological measurement networks. From the pair-wise correlation between stations, it is concluded that wind farms across the country can be combined to produce a stable power output. It is also shown that elevation plays an important role in the wind resource, with the likelihood of sustained low wind speeds decreasing as a function of elevation, while mean speeds tend to increase with elevation. Next, a state of the art Numerical Weather Prediction model is assessed in its ability to simulate wind speeds over the Alps, and is shown to improve drastically upon existing mean wind speed estimates. This same model is then used to calculate the wind turbine capacity that is required to produce significant amounts of wind power, and it is found that the required capacity can be significantly reduced by allowing for wind turbines to be built at high elevations. In the last part of this thesis, smaller areas of the Alpine domain are simulated at high resolu- tions, to investigate the effect of increased model resolution on the accuracy and height of resource assessments. While it is found that optimal model parameterization is dependent on weather and terrain, strong indications of higher wind power potential are found with high resolution models compared to a model at lower resolution. This is explained by the fact that high resolutions are required to properly resolve the complex topography, which has a significant influence on the flow patterns and therefore, on the potential energy production.

EPFL2019

Socio-technical modeling of smart energy systems: a co-simulation design for domestic energy demand

Matteo Barsanti, Claudia Rebeca Binder Signer, Lionel Guy Gérard Constantin, Pranay Kasturi

To tackle the climate crisis, the European energy strategy relies on consumers taking ownership of the energy transition, accelerating decarbonisation through investments in low-carbon technologies and ensuring system stability and reliability by actively participating in the market. Therefore, tools are needed to better understand an increasingly complex and actor-dense energy system, tracking socio-technical dynamics that occur at its margins and then predicting the effects on larger scales. Yet, existing domestic energy demand models are not flexible enough to incorporate a wide range of socio-technical factors, and to be incorporated into larger energy system simulation environments. Here, a co-simulation design for domestic energy demand modeling is presented and motivated on the basis of four design principles: granularity, scalability, modularity and transparency. Microsimulation of domestic energy demand, through the Python open source library demod, shows that it is possible to achieve high detail and high temporal resolution without compromising scalability. Furthermore, mosaik, an open source co-simulation framework, makes it possible to generate, integrate and orchestrate a multitude of demod-based instances with other independent models, which for the illustrative purposes of this study are represented by a heat pump model. The authors hope that the detailed documentation of the proposed solution will encourage interdisciplinary and collaborative efforts to develop a simulation ecosystem capable of investigating alternative energy transition pathways and evaluating policy interventions through the socio-technical lens.

Springer2021

Torn between international competition and municipal claims: Analysing key influence factors on municipal utilities’ business strategies in the German and Swiss energy transition

Susan Marie Mühlemeier

After the nuclear accident in Fukushima, amongst others Germany and Switzerland decided to accelerate the sustainability transition of their energy systems not only by expanding the share of renewables actively but also by quitting nuclear power. Regarding this political level of ambition, energy companies´ strategies play a decisive role in terms of the implementation, progress and success of the energy supply system’s transition. So far scholars in sustainability transition research working on the role of energy companies for the transition process, mainly focused on two actor types: firstly, big energy utilities, the incumbents which often hinder the transition and secondly, the new entrants, small innovative businesses challenging the incumbents with new technologies or business models. However, hardly any scholarly work studies another important actor group, which lies in between: the municipal utilities (“Stadtwerke”). In Germany and Switzerland, big municipal utilities are part of the ten most powerful energy providers and in Germany they are even seen as the fifth big power besides the “big four”. Hence, the municipal utilities form an important and powerful actor group in terms of the energy transitions’ progress, which need to be studied more in detail. For a better comprehension of this particular actor group, i) we reveal the key influence factors on their business strategies on an economic and socio-political level, ii) analyse how these factors influence different business strategies in particular – on the general firm level and especially in the business area of renewables - and iii) we compare the different socio-political and economic settings in Germany and Switzerland to derive differences and communalities for municipal utilities on a more aggregate level. We employ the triple embeddedness framework (TEF) by Frank Geels, which considers the interaction of firms with their economic and socio-political environment and facilitates an in-depth case study analysis. For empirical evidence, we conduct an explorative case study analysis with four big municipal utilities in Germany and Switzerland in the cities of Munich, Hannover, Geneva and Zurich. This allows not only for an in-depth analysis of the single municipal utilities, its business strategies and local environment but also for an inter-national comparison of different political settings, which are highly important for the municipal utilities. Methodologically, we firstly employ a document analysis on the utilities structural characteristics and business strategies – on the general firm level but also on the specific business area of renewables. Secondly, we conduct explorative expert interviews with researchers and members of associations in the field as well as the CEOs of the four selected utilities to further reveal the specifics of municipal utilities, obtain an improved knowledge on their business strategies and an overview on important influence factors. Thirdly, we conduct semi-structured expert interviews with different members of the four utilities’ strategic management board, the municipal supervisory board and the renewables department in order to validate and discuss the revealed results and analyse the causal interrelations between the influence factors and the utilities’ strategies. These empirical results will be mirrored with findings from scholarly and practical literature. Preliminarily, our studies show that the four chosen cases are the biggest and oldest municipal utilities in each country, established in the end of the 19th century and they are still mainly in the possession of the cities (min. 75%). The legal form of the utilities varies from being a dependent division of the municipal administration, an independent public enterprise, a private company with limited liability or a corporation. Therewith, the influence from the municipal supervisory board and the room for manoeuvre of the firm varies enormously. This is one of the most important influence factors on the municipal utilities’ business strategy and a special feature compared to other actor groups in energy supply. On the other hand, the market liberalisation – which took place in 1998 in Germany and 2009 in Switzerland as partial liberalisation – depict another key influencing factor, since the municipal utilities are forced to compete on the (inter)national market on top of their obligations as a public service provider for their local urban system. Dependent on their binding to the municipality, respectively their form of organisation, the municipal utilities reacted differently to the liberalisation: some invested intensively in renewables all over Europe others strengthened their local energy production, some established strategic allies with other municipal utilities or absorbed other companies. These preliminary results already show, that municipal utilities are complex actors with very specific characteristics embedded in multi-scalar environments full of suspense. With our study, we contribute to a better understanding of this actor type, the important context factors and the utilities’ strategic answers in the context of the energy transition. By revealing the specifics in an international comparison, we enrich not only to the scholarly discussion on key actors in the sustainability transition of urban energy supply systems but also provides decision-makers in policy and economy valuable insights for the future design of sustainable and resilient energy governance systems.

2017

After the nuclear accident in Fukushima, several countries decided to accelerate the sustainability transition of their energy system by extending the share of renewables actively but also quitting nuclear power. Regarding this political level of ambition, energy companies´ strategies play a decisive role in terms of the implementation, progress and success of the energy transition. These strategies decisively depend from and influence the political, economic, technical and ecological context, in which they are embedded. This contribution investigates the embeddedness of strategies in the swiss energy sector, in order to enhance the understanding of corporate strategy development. We employ the triple embeddedness framework (TEF) (Geels 2014), which considers the interaction of firms with their economic and socio-political environment. Additionally, we pay a special attention to the physical embeddedness (technical and ecological), which is not yet fully developed in the TEF, although the physical conditions form crucial context factors for energy companies, especially with higher shares of renewable energies. For empirical evidence, we analyse the strategies of selected energy companies in the Swiss energy sector through secondary data and document analysis – according to the TEF. This context and strategy analysis will be mirrored by expert interviews with the analysed energy entrepreneurs, to validate the revealed factors and relations as well as the perception of the importance of different context factors on firms´ strategy development. This study results in a deduction of different embedded companies´ strategies types in the Swiss energy sector and shows how socio-political, economic and physical conditions, e.g. the technical infrastructure or the availability of particular ecological resources, form important context factors. In so doing, this analysis contributes to a better understanding of energy companies’ strategy development and shows relevant parameters for the governance of the future energy transition, which can be played back to policymakers.

2017

“A particular species” urban utility companies in Germany and Switzerland

Susan Marie Mühlemeier

This article presents the characteristics of urban utility companies in Germany and Switzerland and examines their challenges and strategic actions in the context of energy transition. In so doing, it explores a particular actor type in a communal infrastructure service organisation.

2018

Resilience and agency in mature sustainability transitions. Theoretical conceptualisation and empirical analysis of actor- & system-level dynamics in sociotechnical energy systems

In Switzerland, Germany and Austria, as in many European countries, the transition of the energy sector towards more sustainability is a long-term transition process, unfolding since decades. It however only reached the regime level in recent years and therewith the established technologies and governance structures of the energy systems. This fundamental transition process causes complex, interrelated and non-linear dynamics and changes on multiple scales in the technical and social sphere of the energy systems. The energy transition, thus, became a mature sustainability transition, which is a new challenge for research and decision-making in practice. This dissertation contributes to an improved conceptual and empirical understanding of actor- and system-level structures and dynamics in mature sustainability transitions. To tackle this research aim, the dissertation employed an iterative theory building process, which develops theoretical considerations based on preexisting theories and frameworks as well as empirical evidence. The empirical analyses were thereby conducted using a mixed methods approach, which allowed for rich empirical evidence and triangulation. The research was implemented in four modules, whereby each module tackled one research question. Main data sources were scholarly literature, regional structural data and documents as well as transcripts from several rounds of semi-structured expert interviews and expert workshops. The empirical data stemmed from three cases: energy regions in Austria and Germany, a network of change agents in Germany and urban utility companies in Germany and Switzerland. The main analytical methods, employed in this dissertation were qualitative literature analysis, document analysis and structuring qualitative content analysis. For the analysis of system structure for functionality and transition dynamics, this dissertation presents an indicator set to analyse and measure resilience of sociotechnical energy systems in transition, based on the key system characteristics of diversity and connectivity. The empirical application provided rich insights on the sociotechnical system structure and its changes over time and discusses appropriate methods for the empirical analysis. For the analysis of transition dynamics, this dissertation provides a reconceptualised framework for the systematic analysis of actor- and system-level determinants of agency as well as the feedback of agency on the system. Especially focusing on the role of incumbents in mature sustainability transitions, the dissertation moreover provides findings from the empirical exploration of urban utility companies and derived analytical perspectives for public incumbent actors in network industries in transition. The dissertation finally discusses the integrability of conceptual findings to transition studies and presents an integrated framework to analyse structures and dynamics in mature sustainability transitions. The thesis provided key theoretical and empirical insights on actor- and system-level aspects of mature sustainability transitions in sociotechnical energy systems. It contributed to a further discussion on dynamic resilience concepts for sociotechnical energy systems, a more systematic analysis of agency in sustainability transitions and a more nuanced picture of incumbents' agency in sociotechnical energy systems in mature sustainability transitions.

EPFL2019

Rusty dinosaurs or the surviving species in the new energy system? Analysing urban utilites in the German and Swiss energy transition

Susan Marie Mühlemeier

2017

Integrated energy planning assistance for major consumers - Application : HUG – Cluse Roseraie Hospital district

Bastien Maxence Bornand

Given the present context of energy transition, the University Hospital of Geneva is constrained to readapt its energy strategy to target the new State objectives in terms of energy consumption management. A long-term energy planning assistance tool is developed to help match the hospital district energy strategy to the Property Master Plan in the aim of targeting the new legal prescriptions. A model is implemented to describe the needs in an adaptive way, in terms of spatial distribution and temporal evolution. The model is based on energy flow characterization, using recorded data collection, measurements and estimation thanks to internal documentation and resources. The modelling parameters are set by fitting the model with the available measurements and energy performance actions are assessed by comparing the current energy status to standard prescriptions. The energy integration is performed based on pinch analysis and optimization problem is based on a multiperiod description, characterizing the main stages of the site’s architectural morphing by the year 2050. The solutions are proposed based on time-availability of the energy resources, by minimizing operating cost and CO2 emissions. Four main indicators are computed per unit area in order to assess and compare the proposed scenarios: the primary energy consumption, the total cost, the CO2 emissions and the share of renewable energies.

2017

The goal of this Master thesis project was to design a methodology that helps to analyze a set of indicators that can support the decision-making process, by identifying energy strategies with a temporal horizon 2030-2050 in Cuba. Several sources of data and methodologies were used to fulfill the objective. The energy planning model created by Madrazo during her Ph.D. thesis was used as the main tool in this project. The hourly demand and the wind and solar capacity factors have been used as input data for this model. A post-processing module was created in R code, with the objective of analyzing the behavior of the six technical indicators that the model offers as output. The Principal Component Analysis (PCA) method was used as an exploratory method to identify cluster that later allowed studying in detail the particular characteristics of these indicators. Different graphics were used to visualize the performance of the technical indicators under different conditions, which allows us to propose the best energy strategies to ensure a secure and sustainable energy transition. The methods of “Levelized cost of energy” (LCOE) and the costs associated with the "engineering process design" allowed to assess the economic feasibility of some scenarios of energy transition identified as interesting for decision making. The current cost of the Cuban electro-energetic system was estimated and compared with the costs obtained for future scenarios simulated. After analyzing the behavior of the indicators in detail, it was identified as the most suitable transition scenario for Cuba, where 150% demand is covered by 90% intermittent energy and 10% wind energy. Also, no backup will be required under these conditions, which represents a considerable saving from the current costs required by an electric generation with fossil resources. The energy storage needs will be 0.05 TWh, and the “concrete towers” and “VOSS” technologies can be used in order to minimize installation and operation costs of these facilities.

2020

Most European countries are committed to an energy transition which consists in the substitution of conventional CO2 emitting energy sources by new renewable energy sources (RES), in particular wind and solar power. As opposed to conventional energy sources, new RES are distributed, non-dispatchable, fluctuating and inertialess and have negligible marginal costs. In this thesis, we investigate the impact of the energy transition on the electricity sector in Europe. In the first part of this thesis, we investigate the future electricity production and prices in Europe. We develop a dispatch algorithm on an aggregated model of the pan-European power grid with which we study the future European productions. We show that, as the penetration of new RES increases, the transmission grids are more strongly used and that more flexibility is required from conventional generators. The existing infrastructures seem to able to absorb, through increased international power exchanges and usage of the existing pumped-storage hydroelectricity, the variations of new RES productions even for high penetrations. Then we investigate the effects of new RES on electricity prices. We explain why, due to their negligible marginal cost and their lack of dispatchability, they tend to drag electricity prices down and can be considered as a reduction of the load in the electricity pricing. In particular, photovoltaics decreases the volatility of electricity prices. We show that, in most European countries, the day-ahead electricity price is strongly correlated with the residual load, which is obtained by subtracting the non-dispatchable productions, in particular those of the new RES, from the load. From this observation, we build an effective price model based solely on the residual load with which the revenues of different electricity producers are evaluated. The second part of this thesis deals with disturbances in large transmission grids. The substitution of conventional generators by inertialess RES reduces the amount of inertia connected to power systems which might affect their reliability. To examine the propagation of disturbances in large transmission grids, we develop a dynamical model of the continental European transmission grid. We observe that the magnitude of the disturbance following a power loss depends on the fault location. We show that when inertia and primary control are uniformly distributed, the faults exciting the slowest eigenmodes of the network Laplacian are followed by the strongest disturbances. Reducing inertia on those eigenmodes, which are mostly located in the periphery of the grid, affects more its resilience than when the reduction occurs in its center. Finally, we use perturbation theory to derive algorithms for optimal placement of inertia and primary control when some mild inhomogeneities are present in their distributions. We show that,when the vulnerability of the whole grid is taken into account, a uniform distribution of inertia is optimal and the primary control is best placed in the periphery of the grid.

EPFL2019