Mr. Scharf, what kind of radical changes does industry need to prepare for when it comes to the energy transition?

Scharf: The “Energy Transition Outlook” sets out the primary trajectories for development up to 2050. This study from DNV shows that the overarching trend is one of increasing electrification – the keyword being the “all-electric society”. Energy needs to be generated, stored, converted, distributed, and made available for consumption. It’s a colossal market where the corresponding infrastructure needs to be built up. Another aspect covers the rising demands on the grids and the energy infrastructure as a whole.

What specifically is changing with regard to the grids?

Scharf: The success of the energy transition depends on many factors. Firstly, the pace of energy grid expansion is going to pick up massively (and will need to), in order to keep pace with demand. Moving from coal, gas and oil to electricity from renewables is going to put huge strain on the power grid and considerably increase complexity in the system. After all, the present grid, which has been designed to distribute energy that is generated centrally, is becoming a complex network of numerous decentralised elements. Secondly, requirements regarding the transparency, flexibility and intelligence of the whole energy infrastructure will grow, and there must be a (digitally assisted) means of monitoring and controlling these. Thirdly, there is the way the various elements in the energy system interact with each other, which is known as “sector coupling”. For example, take the idea of using car batteries as mobile storage devices and having electricity flow in both directions. Another example would be “power-to-gas” processes, during which wind and solar power is converted into hydrogen and methane. One thing is becoming very clear – when it comes to energy, we know that nothing is going to stay the same.

How is this upheaval impacting industrial companies?

Scharf: In addition to delivery bottlenecks, the skills shortage and the recent volatility on the markets, companies also have to treat energy as a success-critical and therefore business-critical and strategically important parameter. They need to deal with the availability of energy as a scarce resource and put in place smart energy management that moves energy-intensive production processes to times when energy is less expensive. It’s important to start by asking the questions that really matter. For instance, how will the energy transition impact my own organisation, my products and processes, my business strategy and my customers?

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  Energy prospects

  Study: Energy Transition Outlook 2022

  With energy security, energy independence and rising energy costs in view, Europe remains a global pioneer in the energy transition. That was the assessment of the sixth “Energy Transition Outlook 2022” (ETO), which is compiled by Norwegian company DNV.

  According to the study, the driving force behind the transformation continues to be the growth and “greening” of power generation. Indeed, power generation will reportedly double by 2050 in order to keep pace with comprehensive electrification. The ETO also estimates that renewables will account for an 83 per cent share of the electricity system in 2050. The study states that the biggest engine for the global energy transition is the rapidly plunging costs associated with solar and wind power, which will offset the current, short-term shocks for the energy system. According to the ETO, despite short-term raw material cost challenges, the capacity growth of solar and wind is unstoppable – by 2050 they will have grown 20-fold and 10-fold, respectively.

  The complete study: eto.dnv.com

   

That brings us to the crucial question – what do we do, Mr. Scharf?

Scharf: The great challenges of the energy transition also represent an opportunity with huge potential for all of us. Rarely has industry ever needed new solutions as quickly and urgently to deal with such a lot of issues. What’s more, it needs more than just products – it needs partners who help manage complexity and safeguard competitiveness.

How can this new complexity be managed?

Scharf: Based on the experience Rittal and Eplan have built up with customers in the panel building, switch gear and mechanical engineering sectors, we can say that optimizing and industrialising process chains offers very considerable potential for operational efficiency. It is always important to think through all customer processes from end to end and understand them, so you can optimise them. Given the large number of applications and changes involved, optimisation is only possible through systematic standardisation in all areas. That is what we work on with our customers and partners. Integrated hardware and software solutions ramp up the pace of infrastructure expansion – from energy generation and storage through grid expansion and sector coupling, right up to the charging centre for electric vehicles. We are starting out in a lot of these areas, as a team comprising Eplan, Rittal and GEC.

That sounds complicated.

Scharf: It becomes more manageable when you think in terms of standards and modules. What will be decisive is whether we can see the bigger picture behind all the challenges, so we can then develop standardised solutions. From our point of view, the basic principle is to think, automate and digitalise along our customers’ processes – to combine hardware and software and then create transparency. This approach will help reconfigure even complex systems more quickly and get them geared up for the future.

Rigorous digitalisation is viewed as the crux of the energy transition. Why is that?

Scharf: Because it reduces complexity. At Eplan and Rittal, we’ve been working closely with customers from right across the energy sector for many years. Digital data models are being created in all areas. Nonetheless, there are very few cases where digital continuity has truly been established from engineering through to construction and operation. The challenges involved in the energy transition are too multi-layered. What we need are consistent, networked and smart data models for establishing and running energy infrastructure, data centres, production machinery and plants, and for building technology. It makes sense that the sector coupling mentioned earlier can only work with ecosystems that have put in place data continuity. In this case, too, if you put a digital twin at the heart of everything, then you have the DNA – the central data hub – and therefore all the relevant information for a plant or system, which can be used in downstream processes from production through to operation. Ultimately, plant operators also benefit from that in terms of maintenance and networking.

According to the DNV study, the energy transition is likely to see unprecedented regional and cross-industry cooperation. Why is that the case and what are the opportunities that will arise as a result?

Scharf: The tasks at hand are simply too complex for anyone to handle on their own, or even tackle for their own purposes. We need partnerships and solution approaches that revolve around the sharing of experience. There is an immense treasure trove of experience, particularly in German industry, that makes it possible to take best-practice solutions as a basis. This brings us back to standards and modules. That is the approach we are taking, too. Rittal and its sister companies are giving the energy sector access to tried-and-tested solutions from countless international energy projects and markets at numerous points in the energy system. We want to assist as a partner, get to grips with the challenges and draw on a proven repertoire of solutions that can be applied to the problems at hand.

Which solutions exactly are you talking about? What is required?

Scharf: Our engineering standards, cutting-edge software platforms and base solutions for various segments of the energy market are good examples. Based on the numerous customer projects they have completed, Eplan and Rittal have jointly created best-practice templates, for example, for planning and implementing charging parks for the e-mobility sector. As a result, when it comes to electrical engineering with Eplan, planners can take a carefully conceived and preconfigured project as a basis, one that factors in all details including standardised industry hardware. All they might need to do is customise it a little, but that’s instead of having to repeatedly develop everything from scratch. This approach speeds the project up with standards and modules that are geared toward data continuity.

Let’s move on now from plant engineering to the operators. What can the manufacturing industry do as an energy consumer?

Scharf: As a major consumer with production plants, it can take matters into its own hands. Firstly, it can generate its own energy. There are industry-proven solutions for that, ranging from having solar panels on the roof to running an in-house biogas plant and so on. Secondly, it can measure its energy flows and then manage them – with assistance from a battery storage system housed in a power container, for example. Integrated data management for production processes that incorporates energy monitoring can help create the necessary transparency for this kind of approach. In fact, you can only achieve professional load management and control energy consumption if you have transparency over your data. That’s the only way to create the flexibility needed to perfectly coordinate the availability of energy with its consumption.

And transparency once again plays a crucial role in that?

Scharf: Precisely. If you can also combine information about production processes with the monitoring of energy flows, you can take transparency even further to incorporate a factor that is becoming increasingly relevant. Rittal (RiZone p. 19) and German Edge Cloud are showing how monitoring can be used to lay the basis for that with a new energy monitoring solution. The open architecture of the DPS (Digital Production System) as composable software (see page 22-23) makes it possible to rapidly integrate new requirements such as energy transparency.

What else is required if we are to really think "end to end" in all processes of the energy sector?

Scharf: Transparency in the supply chains. That is the all-important lever. Take the steel market, for in- stance, it is one of our biggest suppliers and extremely energy intensive. The market is confusing, and there are currently no uniform global standards for what constitutes “green” steel or how emissions generated during production are to be measured. Our customers are increasingly interested in how much carbon dioxide is actually generated by the steel they order from us. At Euroblech 2022, our sister company Stahlo generated the first impetus for more transparency in steel supply chains with its “Stahlo Steel Gate” PCF (product carbon footprint) demonstrator. When it comes to the complex issue of “green steel”, Stahlo is also supporting its customers with what is the first transparency label in the steel market to date. Rittal is getting to grips with this issue so it can configure its future portfolio accordingly.

Thank you for talking to us!