The summer solstice has passed and the three seasons are approaching. The recent extreme weather in North China with temperatures above 40 degrees Celsius for several consecutive days has made it urgent to tackle global warming and achieve the goal of “double carbon” as soon as possible.

In addition, the summer peak season has arrived, which poses a huge challenge to power transmission and distribution. All of this requires digital technology to empower the energy industry. During this year’s two sessions, “integration of data and reality”, “scientific and technological innovation”, “green and sustainable” and “high-quality development” have once again become hot words. How to use digital technology to achieve green and sustainable economic development, how to use digital and software to make energy management more intelligent?

In response to the above issues, Wei Sizhe, Vice President of Schneider Electric and head of Digital Energy Efficiency business in China, shares his thoughts and insights.

Under the “double carbon” goal, China is accelerating the construction of a new energy system, and with a large proportion of new energy connected to the grid, its random, intermittent and fluctuating characteristics cause the contradiction between the power generation and the actual utilization rate of new energy. In view of the above situation, where does the energy industry need to increase the transformation and adjustment of energy management in order to achieve sustainable and low-carbon goals?

Wei Sizhe: In June 2022, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment and seven other departments jointly issued the “Implementation Plan for Synergies on Pollution Reduction and carbon Reduction”, which clearly pointed out that it is necessary to coordinate energy security and green and low-carbon development, promote the clean and low-carbon energy supply system and the electrification of terminal energy consumption, indicating the direction for the strategic development of the energy industry.

To achieve the sustainable goals, we first need to clarify the carbon footprint, and only when the carbon footprint trajectory is clear from beginning to end can the sustainable goals be followed. Carbon footprint covers all aspects of the end-to-end supply chain from energy production, storage to transmission and consumption, so carbon reduction is necessarily a systematic project that requires joint efforts from both the supply side and the consumption side of energy.

As the digital economy and the physical economy continue to integrate, Schneider Electric believes that digitalization and software will gradually become the core drivers of end-to-end energy management. Through the organic integration of digital technology and energy technology, we can use data flow to drive the production, transmission and consumption of energy flow, so as to realize the low-carbon energy production, the intelligent energy network and the electrification of energy consumption, and ultimately achieve the carbon reduction goal of the energy industry.

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From the energy supply side, the focus of carbon reduction work is on energy cleanliness, which requires us to gradually increase the proportion of renewable energy such as wind and solar energy in the energy structure. However, the key problem at present is that although the installed capacity of renewable energy is large, there are serious phenomena such as low utilization rate and abandoned electricity. In order to better improve the utilization efficiency of renewable energy power generation and increase the local development and utilization of new energy, it is necessary to vigorously promote the construction of intelligent distribution networks that accommodate a high proportion of distributed new energy power, and improve the level of new energy consumption through digital capabilities and software.

On the energy consumption side, the enterprise on the one hand has its own ESG planning, to complete its carbon reduction goals, at the same time with industrial upgrading and technological update, the enterprise also attaches great importance to the safety and reliability of the power system, and hopes to improve the efficiency of electricity consumption. This requires energy management companies such as Schneider Electric to continuously develop new systems with the blessing of software and digitalization, so as to achieve visible, manageable and controllable functions in the process of energy use management, and improve energy efficiency with high quality under the premise of prioritizing the safety of electricity consumption, helping enterprises to reduce carbon in an orderly manner and improve efficiency.

In addition, there is also a problem to mention, the current technology iteration and industrial development update speed is very fast, in the process of carbon reduction, new carbon reduction scenarios will continue to emerge, and new digital technology is also in high-speed innovation. In other words, carbon reduction is a dynamic process, its requirements are updated, the scenario is expanding, and the tools available for carbon reduction are also iterating. Therefore, enterprises must always be open and innovative, constantly iterating and optimizing their digital and software capabilities, so that they can continue to accelerate the “dual carbon” goal.