Today our delegation attended the opening of the
Intersolar/SmarterE Europe 2019 conference and
exhibition. Intersolar began in the 1990s and was held in Freiburg,
Germany for many years until 2007, when it became so large that it moved to Munich. It
is now the world’s largest renewable energy trade fair with international
exhibitions in Europe, North America, South America and Asia. With
the growth of the industry, Intersolar’s influence and reach has grown to
incorporate several related technologies. Under the new brand SmarterE
Europe, this year’s event combines four parallel conferences and exhibits
including Intersolar, Electrical Energy Storage, Power2Drive, and EM Power.
The conference was opened with an address by director Florian
Wessendorf who shared some record breaking data from the past
year. In 2018, global investment in renewable energy totaled $332
Billion USD, and this was the fifth year in a row that investment exceeded
$300B USD. 2018 was also the first year that solar capacity
additions exceeded 100GW. At the same time the electric vehicle
market surged with over 5.6 million electric vehicle’s now on the
road. And, as the renewable energy and transportation sectors
continue to intersect, the energy storage market is now expected to grow
13-fold in the next five years.
Dr. Wessendorf’s presentation was followed by a plenary panel
moderated by Wallburga Hemetsberger, CEO of SolarPower Europe. The
panel discussed the goal of transitioning to a future where all of the world’s
energy will be provided by renewable energy. This has also been a
theme in the recent German student climate advocacy campaign “Fridays for the
Future”, that advocates for “Renewable Energy 24-7 by 2050”. The
panel explored the three major sectors of energy
consumption: Heating & Cooling, Transportation, and Electrical
Power. Of those, the electrical sector is the easiest to transition
to renewable energy and that transformation is already well
underway. Panelists were asked to predict when they thought we might
reach 100% renewable electricity. Predictions ranged from 2037 to
2050, with the average of the panel being 2040.
Transformation of the heating and cooling sector is somewhat more
difficult due to the abundance of existing buildings with poor insulation and
building envelopes. On the other hand, for new construction it is
actually an easily achievable goal to reach 100% renewable energy by starting
with the implementation of German Passive Haus standards to dramatically shrink
the building’s energy footprint, and then providing the heating and cooling
needs using electricity generated from renewable sources. What is
necessary are updates to policies, codes, and regulations to encourage the
construction of Passiv Haus, Net-Zero, and Plus Energy buildings.
The most difficult sector to transition to renewable energy is the
transportation sector, and all of the panelists indicated that the key
component to realize this goal is energy storage. Given Germany’s
strong industrial presence in the automotive industry, it was not surprising
that this topic generated some of the most spirited discussion and numerous
questions from the audience. The panel addressed many of the
renewable energy and energy storage technological innovations that are poised
to revolutionize the transportation sector in the next decade.
The opening presentations provided a promising glimpse of the
world’s energy future. We were impressed by the Germans’
determination to address the elimination of fossil fuels through both
technological advancement and policy innovation, and we are eager to learn more
throughout the next two days of the conference and the exposition.