Our current electricity grid was built hundreds of years ago, when power generation was centralised and our energy needs were far simpler. Electricity was distributed from large stable power plants to the consumers through a unidirectional flow that was easily predictable and did not require complex control. But over the last decades, cities have been going through a substantial change, seeing an exponential increase of their energy needs which … [Read more...]
Behaviour Change: measuring complex mobility options to make cities smarter
How do you factor future behaviour change into transport, housing, workplace and energy infrastructure planning? Clearly, future plans based on past behaviour will end up being wrong. And metrics that tell us which behaviour is most efficient can point us in better directions. We won’t find the answer until we start measuring it. That’s why the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) is leading a collaboration of U.S. government and academia … [Read more...]
An independent Global Energy Forecast to 2050 (part 5 of 5): Electric cars
Schalk Cloete has completed his own 5-part independent Global Energy Forecast to 2050, to compare with this year’s IEA World Energy Outlook, published this week. Underpinning all his predictions is his bet that the world will adopt tech-neutral policies (i.e. not backing any one technology over another) in 2030 as the best and only way to accelerate the transition to meet the 2050 goals. Given that, he sees the traditional fossil fuel ICE’s share … [Read more...]
Energy security v Transition in Algeria, Egypt, Morocco, Turkey
Like most developing countries, the challenge of growing economies, increasing population and rapid urbanisation puts energy security above emissions reductions. So it is for Algeria, Egypt, Morocco and Turkey, says Duygu Sever in her report for IFRI Centre for Energy & Climate. In this article she explains that all four countries nevertheless have high renewables deployment potential, and have already embraced wind and solar. To accelerate … [Read more...]
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