Renewables and Decentralised Energy in Smart Cities

Renewable energy is a hot topic on a global scale in order to achieve global climate targets and decarbonization of energy production. Large scale off and onshore wind, CHP and solar projects are well developed and are growing steadily as a replacement of carbon and nuclear capacity. However, despite the UN Paris Agreement on Climate Change, no real international consensus has been reached on the exact technologies to be used, innovation targets or effort allocation amongst nations.

From a bottom-up perspective, and taking into account potential individual actions, the most appropriate level at which new initiatives for renewable energy projects can be captured and stimulated seems to be the ‘vicinity’ or the ‘city’. Local Energy Communities, off-grid production, supply-demand balancing, energy storage, and implementation of data and IOT networks will form a micro-layer driving future energy production. Novel smart financing strategies will need to be adopted to sustain micro-initiatives and link financial resources to sound business models.

Speakers:

– Antoon Soete, Wattson
– Frederic Touquet, Tractebel
– Bram Delvaux, Eubelius

Panel:

– Moderator: Erik Van den Broeck, BDO
– Frédéric Tounquet, Tractebel
– Bram Delvaux, Eubelius
– Frank Vermeulen, Creamo Sustainable Business Creation
– Antoon Soete, Business Developer, Wattson

Additional Speakers:

– Erik Van den Broeck, BDO
– Laura Cafora, IPFA