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Workshop: The Power Grid - Enabler or Bottleneck of the Energy Transition? #clisciety

Laying Myths About the Energy Transition and Power Grids to Rest

Do we want large offshore wind power generation with “monster” lines for power transport? Or do we favor stand-alone solar panels using ecologically harmful batteries for autarky? What is the trade-off between power grid extension vs storage? We are open-source power grid researchers and want to discuss this central vs decentral approach with you. Let’s share our visions, discuss the systemic challenges but also how each one of us can contribute to the transformation individually and collectively.

In this workshop, we will tackle realities and myths of the energy transition and in particular power grids. First, we provide a brief introduction into the topic of power grids with high renewable energy share and its operation. Later, we will collect open questions and typical myths as they appear in the public media discussion. Here we target at questions such as: what is the trade-off between power grid extension vs decentral storage solutions? Or claims like: Large offshore wind power farms require “monster” lines for power transport. We will discuss such open questions and claims in an open Q&A round. In the following, we will split into groups with the workshop participants with one power systems researcher each. In the groups,

(i) we want to investigate whether open-source and open access solutions can give transparent answers to open questions in this field and/or make any contributions to overcome power grid myths;

(ii) discuss requirements for power grid infrastructure and operation from a climate justice and environmental perspective

We summarize the results together and provide them in a blog which is being started soon as outcome of our last workshop.

#clisciety (climate science, energy transition and society) is the idea of a constructive exchange between science, economy and (civil) society. The first events shall bring together research and activism.