EURELECTRIC HOLDS ROLE OF ELECTRICITY WORKSHOPS

Successful workshops were held on the demand and supply parts of EURELECTRIC’s Role of Electricity Project on 20-22 November in Brussels, confirming the importance of competitiveness, sustainability and security of supply, and analysing the contribution that electricity can make to these three key energy drivers. The demand-side workshop highlighted the significant potential for energy savings through technological innovation and the importance of new applications of electricity. In the second workshop, preliminary results of the supply-side part of the Role of Electricity project were presented, after a discussion on the prospects of global fuel supply.

Successful workshops were held on the demand and supply parts of EURELECTRIC’s Role of Electricity Project on 20-22 November in Brussels, confirming the importance of competitiveness, sustainability and security of supply, and analysing the contribution that electricity can make to these three key energy drivers. The demand-side workshop highlighted the significant potential for energy savings through technological innovation and the importance of new applications of electricity. In the second workshop, preliminary results of the supply-side part of the Role of Electricity project were presented, after a discussion on the prospects of global fuel supply.

The first workshop on the subject of demand-side electro-technologies saw sessions on lighting, domestic appliances, transport and heating and cooling. Speakers demonstrated the significant potential for cost- and CO2 savings through advances in energy efficiency in lighting and domestic appliances. However, speakers said that the main obstacle to these energy savings was the slow rate of transfer to new technologies. In the transport and the heating and cooling sectors, speakers demonstrated the clear potential for substitution of direct fossil fuel use by electricity. Two presentations considered the exciting development of the plug-in hybrid vehicle, which would offer the possibility to fulfil most commuting journeys on electricity only. In heating and cooling, presentations showed that heat pumps are competitive at present against oil heating, and represent a rapidly growing market.

In the second workshop on fuel supply and power generation, preliminary results of the supply-side part of the Role of Electricity project, carried out by power plant association VGB Powertech, were presented. The workshop opened with an interesting overview of global fuel supply prospects by speakers from the International Energy Agency and the petroleum sector. The following sessions considered developments in each technology – fossil fuel based technologies, nuclear energy and renewables. The overall conclusion was that no one technology represented a panacea for a sustainable energy future but that all would be needed in combination.

Overall the workshops demonstrated that electricity represents the most competitive and sustainable energy vector, for which generation technologies are advancing and demand-side applications are growing. Concluding the workshops, EURELECTRIC Secretary-General Paul Bulteel stressed the need for a consistent policy framework, and underlined that the Role of Electricity project was a timely initiative as key energy decisions have to be taken. “Let us keep all the options open and let us create a favourable investment climate”, he urged.

The final results of the Role of Electricity project will be available in January 2007 and further events will take place later in the year.

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