20.3.2025
Tämä kirjoitus on julkaistu 20.3.2025 Both2nia-sivuilla. Alkuperäisen kirjoituksen löydät täältä. | Kaisa Penttilä
Key take-aways from the EnergyWeek seminar hosted by Sari Kola, with keynote speech from Professor Jero Ahola (LUT) and panelists Tuomas Hakala, Head of Business Development at Convion, Eleonor Hedström, WISE Ecosystem Lead at Wärtsilä, and Simo Säynevirta, Green Electrification Ecosystem Lead at ABB.
Why?
We all know this – direct electrification and transition to cleaner fuels is not just a trend; it’s an imperative driven by climate change and the need for sustainable energy solutions. Investments in these areas are already happening, but we need to accelerate development manyfold to achieve our climate neutrality targets. There are significant opportunities for growth and innovation and the costs are expected to decrease once manufacturing is scaled up. Although the new solutions will probably never be able to achieve the affordability of fossil fuels, the costs of climate change are even greater, and we need to change the current system
What?
There is no silver bullet technology, but a combination of different solutions to different needs are needed. Direct electrification and hydrogen offer complementary solutions to our energy needs. Professor Ahola gave an example of how solar PV combined with battery storage can provide baseload power on a gigawatt scale. Batteries are particularly promising for land-based transport, with innovations like battery swaps for electric trucks already being implemented in China for example. However, hydrogen has a different role. For long term storage the costs of hydrogen are a fraction of batteries. There are also large markets upcoming for synthetic fuels, especially in the aviation and marine sectors, where battery weight is an issue.
How?
Mr. Säynevirta highlighted that the successful implementation of these technologies requires us to unshackle our mental models and embrace exponential development. Ecosystem Lead companies like ABB emphasize the need for commercialization, scale-up, and speed-up, which they are ready to support the ecosystem partners in. Mr. Hakala emphasized the importance of technological excellence, collaboration and leveraging our strengths to not only lower our own carbon footprint, but to create a significant carbon decreasing handprint globally as well. Ms. Hedström pointed out that Wärtsilä’s modeling suggests that the world could be decarbonized by 2050, but we must start today and work together.
In the myriads of different challenges we are faced with, Ms. Kola asked the panelists to prioritize. Key steps that the panelists suggested include:
- Mandates and Regulations: Emission trading and regulations for sectors like shipping and aviation are crucial to create the business case for the new solutions. There needs to be political will to put a price on carbon in different sectors.
- Customer Contracts: Securing customers and contracts to drive demand is a must. Also, innovative financing models to derisk projects are needed. Let’s not do what everyone else is doing, but focus on our strengths. Finland, with its cheap electricity and point sources of biogenic CO2, has a competitive advantage to serve specific markets.
- Investment in R&D and physical infrastructure: We need investments in both R&D and physical infrastructure to stay competitive globally. The lack of capital especially for physical investments is a well-known issue, but it’s essential to rally investors and create bankable projects. Governments have a role to play in this as well.
So What?
The energy transition is at a crossroads. Understanding the disruption caused by both climate change and digital revolution is utterly complex, which means no-one can tackle the challenges alone. Neither will it be possible to grasp the opportunities on your own, but ecosystems of collaborative partnerships are needed to create value for customers.
The hydrogen market model should not necessarily be based on a 100-year-old natural gas market model, but a truly sector coupling and flexible model could be created. Data centers could become a critical component in balancing the grid and providing excess heat to other sectors. Innovative business models and ecosystem collaboration are needed to support the demonstration of these solutions locally, so that they could be scaled up globally.
By combining the knowledge and expertise of people from different sectors and companies of different sizes, we can challenge the existing ways of thinking and create more flexible energy systems. We have all the required technologies and resources, but we need to raise the ambition level – Let’s be world leaders in implementation too!