Energetica India Magazine December 2021

Optimal Energy and Emissions Management During Energy Transition RENEWABLE POWER 40 energetica INDIA- December_2021 Introduction The energy landscape is evolving. En- ergy costs are fluctuating widely and global concern to reduce Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions grow stronger. Traditional energy sources, such as coal, have relatively declined in importance, while supplies from natural gas and re - newables were consistently growing in recent years because of cost reduction. Additionally, the COVID-19 pandemic impacted consumption patterns, result - ing in drastic price volatilities for oil and petroleum derived products, although re - cently recovered to previous days levels. Adding to the complexity of this environ - ment, hourly or sub-hourly changes of power market prices are becoming very common around the world. Manufacturers are aware of energy’s role in overall costs and emissions. As a re - sult, they put significant effort to achieve a better management of their energy systems. For large-scale process plants, energy normally accounts for 50% of op - erating expenses (that is, excluding the feedstock). Consequently, an energy use reduction of 10% can often improve mar - gins by 5%. As companies seek to boost profits and reduce emissions, energy op - timization is naturally one of the first plac - es to look. When companies can manage energy provision and consumption in real-time, it is possible to significantly reduce to - tal energy use with just a few actions. Area by area, a site can quickly make improvements to improve efficiency and reduce consumption and emissions. On the other hand, large-scale improvement projects, such as installing a new cogen - eration system, need careful examination for cost/benefit potential. Process plants, manufacturing sites and communities need to consider what is the best way to produce, store, distrib - ute, and mix the available energy options in the context of the energy transition to zero GHG emissions. Decarbonization initiatives can be grouped into three dif - ferent scopes: direct emissions of the site, from energy imports and from prod - ucts sold, as presented in Figure 1. First scope is essentially a site related issue which could be initially addressed by improving overall energy production and distribution efficiency. Whether process plants use traditional, renewable or both energy sources, there is a need to find an effective way to adapt to this new context by integrating these sources or by fundamentally changing the existing energy system infrastruc - ture. The final objective is to simultane - ously reduce cost and GHG emissions in the current context, during the transition and continue doing it when a distributed, renewables-based energy system oper - ates long after. Energy systems integration during en- ergy transition Energy transition was defined as the transformation of global and local ener - gy systems from being predominantly centralized and hydrocarbon based to decentralized, low emission energy gen - eration, transportation, storage, and use (Ref 1), as presented in Figure 2. The three forces driving the transition are (1) Rise of hyper-connectivity and infor - mation availability; creating a significant - ly more informed global consumer base. (2) Environmental sustainability: increas - ing recognition that greenhouse gas emissions must be radically reduced. The consequence is an increasingly dis - cerning customer base and shift in be - havior. (3) Rapid Technological change: ad - vancements in physical (such as solar panels and batteries) and digital technol - ogy (for example, real time energy man - agement systems, artificial intelligence and cloud connected devices). These change the economics of different en - ergy generation sources and distribution vectors, as well as making new business and digitally operated sites attractive. Carlos Ruiz Product Manager, Visual MESA Energy Management System (VM EMS)