Bringing Together Academy and Industry to Power Smart Grid Expertise in Europe

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Energy Game Changers 2020 is looking into challenges which the current transition encompasses from a variety of perspectives. We’re bringing on stage policymakers, industry leaders and academy representatives. Together, we’ll assess the potential of powering Smart Grid expertise and sustainable solutions for the energy landscape, for the upcoming years.

Smart Grid implementation requires a significant amount of investments for replacing the current electrical grids with smart grids. On top of that, we need to train the next generation of electrical engineers, who must be knowledgeable to implement the new smart grid technologies. For these reasons, during the afternoon panel discussion, we will dive into how SMAGRINET services can help to make this energy transition successful.

 

MEET OUR SPEAKERS

 

Dan Podjed

Dan Podjed, PhD, is an applied anthropologist from Slovenia, devoted to developing people-friendly and environmentally responsible services, products and solutions. He is a Research Fellow at the Research Centre of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts, a Researcher at the Institute for Innovation and Development of the University of Ljubljana, and an Assistant Professor for Cultural and Social Anthropology at the University of Ljubljana's Faculty of Arts. He has led several applied and interdisciplinary projects (DriveGreen, Invisible Life of Waste, etc.) and has been involved in the development of several ethnography-based IT solutions (MOBISTYLE, TripleA-reno, etc.). He founded the EASA Applied Anthropology Network (served as network’s convenor from 2010 to 2018), and co-founded the “Why the World Needs Anthropologists” international symposium, annually organised since 2013. He is the author of many articles and monographs on sustainable lifestyle, human-technology interaction, volunteering, and altruism.

Hando Sutter

Hando Sutter is a board member of Eurelectric and has served as the Chairman of the Management Board of Eesti Energia since December 2014. Prior to this he was the regional manager of Nord Pool Spot power exchange in the Baltics and Russia. He has also previously worked in the management teams of regional companies such as ESS Group (renamed to G4S Estonia), Tolaram Investments and Olympic Entertainment Group. He is also a Chairman of the Management Board in the Union of Electricity Industry of Estonia.

 

Antonella Battaglini

Chief Executive Officer of the Renewables Grid Initiative. Antonella is currently a member of the European Commission's expert group on electricity interconnection targets and has previously been an expert member of the World Economic Forum (WEF)’s 2014-2016 Global Agenda Council on the Future of Electricity. In 2015 she was named one of Tällberg's 2015 five Global Leaders for her commitment to a sustainable energy future and combating climate change. She is also a senior scientist at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) where she leads the SuperSmart Grid (SSG) process, a concept she developed together with her team to reconcile different approaches to the system integration of renewables. By adopting a holistic approach, the SSG addresses the challenges of the transformation of the power sector considering generation, transmission and demand management. In this concept, both centralised and decentralised options play an undisputed role.

Seddik Bacha

Seddik Bacha received the Diploma of Electrical Engineering and the Magister Degree from the Ecole Nationale Polytechnique of Algiers, Algeria, respectively in 1982 and 1990. After 8 year of teaching activity at the Ecole Nationale Polytechnique and Abderahmane Mira University (Bejaia-Bgayet ,Algeria) , he joined the Grenoble Electrical Engineering Laboratory in 1990 where he received the Doctorate Degree and "Habilitation à Diriger de Recherche" Diploma from Grenoble National Institute of Technology in 1993 and 1998 respectively. He is currently full professor within Grenoble Alpes University in charge of Electric Engineering, power Electronics, mathematics and control lectures for various undergraduate courses. His main research interests are modeling, control and simulation of energy systems and Supergrids/microgrids. He had supervised in this field more than 50 PhD defended thesis, published one book related to power electronics modeling and control and another one on Electric Vehicle to Grid management issues. He has published nearly 450 journals and conferences papers in his area of expertise. He has been the Power System Group Manager (around 70 people) inside the G2Elab Laboratory from 2000 to 2012 and Director Deputy of the National Group GDR SEEDS from 2012 to the end of 2017. Currently he is Program Scientific Director within the SuperGrid Institute in Lyon and President of its Scientific Council. Others : Associate Editor and SS Guest Editor for IEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics.

 

 

AGENDA

9:00  - 9:20 | Opening of the Conference - Welcome words of Tallin University of Technology

9:20 - 10:00 | Industry view – Digitalization and decarbonisation of the economy. Challenges from practice - Hando Sutter, CEO of Eesti Energia/Enefit, Estonia & Board Member of Eurelectric

10:00 - 10:45 | Society view – Engaging society with a human-centric approach to the challenges in the energy sector - Dan Podjed, Ph.D. Founder and Advisor at EASA Applied Anthropology Network, Research Fellow at the Research Centre of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts, and Institute for Innovation and Development of University of Ljubljan

10:45 - 11:15 | Exploring the sustainable opportunities in the energy shift - Antonella Battaglini, CEO of Renewables Grid Initiative, member of the European Commission's expert group on electricity interconnection targets 

11:15 - 11:45 | View to the future - HVDC as a mean for large scale renewable energies integration - Prof. Seddik Bacha, Program Scientific Director of the SuperGrid Institute

11:45 - 12:00 | Break

12:00 - 13:30 | Panel discussion on industry-academy collaboration and the need for powering expertise in the energy sector - Prof. Fabrice Lemoine, University of Lorraine Excellence "Energies of the future”; Prof. Dr.-Ing. Kai Strunz, TU Berlin; Karl Kull, Tallinn University of Technology; Saulius Gudzius from Kaunas Technological University

13:30 | Closing remark

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