This week’s gas price rises and the resulting CO2 shortage affecting the food and medical industries have really exposed the interdependencies and interactions that exist across our economy — and the implications of our ‘just in time’ supply chains.
Several factors have converged. Increased global demand for gas, global gas shortages, low levels of wind leading to lower electricity production from renewables this year and a drop in imported electricity due to cable damage all happening at once have had serious implications for our energy supply, and knock-on consequences for our food production and medical industries.
This is exactly why a major component of the UK’s research strategy is centred around whole systems research, alongside research into energy generation and storage solutions. The outcomes of that research will be critical to informing how we improve the resilience of our energy system and supply chains as we work towards Net Zero.
Whole systems research aims to understand how our energy system and other, wider, systems influence one another.
To do that we need to understand not only the relationship and feedback loops between them, but all the other features — including the social, environmental, economic, technological, regulatory, political, and legal factors — that combine to form the system. Understanding that complex net allows us to optimise the whole system to enhance resilience, while still improving both environmental and economic outcomes.
There is a lot to do, but researchers are tackling exactly these questions, including:
1: How to make industries such as construction materials, metals, chemicals, and textiles more sustainable and resilient, by making them more circular — reusing and recycling components and materials and generating less waste than in traditional systems.
2: Addressing the challenges and opportunities presented by the transition to Net Zero, including how to integrate more diverse renewables into the grid, and how we address the energy storage needs that come with power sources that can’t be switched on and off at will.
At the UK Energy Research Centre researchers are investigating many of the challenges of moving to Net Zero. What does more solar and wind power mean for our enjoyment of the landscape? How do we find ways to balance our energy demands across seasons while minimising our reliance on fossil fuels? And how can we ensure financial incentives to spread electricity demand across the day don’t impact time-poor families?
3: Understanding future energy supply and demand and how the energy network can be configured to deliver this: everything from smart devices that switch off your fridge while you boil your kettle to working out how we’ll charge growing numbers of electric cars.
Researchers at the National Centre for Energy Systems Integration are working with industries within the energy system to make sure the right questions are being asked and the right connections made. They’re investigating everything from deep geothermal energy as a source of power — using a 1.6km deep borehole in Newcastle city centre — to the potential role of nuclear.
4: Facilitating the growth of intelligent local energy systems to provide cleaner, cheaper, and more efficient energy — integrating heat, power, and transport services, and drawing on innovation in areas from energy storage to data management.
At Energy Rev researchers are working with communities, like Greater Manchester and Islington, where local energy systems are already in operation, to identify the challenges and benefits and wider learnings of such systems.
5: Understanding the changes in energy demand needed for the transition to a secure and affordable, Net-Zero society. Zero-carbon energy supply is likely to be dominated by renewables, which increases the challenge of balancing supply and demand. More flexible demand could make a major contribution, but to get there we need to understand more about the drivers of energy demand, like comfort and mobility.
Much of the energy consumed in the UK comes from how we get around and how we heat and light our homes. CREDS — the Centre for Research into Energy Demand Solutions — works with researchers and policymakers to look at how changes to energy demand can help us get to Net Zero faster, including how Covid 19 has impacted on our energy use. You can read more from CREDS on energy demand here.
As Albert Einstein once said ‘the world, as we have created it is a process of our thinking. It cannot be changed without changing our thinking’. Increasing our resilience and sustainability certainly requires a change in thinking.
If you’re a UK taxpayer, your contributions help fund the work of researchers investigating questions like these, via UK Research and Innovation — the funding body that allocates government funds for research — and the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council. You can read more about what we do here.
You can also read more on circular economies here. If you’re interested in local energy systems, try LocalPodZero, an EnergyRev podcast for anyone with an interest in local climate action. UKERC also have a podcast here.
And if you want to know more about reducing energy demand, CREDS are launching a report outlining positive low energy futures for the UK that achieve net-zero emissions by 2050.
Dr Lucy Martin is Deputy Director for Cross-Council Programmes at EPSRC. Her work focuses on energy and decarbonisation and the Faraday Battery Challenge. She is responsible for strategic leadership and oversight of EPSRC’s environmental sustainability research agenda.
This blog was originally posted on medium.com.