Review of the Industrial Energy Efficiency Conference

The Industrial Energy Efficiency Conference on 7 April 2022 in Wels showed that a step change in the industrial energy transition is a key factor both for economic competitiveness and the overall energy transition. It was part of the annual international conference World Sustainable Energy Days, held as a hybrid event with over 650 experts from 55 countries, 430 of them on-site in Wels.

The Industrial Energy Efficiency Conference started with the session “Driving the industrial energy transition”, which focussed on key developments and sustainable energy solutions that support industrial companies in doing “better business” instead of “business as usual”. The following session “Energy flexibility for a clean and digital transformation” presented a range of innovations in energy flexibility, digitalisation and storage technology solutions. These enable companies’ participation in energy markets, support their decarbonisation ambitions and impact positively on their overall competitiveness. Finally, the session “Striving for climate neutrality: examples worth replicating” showcased success stories of industrial companies tackling their energy transition.

The NEFI Projekt Manager Gerald Steinmaurer presented Industrial Microgrids – an innovative energy exchange platform. The aim of the project is the creation of a platform for mapping energy consumption and generation in a spatial context with energy flow optimisation. This is being demonstrated by establishing three test beds for industrial energy communities to validate the platform and testing different forms of energy exchange (heat, electricity, sector coupling).