Kathy Gibson reports – No economy can thrive without extensive and reliable energy – and digitalisation can help to ensure that it delivers.
The energy industry is currently transitioning, at the same time as digital disruption is becoming mainstream.
“We are formulating our strategies around these two disruptions,” says Taru Madangombe, vice-president of the energy business: anglophone Africa at Schneider Electric.
When it comes to energy transition, we are moving away from fossil-based fuels to initiatives that embrace renewable energy with zero carbon emissions, he adds.
Key to the energy transition are moved to energy and process efficiency.
Energy efficiency can drive savings, while increasing electrification and decarbonisation, Madangombe says.
In terms of process efficiency, this is driving sustainability and better asset performance while increasing productivity and efficiency.
On the other hand, we have the digital transformation which is disrupting all industries.
Internet of Things (IoT) is growing, and now accounts for 35% of all 5G apps in the manufacturing and utilities sectors. Meanwhile, big data is set for massive growth, and artificial intelligence is seeing greater investment from companies worldwide.
“It is simple equation: energy efficiency, electrification and digitalisation are all applicable to all buildings and industrial applications.
“The challenge is how we make sure, in the next 20 years, we are all operating using decarbonised energy while being more digital.”
The last few months have seen a lot of businesses being interrupted. “But what is key is how every business has come back up to speed,” Madangombe points. “We have adapted and back to business as unusual.
“But this will require more digitalisation and electrification.”
Businesses that have done well during the pandemic are those that have had a successful digital transformation, Madangombe adds.
“The focus is now on efficiency, sustainability, remote everything and resilience.”
Efficiency refers to energy and process efficiency, end point to cloud integration, lifecycle efficiency, and whole company digitalisation.
Sustainability revolves around digitalisation plus electrification, carbon and resource saving, consulting, and clean technology integration
Remote everything: automated operations, guides remote maintenance and training, remote monitoring
Resilience: predictive maintenance, cyber security services, local/reshared supply chain, empowered country organisations.
“There are multiple benefits to this,” Madangombe explains. For instance energy efficiency saving of up 85% can be achieved, productivity can increase as much as 60%, reliability can be improved by 50%, safety can be 25% better, and sustainability can increase by 50%.
Barry Bredenkamp, GM: energy efficiency at the South African National Energy Development Institute (SANEDI), believes South Africa is in a good position to capitalise on digitalisation in the energy sector.
“South Africa is in an opportune position. With the post-pandemic recovery plan and infrastructure recovery plan we have the opportunity to do it correctly and embrace the concepts of the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR), Internet of Things (IoT) and smart networks.
“We will be able to operate on a par with our international counterparts.”
“Energy efficiency is a key enabler of economic growth, and will create jobs, get the economy moving faster, and reduce costs. Long term, it’ll help create a greener, more sustainable climate,” Bredenkamp says.
“Digital technologies have the potential to optimise the energy usage for many activities; from constructing an industrial product, to cooling a home. This represents an increase in energy efficiency.
“Increasing end-use efficiency continues to be a critical ingredient in energy transitions in South Africa and globally, with benefits in both developed and emerging economies.”
Innovation through the digital platform and transformation is something governments around the world are grappling with – but it will certainly result in things being done differently in future.
One stumbling block could be the way we develop policies and standards now. “These are long and tedious processes,” Bredenkamp says. “We are talking years.
“Moving into the digital era, with technologies evolving at such a rapid rate, we would outlive the tech just through technology and standards process.
“I see that governments are going to have to be able to adapt policies at least annually if not on a monthly basis. We are not going to have the luxury of years and long bureacratic processes.”
That the age of digitalisation is here is not in doubt, Bredenkamp adds. “We have been adopting components of digitalisation; and the Covid-19 situation has accelerated it.”
In South Africa, the three areas that saw growth during the last few months were agriculture, technology and digitalisation.
“So digitalisation is happening as we speak, whether we like it or not,” Bredenkamp says.
“From a government agency point of view, these are exciting times. We will have change the way we do things, and we will have to work more closely in partnership with technology developers, so you will see a lot more public-private partnerships.”