Energy sector

Do you want to grow your manufacturing company, generate your own energy, or electrify your vehicle fleet or production process, and do you need more grid capacity? Then the chances are that you will be refused by the grid manager and put on the waiting list. Your business activities are at risk because the Dutch electricity grid cannot handle our combined supply and demand for electricity. Grid reinforcement takes a long time and in the meantime you want to keep going.

We are so used to the fact that there is always more than enough electricity available that we can hardly imagine that things are different now. New business premises are no longer connected and requests to increase grid connections are regularly denied. Meanwhile, there seems to be little we can do about it ourselves. But is that really the case?

From the European Digital Innovation Hub North Netherlands (EDIH NN) program, we are working on the theme of energy and believe that we can influence the design of our future energy system. We want to prove this, together with your company, in pilots.

In the pilots, we are working toward building Smart Energy Hubs. A Smart Energy Hub is a sustainable, smart and local energy system. In this energy system, you yourself, or with a group of companies, control your generation, storage, distribution and settlement of energy use and supply in a smart way. A Smart Energy Hub can run on its own, or it can still be part of the power grid.

Through a smart controlled energy system, you can balance your joint energy supply and demand. This gives you control over the total peak load of the group of participating companies. With good coordination of each other's energy profiles, it is possible to create space in your total grid capacity. Space you can use to increase sustainability, generate your own energy, grow and so on.

But you don't create a Smart Energy Hub overnight. It takes a lot of work. For example, the Energy Act currently limits the possibilities for sharing electricity. However, there is room to discover in pilot form what it takes to make a Smart Energy Hub work. And that's what we're going to do!

In Hallum, three industrial bakeries, a transport company and a metalworking company are located on one energy loop, in the business park. Because of grid congestion, it is not possible now or in the near future to carry out expansions and sustainability plans. The five companies joined forces two years ago to come up with solutions so that they all have a future at their current location.

Before you can start thinking about a Smart Energy Hub at all, it is important to know where you yourself stand with your company. Then, together with your fellow companies, you can see where you stand as a group of energy consumers and what you yourselves can do to create grid space. The people at EDIH NN can help you do that.

From the EDIH NN program, FME, together with Ekwadraat, is organizing a webinar on what your options are within your company and with your neighbors, to prevent your business activities from being jeopardized by grid congestion. The webinar is intended for manufacturing companies from the Northern Netherlands (Groningen, Friesland, Drenthe) and will take place on March 28 from 3 pm to 4 pm. You can register below.

During the development of the Smart Energy Hub, we will see what innovations are needed. Where possible, we will address that in EDIH NN (technical innovations). For economic, socio-cultural and legal innovations, we will involve other initiatives.