Every major technology shift of the last century came with an operating system. A layer of abstraction that hid the complexity below and unlocked the creativity above. The energy transition is no different. We have the hardware: solar panels, batteries, EV chargers, heat pumps, wind turbines. What we do not have is the software that ties them together into something coherent, responsive, and intelligent. This is a case for that operative system.
Increase of electrical energy demand
According to the IAEA, the world's electrical energy demand is expected to double by 2050, with an average increase above 2% per year. [1] The increased demand is driven by significant factors: expected growth in global population, the ever-growing number of new electrical appliances, the transition of the transportation system to electrical vehicles, and the increasing electrification of systems like heating. There is also a global commitment to provide electricity to areas of the world that do not have a reliable supply today, counting for almost 1.2 billion people, which is 18% of the global population. [2] Production is forecasted to grow at only 1% year on year. The gap between demand and supply is real, and it is widening. A more efficient energy system is no longer a nice-to-have; it is the prerequisite for everything else.
The need for decarbonization of the energy sector
CO2 emissions from electricity generation account for 45% of world energy-related emissions. Carbon emissions from electricity generation depend on both the quantity of electricity produced and the types of sources used. [3] In 2023, global energy-related CO2 emissions rose 1.1% to a record high, though the rapid expansion of clean energy deployment helped constrain what would otherwise have been a far steeper rise. [8] Achieving the goals of the Paris Agreement by 2050 will require a fundamental change to the energy mix, in favour of cleaner sources. [4] The problem is most acute in isolated areas, where fossil fuels remain economically advantageous compared to greener solutions. The majority of the global population without access to energy live either in isolated areas or in developing countries below the poverty threshold. [5] Solving energy access and decarbonizing the grid are the same problem. The same infrastructure answers both.
Why microgrids: the transition to 100% renewable energy
The incumbent energy system is highly inefficient. Fossil fuels are hard to transport and their highly centralised system relies on volatile and often inefficient supply chains. 33% of the inefficiency is due to fossil-based electricity production, with 41% of energy wasted in outdated fossil-based heating technologies and modes of transport. Electricity powered by renewable sources is virtually 100% efficient at end use and can be produced and managed locally and flexibly. Renewable energy is now the cheapest new electricity in countries that make up three quarters of the world's GDP. [6]
Corporate demand for renewable energy is currently greater than current supply by 27 terawatt hours, and this gap is predicted to increase tenfold in the next 10 years. [7] Private businesses and residential users will be key in building a more resilient energy system, by unlocking demand flexibility to strengthen fragile grids and by managing more distributed energy resources such as rooftop solar panels, batteries, electrical vehicles, and heating and cooling loads.
Challenges of integrating renewables at scale
Intermittent renewable energy sources, also referred to as variable renewables, are non-dispatchable due to their fluctuating nature. Wind, solar and tidal energy are considered intermittent, as opposed to controllable renewable sources such as hydroelectricity or biomass. The variable nature of wind and solar poses problems for balancing supply and demand on different timescales, from seconds to seasons, and on different spatial scales. The distributed nature of these energy resources adds complexity in terms of connecting them to the existing grid infrastructure. We need to amend and redesign not only the way we deliver electricity, but also the electricity market, which is designed for fossil fuel generators. Associated with this redesign is the need for new regulation, governance models and procedures. Research shows that most electricity systems today remain in early phases of variable renewable integration, and that the primary barriers are regulatory and institutional rather than technological. [9]
Microgrids benefits
For years, large centralised systems have dominated energy generation, transmission, and distribution. Microgrids, in contrast, represent a small network of electricity users with a local source of supply. They are usually attached to a centralised national grid but are able to function independently. When a microgrid is isolated from any other electricity network, it is commonly referred to as an islanded microgrid. Microgrids contribute to the energy transition by providing practical and accessible answers to improve energy reliability, resiliency, accessibility and cost optimisation.
- When the main grid encounters disruption or instability, a microgrid decouples and continues to deliver energy from local sources.
- Reduction in distribution distances, due to the geographical closeness of demand and supply, allows for a reduction in infrastructure costs and a reduction of conversion energy losses.
- Microgrids allow for more sophisticated and localised operational controls, including precise forecasting, more tailored infrastructure investments, and more advanced demand-side management.
Digitalising the future
In order to operate microgrids, an energy management system is required. This can be as simple as the software that today comes with inverters and electric vehicle chargers, where basic metering and grid synchronisation are handled automatically. I believe the energy management system for microgrids needs to be simple, yet smart. Non-intrusive, yet fully integrated. It learns customer needs, system topology and the status of every component of the grid in real or near-real time, enabling autonomous optimisation with the aim of maximising reliability, availability, efficiency and economic performance. Thanks to advanced data processing and machine learning algorithms, it relies as little as possible on operators, particularly in responding rapidly to changing conditions. It needs to work in both grid-tied and islanded configurations. Distributed energy resources, rooftop solar, batteries, EV chargers, are already reshaping how power is produced, traded, and delivered. Yet most grid infrastructure was not built for them. Unlocking their full potential requires precisely the kind of integrated, intelligent management layer described here. [10]
Towards a total integration
One of the main goals of the operative system is to reduce the complexity and fragmentation of managing today's grid. It takes care of interfacing with all components of the grid. In the current state of the ecosystem, this is only possible by consolidating the different protocols and standards present in the market into a unified message-based communication protocol. It needs to support, out of the box, cloud-connected or Wi-Fi enabled devices. When the physical layer of devices in the home does not offer wireless connectivity, hardware communication modules need to be adopted to bridge the gap, basic hardware connectors capable of translating a physical connection such as RS232, CAN, or ETH to a compatible Wi-Fi one.
Operability and optimisation
For the operative system to accelerate the transition to microgrids, it must be genuinely easy to use, with exceptional operability ergonomics and the ability to adapt to a vast and diverse list of use cases. At the core are systems that use internal data, telemetry of the grid, and external information, weather, prices, local grid status, to optimise energy flow and support demand-side response: negotiating energy exchange with the grid, coordinating with peer nodes in neighbouring households, and executing storage strategies. This is done through adaptive and active learning algorithms that build an understanding of each household's patterns over time. Automatic control then optimises at the device level, regulating amperage on EV chargers, shifting heat pump demand into off-peak windows, managing the energy flow of storage systems including batteries, water tanks, and vehicle-to-home interfaces. For users not comfortable with silent automatic decisions, the system offers a clear interface that surfaces opportunities for cost savings and hands full control back to the human. The goal is trust through transparency.
Open and extensible
One of the biggest friction points in the transition to microgrids is the over-fragmentation of the market, leading to an overproliferation of non-interoperable standards. On the opposite end of the spectrum, the verticalisation by industry leaders forces end users into branded lock-ins and reduces resiliency and interoperability. Integration and data layers are fully open sourced. This allows system integrators and component manufacturers to easily adopt it as their orchestration solution, for free.
I envision future appliances using the energy information to offer energy-effective dynamic features: an eco-friendly dishwasher program that fits consumption spikes into the overall household budget; dynamic cooling ahead of a potential grid brownout; EV chargers that can offer dramatic reductions in price per charge based on smart energy arbitrage. Third parties can benefit from infrastructure operational at global scale, industry-standard protocols, and the network effect of the existing appliances in the ecosystem. We should also invite anyone to build their own application, including alternative energy management systems, on top of our platform. If better automation and optimisation can be developed and our mission be accelerated, it is ultimately in the best interest of humanity.
Conclusions
Past energy transitions moved slowly because they relied on sweeping infrastructure changes from centralised sources. The renewable transition is different. It is driven by millions of small, decentralised generation and storage units on buildings and homes, connected by software. The bottleneck is no longer hardware costs or political will. It is coordination. For companies, investors and homeowners, now is the time to invest. Policymakers can accelerate adoption, both to fight climate change and to unlock economic expansion in a growing sector, while ensuring an equitable transition for communities that have been left behind by the old system. The hardware exists. The economics are moving in the right direction. What we need now is the operative system, one that is open, intelligent, and built for the world we are trying to create, not the one we are trying to leave behind.
Notes and references
- IAEA Nuclear Technology Review: Energy Projections
- IEA: SDG7 Data and Projections, Access to Electricity
- International Energy Agency: Carbon emissions from electricity generation for the top ten producers (2012)
- European Commission: The Paris Agreement
- Productive Use of Energy (PRODUSE): The Impact of Electricity Access on Economic Development, A Literature Review
- BloombergNEF: New Energy Outlook
- Rocky Mountain Institute: Corporate Renewable Energy Demand
- IEA: CO2 Emissions in 2023
- IEA: Status of Power System Transformation 2019
- IEA: Unlocking the Potential of Distributed Energy Resources (2022)
- IEA: Net Zero by 2050, A Roadmap for the Global Energy Sector
- IEA: World Energy Outlook 2023