Buildings, transportation, industry, ICT, consumer behaviour, energy storage, solar / wind / bio energy, CO2 capture and storage, and more. The transition to a sustainable and secure energy supply is one of the grand global challenges for society this century. This transition encompasses many different aspects, which are clustered in the Energy Transition Route of the Dutch National Research Agenda. Discover the ten important and urgent challenges.
How do seas and oceans function and what is their role in the future? How can we convert wind energy to electricity in an efficient and sustainable way? How can vehicles contribute to the efficiency and reduced environmental-impact of the transport system as a whole? These are three examples of the almost 12,000 questions for science which Dutch citizens posed last year. It became the basis of the 25 Routes in the Dutch National Research Agenda.
Route Energy Transition
Energy-related questions were in first instance divided over several Routes in the science agenda. Wim Sinke (ECN, AMOLF, University of Amsterdam) on behalf of the Netherlands Energy Research Alliance (NERA) and co-chairs Kornelis Blok (Delft University of Technology, Ecofys) and Richard van de Sanden (DIFFER, Eindhoven University of Technology): "We have advocated that the energy transition should become a Route on its own. The energy transition is one of the major global societal challenges of this century, bringing together technical, social, economic, legal and spatial challenges. The energy transition needs implementation of excellent building blocks, in an integrated approach and with a broad public support."
NERA was invited to define the Energy Transition Route for the National Research Agenda. Two hundred experts from diverse backgrounds came together in this process to provide all the expertise required. An intensive process of surveying, prioritising, integrating and formulating led to the formulation of ten major challenges that need to be addressed for a successful transition to a 100% sustainable energy system in 2050.
Ten challenges
The Energy Transition Route structures the complex range of questions by formulating ten Challenges. Wim: "All individual Challenges are multidisciplinary in nature, but they should be explicitly addressed in an integrated approach. Only then can ground-breaking innovations be implemented quickly and on a large scale in society and market, and accelerate the Energy Transition. We have chosen for solutions that can contribute substantially in the period until 2050."
- Buildings as power plants and vehicles as energy buffers
- Clean and flexible industry
- Every surface generates sustainable energy
- Intelligent energy systems
- From electricity to fuel and heat
- Dealing with variation
- Measure, analyse, adjust
- Rapid switch to a CO2-neutral society
- A CO2-neutral energy society will be different
- The Dutch transition in a global context
Plea to the Dutch Government
The route description with its ten Challenges is also a plea for increased public investments in energy research and innovation. Wim Sinke: "Currently the Dutch Government invests annually about 250 million euro in energy innovation. If we want to sufficiently address the ten Challenges in the route Energy Transition, we should at least double that investment. That view is backed up by an analysis by specialists and aligns perfectly with the conclusions of the climate conference in Paris. There is utmost urgency to mitigate climate change, and now is the time to seize the economic opportunities that the energy transition brings. The energy field has done its homework; now the Dutch government should respond by making the ambitious and integrated approach that has been proposed into reality."
Download
Want to learn more about the ten challenges? Download the Route Energy Transition of the Dutch National Research Agenda.
Contact
For more information, contact the secretary of the Route Energy Transition: Erik Langereis, E [368] Langereis [18] differ [368] nl (E[dot]Langereis[at]differ[dot]nl)
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