The technological challenge of transitioning to renewable energies

The future of renewable energies in Spain

The sustainable development goals of the United Nations Global Compact are a must-be now. Organizations are driving their net emissions agendas, not only due to the evidence of climate change or the increase in energy costs caused by the war in Ukraine, but also due to pressure from all directions, including regulation, investors, and the employees themselves.

Spain aims to become one of the hubs of the ecological transition. In fact, this vision is one of the main axes of the Spain Can Plan, representing almost 40% of its total budget. Of the 30 components detailing investments and reforms, 3 are the ones that pave the way towards the ecological transition of the energy sector:

1. Massive deployment of the renewable generation park aimed at energy development.
2. Electric infrastructures, promotion of smart grids, and deployment of flexibility and storage.
3. Roadmap for renewable hydrogen and its sectoral integration.

These points are fully aligned with the objectives of the Integrated National Energy and Climate Plan 2021-2030 (PNIEC), which aims to achieve a 100% renewable electricity sector by 2050, with the following intermediate milestones:

• A 23% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions compared to 1990.
• Achieving 74% renewable generation by 2030.

So, where is everything heading? What is the future of renewable energies and which technologies accompany it?

The future of renewable energies

The technological challenge in the energy transition is a social, economic, and environmental necessity. Advancing towards a low-carbon production model has become the most cost-efficient alternative, as well as the cleanest.

The energy transition is an unstoppable reality, so much so that it is revolutionizing the global economy and industry.

It is not surprising, therefore, that the European Union (EU) has set the ecological transition as one of the three pillars of the European Recovery Plan (also known as Next Generation EU), along with digitalization and reindustrialization.

The technological development is the lever of change towards a better and more sustainable world. Technologies such as Internet of Things (IoT), cloud, or artificial intelligence (AI) help improve operational efficiency and energy management in your sector.

3 examples of sustainability projects in Spain

Spain is the sixth country in green technology inventions in Europe. In energy and transportation, we are the main focus of attraction, both in the European continent and in the rest of the world, most innovations are concentrated in the sectors of renewable energy and transportation, followed by construction.

Therefore, here we are going to talk about 3 lines of work with projects in which technology helps improve sustainability:

Shared Mobility and Eco-Friendly Vehicles:

1. Shared mobility apps offer a variety of solutions for users as there are multiple ways to share vehicles. Carsharing, motosharing, kicksharing, or carpooling are trending concepts of multi-user vehicle modalities.
2. In this section, eco-friendly vehicles also come into play. They are vehicles that do not emit gases and are called that because their use does not have a negative impact on the environment and helps reduce the presence of polluting gases in the atmosphere. These vehicles must be accompanied by technologies that also help ensure the safety of drivers, such as the first CarPlay app from an automaker.

Smart territories:

1. Projects like Sentilo help us capture the state of the city in real time thanks to a whole network of sensors that produce large amounts of information that then needs to be processed. This is known as Big Data and the processing and analysis of this data as Data Analytics.
   This network of sensors knows the flow of people and bicycles crossing the main avenues or arteries of the city, the decibel level of the streets, the temperature in each neighborhood, and the air quality. In other words, we are turning cities into **ciudades inteligentes** or **smart cities**.
2. The increase in domestic and industrial waste has been disproportionate in recent years. Recycling and solid waste management is a commitment of both companies and individuals. Outstanding technologies such as smart containers that also use IoT, automated food waste tracking systems, and computer vision technologies can help classify mixed plastics by separating them from others.
3. The Ebro Hydrogen Corridor is one of the examples where digital transformation and new sources of renewable energy such as hydrogen seek to drive the goal of climate neutrality. This project includes the construction of a prototype hydrogen-powered train. Tests are being carried out at the CAF railway company factory in Zaragoza.

Reduction of energy consumption and renewable energies

1. All of this must be accompanied by the reduction of energy consumption to avoid depending on oil or coal, as these sources of energy produce greenhouse gases. In addition to that, reducing energy dependence is also a priority task. Improving energy efficiency in an attempt to use less energy to produce the same result.
   In this case, technology is also on our side. Artificial intelligence helps reduce energy and resource consumption, promote decarbonization, and drive the circular economy, because it allows us to improve environmental planning, decision-making, and monitoring of environmental threats.

Technology applied to sustainability

Previously, we have talked about the key technologies for sustainable digitization, but what function does each one have?

• IoT: Allows sensorizing the real world using generated data and, through machine learning, making predictions that facilitate decision-making. In this way, it is possible to control and prevent environmental impact.
• Big Data & Data Analytics: The generation of large amounts of data, thanks to technologies like IoT, and their subsequent analysis and processing (Data Analytics) allow us to better understand the world we live in and make better decisions.
• Artificial intelligence: Accelerates the analysis of large volumes of data, allowing a better understanding of environmental challenges and providing solutions.
• User experience: Increases end-user engagement with easy use and optimal experience of the solutions developed.
• Cloud: On the other hand, these solutions must have an optimized architecture, both in terms of computational and energy resource consumption, and this is achieved through cloud-based models with carbon-neutral emissions, such as the new AWS region in Spain.

The goal is clear, to achieve energy efficiency and sustainability to create a better planet as in these well-known use cases at SEIDOR. If this is one of your goals, we can help you, contact us!