SYNERGIES WITH OTHER

THEMES

In the chapters Transport & Smart Mobility and Digital Industry new industrial processes are explored to optimise industrial processes, a cooperation between these domains and the Health and Wellbeing domain can be useful to support the major challenge “Restructuring Healthcare Delivery Systems”.

Digitisation is a main driver in Transport & Smart Mobility and Digital Life and challenges related to the use of data, trust, safety and security are shared with the other domains.

Challenges on Connectivity and Interoperability and Safety, Security and Reliability are shared with most of the application domains especially relevant for the Health and Wellbeing chapter with the emerging Internet of Things (IoT) entering the hospital.

3. Energy

Energy

3

3.1.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

The energy world is in transition: different energy sources are linked to achieve high efficiency, reliability and affordability. Renewable energy sources, such as solar and wind power, are changing the nature of the world’s power grids. The centralised power generation model is gradually turning into a distributed one, causing today’s unidirectional power flows to become bidirectional. This situation requires intelligence and security features at each level of the grid and interfaces. Micro- and nano-electronics, integrated into power electronic modules and systems, are essential for an efficient, reliable and secure management of power generation, transmission, storage and consumption through smart grids, safe and secure system applications and devices.

All stakeholders of the European ECS industry, including nano-electronics, electronic device manufacturers and systems integrators (OEMs), together with the research institutes, contribute with innovative solutions, based on long-term continuous research on all Technology Readiness Levels (TRLs), to achieve the targets jointly agreed by the Industry and the European Commission.

Significant reduction of the primary energy consumption, along with reduced carbon dioxide emissions, is the key objective of the Energy chapter. ECS are key enablers for higher efficiency and intelligent use of energy along the whole energy value chain, from generation to distribution and consumption. Enhancing efficiency in the generation and distribution as well as reducing energy consumption and carbon footprint are the driving forces for the research in nano-/micro-electronics, and in embedded and integrated systems, to secure the balance between sustainability, cost efficiency and reliability of supply in all energy applications.

3.2. RELEVANCE

3.2.1.

In recent years, it has become apparent that semiconductor-based innovative technologies have enabled more electrical energy savings than the growth in demand in the same period. The core of the European competitive advantage is in system knowledge and the provision of holistic system solutions. Saving energy is equivalent to reducing the costs and being more competitive. Energy efficiency levels in the IEA member countries improved, on average, by 14% between 2000 and 2015. This generated energy savings of 19 exajoules (EJ) or 450 million tonnes of oil equivalent (Mtoe) in 2015. These savings also reduced total energy expenditure by USD 540 billion in 2015, mostly in buildings and industry. While GDP grew by 2% in IEA countries, the efficiency gains led to flattening of the growth in primary energy demand.

In parallel, global CO₂ emissions have risen at a rate of 1,5% per year in the last decade, stabilizing only briefly between 2014 and 2016. Fossil CO₂ emissions from energy use and industry, which dominate total GHG emissions, grew 2.0 per cent in 2018, reaching a record 37.5 Gt CO₂ per year (source: United Nations Environment Programme, Emissions Gap Report 2019). The stabilization and the slower increase

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According to IEA, the analysis of factors driving energy consumption trends in IEA member countries indicates that the decoupling was mainly due to efficiency improvements (figure upper right). Structural changes (mostly a shift to less-intensive industries and services) also assisted in efficiency improvements by reducing total energy consumption.

Cumulative savings over the period 2000 – 2015 were 159 EJ, equivalent to more than one year of final energy consumption in Europe, China and India combined.⁵⁵

Examples of the most important ECS applications having high impact on the efficient use and generation of energy are power inverters – a steadily growing market (USD 65 billion forecasted for inverters in 2020⁵⁶).

Another example of ECS market contributing to the efficient use of energy is the wireless infrastructure RF power device market, with around USD 1 billion TAM. The share of GaN based devices is expected to increase from 10% in 2015 to 40% in 2022 (source ABIresearch, 2017), which demonstrates how fast new techniques can be deployed if the added business value is achieved. Driven by new developments, such

Ñ

54 Trends in global CO₂ and total greenhouse gas emissions: 2017 Report; © PBL Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency; The Hague, 2017; PBL publication number: 2674

55 Energy efficiency indicators by OECD/IEA – Highlights 2016

56 Power Integrated Circuit 2017 – Quarterly Update – Yole Développement

is a result of lower coal consumption, higher energy efficiency and increased renewable power generation, particularly wind and solar power⁵⁴.

Energy saving is also an opportunity. In fact, by reducing power dissipation and corresponding heat production, energy is available for other uses and equipment.

F.27 Growth in world electricity demand and related CO₂ emissions 2018-2030 GROWTH IN WORLD ELECTRICITY DEMAND

AND RELATED CO₂ EMISSIONS

Source: World Energy Outlook Special Briefi ng for COP21 (2015) Source: adapted from IEA Energy effi ciency market report, 2016, based on IEA energy effi ciency indicators database

1990 2000

Source: World Energy Outlook Special Briefi ng for COP21 (2015) Source: adapted from IEA Energy effi ciency market report, 2016, based on IEA energy effi ciency indicators database

as the electro mobility and Industry 4.0, new energy supply chains and consumption patterns are emerging.

Powering the electro mobility is a major challenge in the coming years with the implementation of a reliable and sustainable charging infrastructure.

The potential of the emerging industrial era 4.0 is based on the combination of novel technologies: Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS), Internet of Things (IoT) and Artificial Intelligence (AI). Higher efficiency at all levels in power usage is one enabler for Smart Industry: Power conversion & energy harvesting, Power Management, Power storage & Motor Control (see figure above).

European ECS companies are among the leaders in smart energy related markets, which is largely driven by political decisions as well as by the move to renewing energies and to added costs on carbon dioxide emissions. Leading market positions are achieved in electrical drives, grid technology and decentralised renewable energy sources. This position will be strengthened and further employment secured by innovative research at the European level. Competitive advantages can be gained by research in the following areas:

1. Significant reduction and recovery of losses (application and SoA-related);

2. Increase of power density and a decrease of system size by miniaturisation and integration, on the system and power electronics level;

3. Increased functionality, reliability and lifetime (incl. sensors & actuators, ECS HW/SW, artificial intelligence and machine learning, monitoring systems …);

4. Manufacturing and supply of energy relevant components, modules and systems;

5. The game changer to renewable energy sources and decentralised networks, including intermediate storage;

6. Energy supply infrastructure for e-mobility, digital live and industry 4.0;

7. “Plug and play integration” of ECS into self-organised grids and multi-modal systems;

8. Safety and security issues of self-organised grids and multi-modal systems;

9. Optimisation of applications and exploitation of achieved technology advances in all areas where electrical energy is consumed.

10. ECS for storage solutions.

F.28 Industrial 4.0 example (Source Hannover Messe conferences)

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3.2.2.

The ECS for energy (incl. components, modules, CPS, application software), which supports the EU and national energy targets, will have a huge impact on job generation and education if based on the complete supply chain and fully developed in Europe. Key will be the capability to maintain complete systems understanding and competence from small-scale solutions up to balanced regional energy supply solutions. It is mandatory to have plug-and-play components enabled by broad research contributions from SMEs and service providers, including EU champions in the energy domain. Thanks to the expected wider proliferation of energy storage devices in the smart city context, new distributed forms of energy storage will become available, to be exploited by smart control systems, based as well on artificial intelligence enabled solutions.

Societal benefits include access to knowledge, development of modern lifestyle and the availability of energy all the time and everywhere – with a minimum of wasted energy and a minimum of greenhouse gas emissions. Applications having a huge energy demand and therefore a large saving potential are in the areas of High Performance Data centres serving the mobile connected world, the implementation of Smart Cities and the future implementation of e-mobility with widely distributed charging stations, demanding a higher density of energy distribution points with, as a key feature, local intermediate storage systems.

F.29 Smart Energy landscape – from centralised to distributed (PV, wind, biogas, ...) generation and conversion, consisting of High/Medium Voltage grid (orange), Low Voltage grid (yellow) including Communication Network (aquamarine) linking producers and consumers down to regional and community level (source ECSEL MASP 2016⁵⁷).

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57 http://www.ecsel-ju.eu/web/

downloads/documents/ecsel_

gb_2015_46_-_masp_2016.pdf

Digitalisation in the smart grid will be one element for delivering smart energy from providers to consumers, and to control appliances at consumer homes to save energy, reduce cost and increase reliability and transparency.

PV module

ESS

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