IERE Technology
Foresight

Emerging Technologies for the 2020sOutline

2017Rev. 1 Jan.25, 2024
Sept. 19, 2017

IERE Technology Foresight activities
The social environment surrounding the electric power industry is changing drastically,
and the related technical fields are expanding rapidly. IERE, an international platformcomprised of major utilities around the world related to electric power technologies, hasstarted the Technology Foresight activities in 2015, in which important technical issues
are examined and discussed based on IERE members' own needs and foresights, bothglobally and locally.
The IERE Technology Foresight 2017 report (TF2017) was compiled with the cooperationof a consultant in the period from 2016 to 2017. The technologies selected in TF2017
were based on the questionnaire survey of IERE members. The consultant then compiled
the report with close cooperation with the IERE appointed Technical Committee and themajor findings and finally report presented at IERE meetings. The TF2017 reportoutlines and explains the outlook of the most important Emerging Technologies which
are already commercialized, and Fringe (black swan) Technologies which may potentiallyhave a large impact on the electric power business in the near future. This document
reflects the key results of the TF2017 report and proposes how to proceed with IERE
Technology Foresight activities.
1. Outline of the Technology Foresight Report (TF2017)
As part of the regular Technology Leader Meetings (TLM) initiated by IERE within its
Board members, the TLM held in Berlin on November 10, 2015 first conducted amember-wide survey on identifying key technologies impacting the industry at large.
Subsequently, at the 30th Beijing IERE Board Meeting held on May 10, 2016, aTechnology Foresight task sponsored by IERE was proposed and then approved by theBoard, in which IERE members would collaborate to research and analyze the emerging
technologies that will enable and/or force the industry to transform, and then share theresults with all members. Soon, the Technical Committee within the IERE Board
members was formed and the Committee eventually selected Frost & Sullivan as aconsultancy entrusting them to compile the Technology Foresight (TF2017) report in2016.

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Based on the questionnaire survey of IERE members, IERE members selected 20
important Emerging Technologies and 5 Fringe Technologies from 6 different fields
ranging from power generation to allied technologies, Figure 1 refers. In addition, theTechnical Committee further selected the five most important technologies that have thehighest “Potential for Market Transformation” within the electric power industry.
Power generation

Power T&D

End useHYBRID ENERGYSYSTEMS, OFFSHORE
WIND, CCUS,
GEN III+, ADVANCEDNUCLEAR,ADVANCED PV& distribution
SMART
GRID,RENEWABLE AND
DISTRIBUTEDGENERATION, VPP,DC GRID

PROSUMER, EV &FUEL
CELL
VEHICLES. SMART
X, GRID AND HOMECYBERSECURITY

Climate change & Water

Energy storage

Allied technologies

CLIMATE MODELLING,WATERRESOURCE
PLANNING,WATERRECOVERY AND REUSE

ENERGY
STORAGEDEVICES, LITHIUMION
BATTERY,HYDROGEN ENERGYSTORAGE(Reds are the most important 5 Technologies, blues are the Fringe Technologies)
Notes:
Artificial Intelligence (AI): Artificial intelligence involves developing human-like
cognitive capabilities such as learning, reasoning, problem solving, planning, and selfcorrection for machines.
Internet of Things (IoT): A global network infrastructure, where physical and virtual‘things’ have identities, and are linked through a high degree of autonomous datacapture, event transfer, network connectivity, and interoperability.
Carbon Capture, Utilization, and Storage (CCUS): Technologies to capture
anthropogenic generated carbon emissions from power generation and then either
utilize it or permanently store it underground.
Prosumer: Collection of technologies that enable end users to become both consumers
and producers of energy.
Virtual Power Plant (VPP): A group of prosumers interacting with another group ofprosumers for selling and buying electricity.
Fig. 1 Most Important Emerging and Fringe Technologies in the six fields
2. Features of TF2017
Technology Foresights related to power industry are energetically performed by many
international organizations, governments and consultancies, and representative2

examples include the International Energy Agency’s Energy Outlook and Energy
Technology Perspectives.
As indicated by the Paris Agreement, countermeasures against global warming are an
urgent issue of the global energy industry and technological advancements in the energy
sector play a key role. At the same time, large swells of changes in the business model ofthe energy industry such as electricity liberalization are occurring. The rapid
development and deployment of new technologies such as transport electrification anddistributed energy resources are also putting new players in the traditional landscape.
The purpose of the Technology Foresight activities advanced by IERE is to examinevarious technologies under the global expertise of the IERE community, and perhaps
more importantly how to identify and advance the right technologies to suit the local
needs and global trends.
TF2017 investigated different attributes of individual technologies with the cooperationof IERE experts, e.g. its function, drivers, outline and development status of thetechnology, the potential for market transformation, economics, market trends andforesight, future outlook, alternatives, R&D objectives, key organizations, advantages
and disadvantages, enablers and barriers etc.

3.

Key Insights from TF2017

TF2017 identifies five most important Emerging Technologies:
1) Prosumer Technologies: Prosumertechnologies

will

bring

about hugetransformations to the architecture of the energy market. They also act as acatalyst for 3 major transitions occurring within the energy landscape, namely a)
the transformation of the pattern of relationships between producers andcustomers. Prosumer Technologies enable decentralized power grids which
increase “energy ownership” among end users, in the form of an industrial,commercial, or residential prosumer; b) Prosumer Technologies will lead toenergy democracy, which means both the management and ownership of energy
generation is distributed widely and is governed by free market principles. The
rise of blockchain can also potentially impact energy trading between prosumers
because it can cope with the inherent real-time dynamism in electricity demandand supply, thus real-time return on investments can be realized; c) Prosumer
Technology may also accelerate an off-grid, low-carbon energy system and self3

sufficiency among end users. In an area without grid access or where expansionof the electricity grid is not viable, Prosumer Technologies can improve energy
reliability by establishing rural energy entrepreneurs, generating additional
revenue while offering local energy benefits to the surrounding community. This
will also lead to lesser need to invest in more large-scale power plants. Also,
certain concepts can be realized with Prosumer Technologies, such as Virtual
Power Plants (VPP) systems.
TF2017 points out the rapid advances in technology, particularly smart
meters as the enabling factor (Enablers) for prosumers. Smart meter penetration
will likely to double from 2015 levels by 2025, mainly driven by replacement of
first generation meters that have only basic functionalities and a limited lifetimeof 10 years especially in Europe and APAC. TF2017 also points out a barrier ofprosumers is the aging infrastructure which cannot handle fragmented
bidirectional power flows and related accounting functionalities.
2) Energy Storage Systems (ESS): ESS can be employed at all levels, e.g. generation,
distribution or at the end-user’s meter. ESS provides power balancing and load
leveling for renewable integrations; reactive power supports and voltage
regulation, and investment deferral. Furthermore, with more electric vehicles inplace, ESS also can provide a buffer for charging needs to ease the stress incertain distribution networks. Residential Energy Storage (RES) is likely toexperience significant growth globally, with Germany, China, Australia, theUnited Kingdom, and the United States being the pioneers. It is predicted thatthe RES market will become a fragmented and highly competitive market
because, aside from the major battery manufacturers, multiple smaller
companies are beginning to offer the same service. Globally, RES is likely to reacha clearly established market structure by 2017.
Currently, the selling cost of a second life battery is 35% lower than that of abrand new one, which could decrease down to 66% by 2018 due to theestablishment of dedicated facilities for battery repurposing, which could bring
down the cost of repurposed batteries to $20/kWh.
3) Big Data Analytics (BDA): BDA can positively affect the electricity marketplaceby enabling power companies to detect energy theft. Today’s highly sophisticatedgas and steam turbines used by thermal power plants leaves very little margin
for variation. The capture and analysis of massive amounts of data collected from4

sensors at different plant equipment can detect and notify the engineers locatedremotely about any malfunctioning or breakdowns. Power companies’ own
equipment is worth millions if not billions of dollars, including cables, overheadlines, transformers, and controls. BDA will also help predict failure and prevent
it through maintenance or scheduled replacement. Perhaps most importantly,
BPA will enable electrical utilities to offer their customers new incentives andpricing structures that can generate new revenue for end users. This is achievedby using BDA to measure and reward their customers' responses to enable moreinteractions.
Availability of advanced computational technologies such as in-memorycomputing (due to significant reduction in cost for memory in the last few years)
is becoming an important enabler for Big Data adoption across sectors. Also,increasing adoption of Internet of Energy Things (IoT) powered by smart grids,smart meters, and smart home applications is a key enabling factor that will
drive the use of BDA. On the other hand, Data quality, privacy and integration
risks with existing infrastructure are considered as barriers of the technology.
4) Renewables and Distributed Generation: Distributed Generation (DG) has thepotential to change the existing power scenario through greater adoption ofrenewables and the powering of remote locations globally. The rapid adoption of
DG is currently empowering the energy market in many countries such as Africaand India. This is considered the beginning of a new global trend and could be
used in tandem with solar photovoltaic (PV) and energy storage solutions topower many communities who are seeking to increase energy reliability andindependence from the electricity grid. The addition of DG solutions will also
reduce the dependence on conventional fossil fuel sources such as coal and gas
for power generation, thereby improving the emission scenario. To remaincompetitive in the changing energy landscape, utilities will need to deviseinnovative business models to embrace both renewables and distributedgeneration.
Major barrier is how to effectively integrate modular and isolated systems
into larger centralized grids over the long term. Potential risks include
introducing greater volatility into energy networks, leading to possible largescale and wide-area grid failures.
5) Climate Modeling: Meteorological variability often causes irregularity in the5power sector, especially for renewable power sources. Changes in climate
conditions such as changes in temperature, precipitation, sea level, andfrequency and severity of extreme events affect how much energy is produced,delivered, and consumed. Climate change’s most worrisome change is on
temperature and heat waves because the impact is felt across the value chain ofpower generation, either in generation, transmission, distribution or storage. For
example, in July 2012, India was hit with a large blackout affecting more than
300 million people because of a surge in demand from an unexpected sector,
which came from farmers. Due to draught conditions, farmers were using more
electricity to pump water from deeper boreholes for agriculture purposes. The
cumulative effects from a surge in the demand for air-conditioning and pumping
power subsequently led to the massive blackout. Climate models give information
about what changes have occurred, how well past and present climates have been
understood, and what changes lie ahead. From the power utilities perspective,
climate modeling contributes in four ways, which are:a) Prediction oftemperature increases and heatwaves; b) Prediction of extreme events; c)
Prediction of climate change impacts on coastal areas; and d) Prediction ofrenewable generation.
In addition, TF2017 is presenting the present state of technology development of eachtechnology (Fig. 2). Various technological developments are considered necessary forpractical applications of the Fringe Technologies.

6Fig. 2 Present state of technology development of each technology
4. Future IERE technology foresight activities
As mentioned above, the rapid progress in technologies significantly impacts the way
energy is converted, transmitted and used. Thus, the business of energy companies is as
much changing as the related R&D has to shift priorities. IERE’s Technology Foresightprovides an expert review on these developments. With its global outreach and, mostimportantly, with specific focus on R&D needs it will support utilities around the worldin their preparations for the changes ahead. TF2017 has been established by IERE tolaunch a global platform for the evaluation of emerging and fringe technologies. On a
regular basis industry players, not limited to the researchers only but also including themanagement and policy makers shall be informed to better understand the latest
development of relevant energy technologies.
Individual technology developments and their adoption in markets depend on global
trends as well as regionally different needs and political/ regulatory priorities. IERE, aninternational exchange platform for electric power technology research, helps to match
technology foresight with insights on global trends and regional needs.
IERE's technology foresight activities are not only providing valuable support to IERE
members to select, evaluate and analyze important technologies, but is also providing
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opportunities to build a global community that shares knowledge and experiencesamongst the IERE members. Our technology foresight activities will stimulate further
individual or joint discussion amongst IERE members and external partners to foster
outward orientation and an un-biased view to the benefit of all parties involved.
TF2017 has been officially released to all IERE members in 2017. Based on their
feedback our future Technology Foresight activities will be shaped according to themember’s needs. A more in depth analysis of selected topics is planned and an update of
the current report including latest developments shall be provided on a regular basis (e.g.
every 2-5 years).

8Rev. 1 Jan. 25, 2024
Sep. 19, 2017