Strommarkt im freien Wettbewerb

By getting closer together, the European countries are looking for new solutions. One of them is the market liberalization for gas and electricity. The structures of the German (and also Austrian) energy market are going to change. The force of deregulation will cause hard competition among the utilities, also with eliminating effects. This situation together with possible imports of cheap electric power leads to considerable pressure on the energy production costs which will be extremely lower than the present level. Highly efficient power plants with low fuel and investment costs operating with a high full load rate will become the key concerns of future plant concepts.     

Battery energy storage technologies

Battery energy storage systems, comprising lead-acid batteries, power conversion systems, and control systems, are discussed. They are used by power generating utilities power distributing utilities, and major power consumers (such as electric furnace foundries). The principal advantages that battery energy storage systems offer generating utilities are described, including load leveling, frequency control, spinning reserve, modular construction, convenient siting, absence of emissions, and investment deferral for new generation and transmission equipment. Power distributing utilities and major power consumers can avoid costly demand changes by discharging their batteries at peak periods and then recharging with lower cost off-peak power (say, at night). Battery energy storage systems are most cost-effective when designed for discharge periods of less than 5 h; other systems (for example, pumped water storage) are better suited for longer discharges. It is estimated that by the year 2000 there will be a potential need for 4000 MW of battery energy storage     

Trends in der Automatisierung von Versorgungsunternehmen

The author presents five statements as a result of market observations and points out their logical consequences on future trends of product development and customer behaviour in the field of utility automation:

1. Progressing liberalization of the energy market and increasing cost pressure in the energy business lead to new stimuli on the automation market.
2. Open systems are an immediate advantage for the supplier. For customers they mean a greater degree of dependence.
3. Integrated systems for the various demands of utilities are not possible today-but if they were possible, customers would not want them.
4. Interoperability precedes integration.
5. International standards will control market dynamics.

     

Spire Florida formed to exploit PV opportunities

Massachusetts-based Spire Corporation has announced the incorporation of Spire Florida Inc, whose initial mandate will be to provide solar electric systems to the sunshine state’s renewable energy market. The new company’s initial venture, Spire Solar Florida, will introduce the company’s PV manufacturing technology and systems integration capabilities to utilities, municipalities and alterative energy suppliers in the state.This is a short news story only. Visit www.re-focus.net for the latest renewable energy industry news.     

Utilities and two-way customer communication systems

The concept of providing energy conservation programs with monitoring and control via two-way communication (TWCC) systems will be one of the solutions that utilities will employ in the conservation of the nation's valuable natural resources. The development of microelectronic technology is changing the manner in which meters will be read. There are many methods currently available in the market that enable retrieval of data remotely from a customer's premise. The potential of this technology and its applications can be endless. In the area of automatic meter reading (AMR), current technology is in a state of evolution where no single method excels. Development of the new “information superhighway” industry is likely to promote standards based upon open systems and open protocols. Current AMR technologies are described     

European electricity deregulation will not level the playing field

The European Commission (EC) announced on 12 March 2001 a new directive for the electricity markets of its member states: all should be fully open to competition by January 2003. That is, all consumers, whether industrial or residential, in any nation in the European Union (EU), should be free to choose an electricity supplier. Here, the author argues that, while this seems an affirmation of free and open competition, many state-owned electric utilities will be insulated from competition by the decision. He believes that it will prevent a level playing field from ever taking shape     

Betriebs- und Instandhaltungsstrategien der KELEG

Because of the approaching opening of the European market no other field of business is under such pressure as the electric utilities. In order to perform the economical requirements in a better way, together with the core business production and distribution additional services like communication, waste management, consulation etc. will be offered. In the future eligible customers codetermine the production, the transport and the distribution of the product. This requires — among other economizations — a minimization of the operating and maintenance costs combined with an optimal utility life of the existing components of the facilities. This aim can only be reached by using modern operation concepts and maintenance strategies. In this publication KELAG’s considerations to these main requirements will be presented.     

Fiddling while coal burns? UK energy policy-lessons from Europe

The UK electricity supply industry is going through a phase of great upheaval following the privatisation by the government. The need to devise a modern and effective national energy policy has been all but forgotten and the UK is lagging far behind its European neighbours in energy matters. The author describes aspects of successful European policies and looks at why the present structure of Britain's energy utilities makes it nearly impossible for the UK to make full use of its resources and to achieve similar success     

Future Trends in European PV Power Generation

An overview of photovoltaic (PV) power generation activities in Europe is presented, drawing on recent experiences from the European Commission's THERMIE PV demonstration programme, and including some European PV market data and a summary of ways that photovoltaics contributes to the policy objectives of the European Union (EU). The importance of further cost reductions is emphasized with reference to the THERMIE objective of 10–15% reductions in overall projects costs per Wp over the next 4 years. Noting that PV power generation in Europe is moving from being mainly an R&D activity to being one that needs promotion in the market, the market development process is explored, and it is emphasized that project and market organization ‘orgware’ issues are as important as technical hardware and software issues in PV demonstrations and promotional activities. Finally, some European ‘success stories’ are presented and priorities for future PV demonstrations are proposed. It is concluded that one of the most promising areas for PV power generation in Europe is in distributed grid-connected PV power generation, and that greater emphasis should be given to ‘orgware’ issues such as building confidence in PV technologies, links with utilities, meeting the needs of the users (citizens) and reducing costs by exploiting economies of scale in project implementation. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Kundenabrechnungssystem für STEWEAG-Sondervertragskunden

The liberalization (de-regulation) of the energy markets creates a new environment, with new requirements and demands on utilities and their business practices. STEWEAG responded to these changes of the market by initiating in 1993 an indepth re-engineering process for the whole company. The customer account (billing) management system for industrial and commercial customers is to be regarded as part of this process of re-engineering. The variety of features of the system described in this presentation should enable the reader/audience to understand why STEWEAG has opted for this system.     

ATM—success or failure? Economic remarks on the introduction of broadband technology in Europe

The introduction of ATM and broadband-based equipment into the European market requires considerable capital investment. It will result in a structural technological change, affecting the competitiveness of the European economy. Successful introduction depends on how both ATM network equipment and broadband based end-user equipment are brought onto the market. This paper focuses on economic benefits and anticipating marketing strategies, applicable in Europe with its specific, historically evolved structures. The price to pay for this ‘in-sight information’ is leaving out a global comparison. Refraining from evaluation whether conditions are good or bad for Europe or other areas, the article explains what conditions can be found there recently and where are the chances and challenges right now.     

Evolving Best-Response Strategies for Market-Driven Agents Using Aggregative Fitness GA

There are very few existing works that adopt genetic algorithms (GAs) for evolving the most successful strategies for different negotiation situations. Furthermore, these works did not explicitly model the influence of market dynamics. The contribution of this work is developing bargaining agents that can both: 1) react to different market situations by adjusting their amounts of concessions and 2) evolve their best-response strategies for different market situations and constraints using an aggregative fitness GA (AFGA). While many existing negotiation agents only optimize utilities, the AFGA in this work is used to evolve best-response strategies of negotiation agents that optimize their utilities, success rates, and negotiation speed in different market situations. Given different constraints and preferences of agents in optimizing utilities, success rates, and negotiation speed, different best-response strategies can be evolved using the AFGA. A testbed consisting of both: 1) market-driven agents (MDAs)-negotiation agents that make adjustable amounts of concessions taking into account market rivalry, outside options, and time preferences and 2) GA-MDAs-MDAs augmented with an AFGA, was implemented. Empirical results show that GA-MDAs achieved higher utilities, higher success rates, and faster negotiation speed than MDAs in a wide variety of market situations.     

Chancen und Strategien der ÖBB im liberalisierten Energiemarkt

The Austrian Federal Railways (ÖBB) with a demand for traction-energy of about 2 100 GWh will be an authorized customer in the first stage of the liberalized European power market. Therefore there are various opportunities to optimize the own production, delivery contracts and additional supply. This arcticle describes a possible portfolio for electricity-sourcing of the ÖBB with respect to a secure and cheap energy supply.     

Americans in Paris . . . [European Community]

Steps being taken by US companies to prepare for the post-1992 European market are described. In some cases, US companies may be better organized than their European counterparts to deal with a unified market. However, US trade officials still fear possible trade barriers. In particular, Article 115 of the 1957 European Economic Treaty has been used to protect the domestic automobile industries. The single market that is supposed to emerge in 1992 will do away with Article 115, but some European Community (EC) members have simply proposed enacting similar trade rules on an EC-wide basis, rather than a national one. What has provoked the ire of some US high-technology companies is a 1989 change in EC rules of origin that allows a product to be classified as European. To get the made-in-Europe seal, semiconductor chips must be fabricated in EC territory, whereas previously they only had to be assembled into packages and tested in Europe. Some of the largest US electrotechnology companies-AT&T, DEC, and IBM-have joined the European Strategic Programme for Research and Development in Information Technologies (Esprit), and, in January, Philips Consumer Electronics Co., Thomson Consumer Electronics Inc., and NBC formed a high-definition television (HDTV) consortium     

The state of the art of electric and hybrid vehicles

In a world where environment protection and energy conservation are growing concerns, the development of electric vehicles (EV) and hybrid electric vehicles (HEV) has taken on an accelerated pace. The dream of having commercially viable EVs and HEVs is becoming a reality. EVs and HEVs are gradually available in the market. This paper will provide an overview of the present status of electric and hybrid vehicles worldwide and their state of the art, with emphasis on the engineering philosophy and key technologies. The importance of the integration of technologies of automobile, electric motor drive, electronics, energy storage, and controls and also the importance of the integration of society strength from government, industry, research institutions, electric power utilities, and transportation authorities are addressed. The challenge of EV commercialization is discussed     

Tradeoffs: turf vs. togetherness [ESPRIT]

The changes that will attend the creation of a single European market in 1992 and the tradeoffs entailed are discussed. The biggest success so far has been so-called precompetitive research, which began with the advent of the European Strategic Programme for Research and Development in Information Technology (ESPRIT) in 1984. The ESPRIT program, and the dozens of others created in its image, are making progress toward two goals fundamental to the ultimate goal of unification. Research has also assumed the more concrete role of helping to reform Europe's industries by moving them toward the single market, particularly in telecommunications. The existence of 12 telephone networks with vastly different technologies presents a huge obstacle to a single market     

Energy-Efficient and Improved eWALL: e2WALL

eWALL framework, under development in the European eWALL project (project no. 610658: “eWALL for Active Long Living”) is meant for care of population with age related impairments, mild dementia and COPD. Expanded eWALL (e2WALL) is planned to be an integrated quality framework for long-term care services which will cover very different types of care: all healthcare (both preventive and rehabilitative), societal services, care for cognitive diseases, services delivered at home as well as support for caregivers as an integral part of the quality improvement process. Thus, we present e2WALL home system that would encompass installation (setup) of e2WALL in homes (flats, houses and aging homes) and their management and maintenance across Europe, starting from the partners involved in eWALL (Austria, Bulgaria, Croatia, Denmark, Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Germany, Greece, Italy, Montenegro, The Netherlands and Romania) and expanding the partnership to the most of Europe (e.g. United Kingdom, Poland, Czech Republic…). This would be a direct application of the developed e2WALL platform and should be done through a network of collaborating small-to-medium sized enterprises (SMEs), each of whom would lead the process of setting up e2WALL system and continuing to provide support services to homes in their respective country. In this way, the growth of high tech and innovative SMEs will be ensured at pan European level, which will enable growth over restricted national market and stimulate European investments in SMEs and startups. Actually, the bigger platform will enable e2WALL European Ecosystem (e4WALL), which can then expand into other non-European markets (e.g. Asia, USA) and means sustainability beyond the life of the project. e2WALL will lead to connected tech start-up hubs to the larger European business ecosystem and will contribute to increased access of country-specific and customized new product to the pan European market, which will lead to increase of employed qualified individuals. Another important focus would be creating an energy efficient environment for a new social network where registered users would provide on-demand services.     

Rolling across Europe's vanishing frontiers [electric railwaytechnology]

The European Union's market opening are leading on a broad front to the restructuring of the railway industry. State train monopolies are being dismantled and railway services are being transformed into private companies. For the new entities, the change means more than a reorientation to market imperatives-it means learning to step beyond their national frameworks and view themselves as service providers for all Europe. That, in turn, is affecting how electric locomotives are designed and built, especially for long-distance overnight and freight operations. In the long run, these policies will lead to higher performance and greater efficiency and will bring more traffic onto the rails. Because of open access to markets, too, European train manufacturers will enjoy larger batch orders, and rail service providers will enjoy lower costs per vehicle. The trend toward privatized rail service is in top gear by now. Britain is already far advanced. Germany negotiated the transformation in 1994 with great success. Now France and Switzerland are following in their tracks     

Konsequenzen der Strommarktliberalisierung für die Stromerzeugung

Enormous pressure on electricity production costs comes from changes in energy politics and in the socio-political environment of electricity supply undertakings, such as the increasing liberalisation of the electricity market, the closer meshing of the European networks or the growing number of environmental regulations and expectations. Particular attention has to be given to this aspect when transcribing the directives of the European Union into national law in order to allow for continuing the use of ecologically beneficial energy sources. The need for increased cost reduction calls for new approaches. Verbund meets these new challenges in electricity production amongst other with intensified automation and a new maintenance strategy.