Achieving carbon neutrality and understanding its impact on grid operators

Under the national goal of carbon neutrality by 2060, China’s grid operators are facing tremendous challenges. With more and more renewable electricity injected into the grid, challenges such as grid expansion and energy security, interregional transmission coordination both on national and provincial level, rising power demand through electrification in other sectors as well as requirements on  power system flexibility necessitate new solutions.

Against this backdrop, on 23 - 24 March 2021 the Sino-German Energy Partnership organized an online workshop enabling an in-depth exchange between the Energy Bureau of Zhejiang Province, State Grid, and researchers and on the German side, the Ministry of the Environment, Climate Protection and the Energy Sector Baden-Württemberg and distribution and transmission grid operators of the state, NetzeBW and TransnetBW, to discuss solutions and experiences on energy generation, flexibility, energy storage, and grid operation under the objectives of carbon peaking and carbon neutrality.

Despite the different contexts in China and Germany, as well as the different stages of the energy transition, both regions face similar challenges and obstacles under the ambitious climate goal. Through in-depth exchanges and discussions, both sides identified many commonalities between both regions in terms of digitalization of the grid, of electrification (especially in mobility) on grid operation, power imports and grid expansion, and the contribution of demand response to grid flexibility. Both sides look forward to continuing future bilateral exchange to delve deeper into selected topics to expand sharing of knowledge and best practices, as well as identifying cooperation potentials on these topics to support the transformation of grid planning and operation for the achievement of the carbon neutrality goal.