Climate change has been a widely discussed topic over the past year. Demonstrators around the world made it clear that the direct consequences of climate change urgently need to be resolved. A successful energy turnaround could be the solution to the problems. The first coal-fired power plants are scheduled to cease operation from 2028, but in addition to these political measures, there is a need for concepts that promote a successful energy turnaround. HAMBURG ENERGIE has presented one such concept.

In a field test phase of the NEW 4.0 project, the municipal utility has automated consumers and producers of renewable energy. The approach promotes non-standardised trading transactions with flexible electricity quantities, which came from large consumers. The participating large-scale consumers are ArcelorMittal Hamburg GmbH, Aurubis AG and TRIMET Aluminium SE. These companies require a particularly large amount of energy as part of their actual business processes. Short-term surpluses can be made available without any problems. It is precisely these surpluses that can be traded via the energy platform and can thus be passed on to consumers. The complete software concept of the Energy Platform is based on block chain technology. Among experts, this is considered to be particularly promising for the future and enables the representation of complex processes. The use of the Blockchain enables a better use of decentralised flexibility. In addition to energy trading, the block chain also ensures greater transparency. Accordingly, consumers can decentrally and reliably trace where the electricity they buy comes from. One of the major problems that the new energy platform is designed to solve is the volatility of electricity generation. Energy sources such as wind and solar do not function as a continuous source of energy. This makes it difficult to forecast the available energy. The EnergyPlatform is the corresponding software-based solution and is designed to drastically reduce the lead times for electricity trading.