By Xuefei Chen Axelsson
Stockholm, Feb.2 (CED) — EU and China join forces to drive smart energy innovations.
(Photo: Unveiling ceremony of Smart City Energy System Lab)
In July 2022, Tsinghua Sichuan Energy Internet Research Institute (EIRI) staged an unveiling ceremony for its “Smart City Energy System Lab” in Tianfu New District in Chengdu of Sichuan Province. This is one of the many initiatives of EIRI as well as EU to support sustainability development in China with smart energy innovations.
Tianfu is the location where the concept of “Park City” was first coined by the Chinese authorities. This refers to an ambitious idea to sustainably improve a city’s urban layout, environment protection and industrial development.
EU in association with its local partners, believe they have found one of the keys to help materialize the park city concept – Smart energy. Their joint initiative in Tianfu New District, Tsinghua Sichuan Energy Internet Research Institute (EIRI), is the spearhead of such contributions by delivering smart energy innovations.
In 2019, EU-China Energy Cooperation Platform (ECECP) was launched to support the implementation of activities announced in the “Joint Statement on the Implementation of EU-China Energy Cooperation”. The overall objective of ECECP is to “enhance EU-China cooperation on energy. In line with the EU’s Energy Union, the Clean Energy for All European initiative, the Paris Agreement on Climate Change and the EU’s Global Strategy. This enhanced cooperation will help increase mutual trust and understanding between EU and China and contribute to a global transition towards clean energy on the basis of a common vision of a sustainable, reliable and secure energy system.”
EIRI is the leading unit of ECECP to put the latter’s vision into action. Established by the prestigious Tsinghua University of China with the support of the Sichuan, Chengdu and Tianfu local governments in 2016, the EIRI has 33 top-notch research units with a strong team of 300 plus international and domestic R&D elites.
EIRI has been acting fast and making strides since its inception. As Chengdu is one of the Chinese cities included in the EU-China Cooperation on Regional Policy, EIRU hasthe support fromEU Delegation to China, International Urban Cooperation (IUC) Asia and International Urban and Regional Cooperation (IURC) China of EU. EIRI signed MoUs with Manchester Metropolitan University and Sapienza University in 2020 and 2021 respectively on research, exchange programmes for SMEs and startups on small energy and energy efficiency studies. At present, EIRI and IURC China are exploring further cooperation on green energy and smart energy in cities and regions covered by EU-China Cooperation on Regional Policy. These cooperation span from production, academic studies to research.
EIRI has also borne fruits in developing innovative solutions for enabling a smart energy eco-system. For instance, the aforementioned “Smart City Energy System Lab” has developed a software for calculating and analysing carbon emission in China. This can facilitate businesses to deploy low-emission production operation more effectively. In addition, EIRI with the support of Siemens has developed a modular electricity router which is pivotal to the establishment of agile electricity grids for cities.
Together with its European and Chinese partners, EIRI has ambitious plans to build research labs on zero-carbon city, energy equipment and hydrogen technologies.
The works of EIRI in Tianfu are significance as they help connect local application demand in China with cutting-edge technological innovations across Europe and China, and engaging the local users in the process, to enable a more sustainable lifestyle and greener living environment for people.
(Photo: Senior leader of “Smart City Energy System Lab” introduced the functionalities of its software solution for calculating and analysing carbon emission in China.)