Transcript for "Episode 1 – Europe's energy transition": Welcome, everyone. This is the first episode of a new webinar series, the Europe... About Europe's energy transition. My name is Odo van Graech. I'm chair of the NVDE, the Dutch Renewable Energy Federation, and also the Formula E team, the National Board on Eability of the Netherlands. Very happy to have you here. We're at a pivotal moment. The energy transition is developing fast, and not only, because of, climate change but also for geopolitical reasons. And the question is no longer if it's gonna happen, but how, what are the main hurdles and the opportunities? Where are the pains? Where are the gains? And that's why we organized this series of, webinars. Happy to have you here. This series brings together policy makers, industry leaders, investors, and technical experts. And we love to have a conversation also with you about Europe Europe's energy future. It's a series of three episodes. One before summer, that's today, two after summer. We come back to that later on. Today, the theme is policy and regulation. And, there is a lot of regulation happening on the European fields. There's an entire bingo of abbreviations, and I will mention a few of them. There's the REP3, the Renewable Energy Directive, the AFIR, so alternative fuel infrastructure regulation. I have to read it to say it, correctly. The EPBD, the energy perform... Performance of buildings directive, and there's a lot of national legislation like the Dutch climate law. We're here with some experts, to share their thoughts, but also your thoughts because we wanna know how is this shaping investment decisions, business cases, business models, where are the opportunities and what can we do to move faster, and make it a good investment for everyone and for society. We also wanna involve you, of course. So there are a couple of polls part of this conversation. I will immediately start the first one. If it's okay, you can see it on your screen. You should see a poll now. It will be there for thirty seconds. And the first question is, what do you see as the biggest obstacle to Europe's energy is it interoperability between markets, or is it none of the above? Please give us your votes, and the results of the votes will appear on screen. Obviously, uncertainty is winning the gold medal so far. In grid congestion is the silver silver medal. Yeah. Looks like policy uncertainty will be the champion of the first poll. Yeah. That's it. We'll come... Definitely come back to this. Also, some house rules may be obvious for you, maybe a little bit boring, but I wanna mention them before we go, any further, some practicalities, how to get most of today's sessions. On the right hand side of your screen, you'll see the engagement panel. Click the q and a tab to submit your submit your questions. You can do this at any time during the session. Once your question is approved, it will be visible to everyone, and other attendees, can upvote it so they can vote if they think you're raising a good question. We'll tackle the most upvoted questions first during our Q and A session. So your vote matters. The chat tab is also in the engagement panel. Feel free to use it for reactions, comments and resource... Resources or links or anything you think is valuable for the others. And, of course, keep it respectful and on topic. We'll be doing more polls during this session. They will pop up. Please do participate. Your answers shape the conversation, and, please please make use of it. This session is being recorded. A replay will be shared with all registered participants after the event. Now we move on to the panelists because we are having a very good and knowledgeable panel here on my right hand side. Directly sitting next to me is Anna Marie Schauzer, director of business development at Scamper Hundes. Welcome, Annemarie. Can you tell a little bit more about yourself? Yes. Of course. So, I work for the company Genter and Gonders, responsible for business development and renewables, in that company. This is a company which is basically a merger of two companies. It's Kanter and. Kanter, originally coming from the grid operator, Alejandra, a infrastructure company specialized in transformers and metering. And with that metering also having a lot of data of, of of our customers, b to b customers mainly. And then Roombus is originated out of a a solar company. So I I went, I I moved to this company a bit over a year ago, and it was very deliberate because I see that the energy sector is in a moment in time, in The Netherlands at least, where, we need to do something different. And by combining infrastructure, data and a market, the energy market together, we at least have pieces of the puzzle to start solving some problems. Very excited to do so and also very excited to be here. Thanks for being here. Move to the other side of the table. Peter Loewenstein working at the Ministry of Infrastructure and Buildi. You're coordinating charging infrastructure policy making. And please tell a little bit more about you. Yeah. So thank you, Olaf, and also, thank you, of course, customer solutions for inviting us here. It's it's a pleasure to be here, and I think, us being here as ministry is also exemplary of how we, how we aim to develop our policy. We want to, of course, we're autonomous in in in the end, but, jointly developing and considering different insights that's really helps us in developing our policy. And, of course, also key in implementation is the cooperation with the market, so that, therefore, it's always a good idea to be at these kind of meetings. So my name is Peter Loistein. I'm, I've been working on electric mobility for about fifteen years now. At first, I was on innovation funding. I very soon got taken away, by the strong technological technological basis of of this industry. I was also the creativity in in the sector, and and and most importantly, of course, the the major benefits it has for society. So it's been a pleasure working in industry for such for such a long time. I've been promoting, designing, and and and, of course, implementing policy since, since the... Those early days. First, very much an implementation focus, so I've set up a dedicated government very much focused on... Or at regional level, combining practical knowledge, implementation power, procurement, these kind of things, getting things... Those things off the ground. And three years back, I've made the move, to, to the ministry where I've been working on international and European affairs for the ministry with regards to recharging infrastructure and the second part of my work is on market organization and price transparency so very much this user centric approach And then that's also what I see as my task. Task is making charging easy and affordable for all. That's that's my main main my main goal. And, well, in in this panel, I also hope to bring in that that perspective, of course, how do we make this business beneficial for for society and also, the best for the end user. Yeah. Arna Richter is your head of public affairs and PR at Lost Mile Solutions. That's correct. And we get to talk about regulation, for the next hour or so, which is always somewhat of all the topic for me. Yes, indeed. I work for Last Mile Solutions. I've been in the e mobility space for about ten years, and I work for pioneering companies either on the infrastructure side, actually rolling out EV charging networks across Europe to, a hardware manufacturer for for a brief period and now with Last Mile Solutions on the digital side. We are a SaaS company, software as a service. We run EV charging networks. We also issue, as an EMSP, charge cards, and we still do a bit of hardware on the home energy management smart side of things. But mostly, we operate large EV charging networks in 25,000 sockets and also a large number of charge cards that we are, I think close to 2,000,000 now that we have issued. Yeah. Cool. And why did you initiate this webinar series? Because, ultimately, our company sits, in the middle of two traditional sectors. One is the transport sector, the other is the energy sector, and we're the digital blue. Yeah. So data, to a large extent. But how do you make those two worlds work together in a seamless fashion? And a lot of a lot of the synergies that are to be had between the transport and energy sector are actually solved by these digital, platforms that you can actually start playing with energy flows, And that's a major theme of the day, and that's actually a large part of the solution for our, I would hope, successful energy transition. Yeah. Cool. So dive deeper into that. But before we continue with our panelists who you now know more about, come back to you first with the next poll. I think it's on the screen now. How do you expect that the red three renewable energy directive will affect the renewable energy investments? Do you think it will accelerate investments? Will it shift investments towards flexible solutions like smart charging or dynamic load balancing? You think it will have limited impact? Do you think it will reduce investment attractiveness? That's also a possibility. Or none of the above. Please give us your thoughts. Or we'll remain open for thirty seconds again. So far, two votes, let's say, it will accelerate investment, three. But most people say it will shift investments towards flexible solutions like smart charging, etcetera. Yep. That was it. Thanks. We'll use these results in our conversation here at the table. The first, theme we dive into is how will, the red free and related EU frameworks reshape the business case for renewable assets? And Peter, to start with you, like you said you've been working for a while on this transition. Can you give us a bit of an overview of all the regulations that are trying to reshape the market? It's a big question, but I hope you can give us some guidance. Yes. Sure. So, indeed, I can't cover it all, but I think, first, regulation, I should point out is, of course, the operative fuels, infrastructure regulation. For for me, my daily work, the the key regulation to to consider, I think, for for many of our listeners, and viewers, as well. So the alternative fuels infrastructure regulation, is the regulation which sheds the targets for member states on the amount of, alternative fuels, infrastructure regulation to, to install. And of course it also covers recharging stations. It also covers hydrogen etcetera but let's stay with recharging stations for for today. So those are the those are the targets and those are targets for both light duty and heavy duty. That's one important part, of the AFIRE. There are two other important parts. One is on functional requirements and technical requirements with regards to the charging infrastructure. So for instance, the Harfaire prescribes that it's necessary to have ad hoc charging, so charging without a subscription, but it also has technical requirements like having specific communication protocols installed which would then allow for instance, bidirectional charging. And the third part of Affair is on on data. So it's about open data, sharing sharing the data, publishing the data, and and data exchange. So those are three three key parts within within Affair, and they they very much shape the industry because it provides in my perspective, but you can, of course, respond to that investment security on on the direction. And that's also why, for instance, in the AFFIR, we feel that we're now doing, at European level, so it could be revised, the affair. Now Nenana is very much supportive of the affair in its current form. So, for instance, with with regards to targets, but we also see options for improving it. Then the second part, second important part of legislation I should mention is the energy performance of buildings directive. Here again, there are there are targets for the amount of, charging stations, but here it's related to the amount, of parking spots, close to a building. And it's both for residential buildings and nonresidential buildings, and this will, in our view recreate another major impulse to the roll out of of of charging infrastructure. And it's... But it's not just targets again also within this legislation. There's a reference to AFIR which mentions that the interoperability interoperability, requirements in AFIR are also applicable to the, to the, charging stations that have to be installed due to the EPBD. So there's a quick... Important link there, between the AFTR and EPBD, that will create another impulse to not only have charging stations, but to have them... For them to have certain quality, for instance, the ability. And, I should also mention that there's a requirement to have... Prepare those charging stations for smart charging. I think it's also important to know for for our our viewers today. So that... Those are thing... I think for now, two key, regulations. Of course, there's also the renewable energy directive that this is part of our, this is being taken care of by our Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate. So, I don't feel, the freedom to to discuss that here, but I think, there are other panelists that that can add to that. Yeah. Thanks. Now maybe I don't know if it's a difficult question, but can you give any numbers? What's the amount... Kind of amount we need? How many charge points do we need in, for instance, The Netherlands? This is 100,000. This is 1,000,000. Yeah. So looking at Europe, I just read a rather recent, a recent number which says that by 2030, we might need 35,000,000, charging station, which which is which is enormous, and which would make it a major industry and, of course, also with a great impact on on our on our grids, but also major business opportunities and a lot of, autonomy for for for the end user, of course, because they can, spy their own drone energy. So these are great numbers. And I should say that for our fear, these only provides the baseline. So if we would just meet meet the targets, we won't... That won't be sufficient to meet market demand, at least in The Netherlands. It might be other other way around. In other countries, but in Netherlands, is is just the baseline. It's the basic network, but we need to move way beyond that in order to meet demand. Yeah. Thanks. 25,000,000. That's a number that sticks. That's impressive. Arne, can you tell a little bit more about the red free Yeah. The emergency directive. It's not new. Of course, we are now in the third version. Yeah. We've also worked with the second version, which Netherlands also had a great scheme for promoting renewables in charging on public charging stations if you're in public. That was under Red two. But now we have moved on to Red three and actually that regime has been expanded. The scope has been expanded and it's now also applicable to companies and households, which is a major driver for investments. It already was a major driver for the rollout of public charging infrastructure in the NINDS, which I think NINDS has been extremely successful in doing well. I think I saw some recent numbers in talking of projections that, I think recently communicated we're now at 140,000 sockets public, and we need to go in 2,035 to 1,300,000 public. Right? So it also shows that we're at the very start of this transition. And, on the Renewable Energy Directive side on the version three, we now also see that with the ANAs and the Renewable Energy Units that are available, you have a lot of excitement with companies that register those units and actually building propositions towards end consumers. Yeah. It doesn't work, ERI. The ERI is basically, you need... First of all, you need to you need to make sure it's accountable, and you need to deliver some elements of proof that you have a charging station with an MID meter, and that you run a certain software version. I won't go into details, but, that's also an important one. And then basically, once... And to prove that you're using renewables and then you go to a booking agency collectively, if you use a certain volume that you, have and use one megawatt, then you can book yourself in as a collective into a booking agency that's vetted and then basically, you would get money in return, for doing so. You're paid to charge. Pretty much. Well, you're ultimately yours. You have to... At the end of the day, you will have to pay, but at least it's less expensive than it has to be if you're using gray energy, if you if you like. Yeah. Yeah. If any kind of numbers is it... It's actually fairly new. So, I did check to see whether or not I could already bring some numbers today in terms of how this is taking off. But if you look at what happened with Habe Ace in the red two to what now is happening in, red three, I would say it's going in the right direction. It's really... If you don't have that as part of your proposition in The Netherlands, then you're really putting yourself in a... In handicap of sorts. You need to be, yeah, ready for it. So at least a couple of cents per kilowatt hour, I would say. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Thanks, Anne Marie. You developed solar projects before you entered Groom, Ghentronders, and it's still part of your portfolio. Can you say something about, the investment perspective from the solar sector? How to make money out of solar at the moment? Yeah. So first of all, I do second what you're saying about the EREs. We already see with our customers that they are definitely interested in understanding how it works, but you need to do some financial engineering and and and and they they need to understand how it works. Right? So so, but there, we definitely see that it makes a lot of sense to do the financial and understand how that whole picture plays out. So lots of interest, I think, in the past couple of months to, to combine, to combine the assets behind the meter in this regard. And then if you're talking about solar, yeah, I think if you know the Dutch renewables sector a little bit, you've seen that in a couple of years ago, there was definitely a spike in in adding renewables to the grid. There were a lot of subsidies. It was extremely interesting to to invest in in renewables, in wind and in solar. So, we added a lot of solar capacity to The Netherlands, and that's at the same time also one of the reasons why it's not going that well right now. Right? So the energy sector is, of course, a market. So when you have lots of supply and and limited demand, we see negative negative prices. That's basically one of the reasons why nowadays, it's very difficult to invest in in in, let's say, a plain vanilla solar park or a plain vanilla solar roof. So that's... So so it's it's it's becoming increasingly difficult to to invest. What I've been seeing in the past couple of years is that a part of the market, because of this asset, were leaving The Netherlands. Bigger companies, utilities that were active in multiple countries have said, okay. We're stopping. We're seizing the activities of solar, in The Netherlands. But there's definitely a part of that sector that continue to to to work in solar, but not only on solar. So I feel that this is a quite an... The ones that stayed, which is still a significant part, they're quite innovative, quite entrepreneurial, and they start doing things to optimize their cases. One of the easy parts or easy thing... Relatively easy things you see is that they co locate battery, battery systems next to the solar parks, or to the solar rooftops. That's one of the things that you see. So bringing in flexibility, bringing in more possibility to trade on the energy markets. What I also see with the limited amount of companies that is that they try to elongate their scope. Right? So they add trading capabilities, so only being, locked, let's say, to the subsidy and a fixed PPA, but they add trading capabilities to their company. But also on the other side, I also know companies that that are now investigating, to connect big solar utility scale parks or rooftops to, DC charging trucks. So that that you see that on the other end, they're trying to to to make money as well. And, again, apart leaves. So it's it's it's it's an interesting dynamic sector right now. Yeah. Do you think there's still growth potential for solar in The Netherlands, or is the market saturated? Well, there have been quite some investigations in the past couple of months. One of the investigations has been done by CD Delft. Probably you know of it or not. But you do see that there's growth potential and need for more solar and need for more renewables in system in The Netherlands. However, we all know that it's it's it's difficult. I I just mentioned a couple of things, but there's also grid congestion. So if I could put a bet somewhere, I do think that it will take, that it will go into the lift again in a couple of years. But nowadays, we, as a sector, need to create new business models, create new ways of of getting... Yeah. Investing in investing in the in the in the renewables. Yeah. Yeah. Thanks. Maybe switch back to, Peter. In the poll, you saw that a lot of people, are hesitant. It's about the predictability of government decisions. And like you described, Afia, for instance, aims at giving predictability to the markets. Can you dive a little bit deeper into that? How does the Afir help in this respect? And can can we trust in the stability of political decision making? Wow, that's a big question. Yeah. Yeah. I got, yes. You should keep trusting in the system. That's that's in the political system, so that's the first off. But, I said, AVI does does provide a reliable basis. It's it's... But it still is under discussion. Of course, there are also member states, that want to reduce the ambition in in AFIRE. We're not one of them, but as long as this debate is on table, there's already a little bit of uncertainty. But we're holding on to the status quo, which is at the upper, of course, we're in in a strong position, so we're we're confident about about that. And, maybe a little bit on policy uncertainty. I I should point out that often policy uncertainty is is felt when when subsidies end. Right? But I should I should say that subsidies are always meant to end at some point. Right? But you should then be predictable about when you're going to end it and tell it tell us... Tell it beforehand, not not sudden. So, we have several subsidy schemes right now, for instance, for investing in, heavy duty vehicle, charging. And, well, it won't be a surprise, but those will end at some point. We're gonna tell you in time, but they will end. So, I can I can see the, concerns about policy uncertainty, and it's also it's also a a global issue, of course? It's it's it's... There there are the global tariffs and doesn't make the situation, much more, more reliable. So, I would also have expected that, I don't I don't think it was in the in the in the possible answers, but that then in the the the global uncertainty and the global competition could be a blocker for the for the transition. And we're we're moving to a more, let's say, more more autonomous regions, where they're... To be... Trying to be more more dependent self... More self dependent, I should say, more resilient. This is a good point in in a way, but if you look at that from a from a broader broader perspective, this will slow down the the transition because it's it's suboptimal with regards to, let's say, efficiency or maybe afford... Affordability. And there are, of course, benefits to that, but, and that also gives the impression, I guess, of, unpredictable government, but it's in some ways, of course, and also external to, let's say, The Netherlands or or Europe. It's it's it's a global it's it's a global circumstance. Yeah. And, do you know some unstable political leaders in the world? No. No. No. Let's... No. No. No. No. No. Let's not go into that. But, but I think one thing is the beauty of AFIRE is in regulation. And the regulation at European level means it's directly applicable across the board in a in a similar fashion in every member state that you do price... Is comprised of, which is the beauty of that piece. Contrary to the red, which is a directive, which is transposed international law and done so differently across the board. So you're at this jointment that there then exists, which great skill that the European market is very much about as well is not there. But on Ather it is. And actually the industry and basically by definition, most industries don't like being regulated. They want freedom to be to to to to a transfer nerve. But after you solve this chicken and egg dilemma that we've had in the infrastructure base for such a long time, we don't bring the vehicles if there's not the infrastructure, there's no infrastructure, there's no vehicles. So what after we tried to do with an EV charging capacity model is make those two things hold together and imbalance. Right? But the beauty of Afri is also there's a sunset clause in there. And the sunset clause actually asks that if 15% of your vehicle fleet is EVs, you no longer need a regulation with charging infrastructure up because the business case is there. Volume of vehicles for that market to basically run and govern itself. Industry, by the way, and I'm close to that discussion in Brussels, is actually asking for that percentage to be reduced from 15% to 10% because in some markets, industry already sees, maybe The Netherlands as well, that maybe you don't need these terms in terms of, you know, the requirements that the public charging infrastructure up if the vehicles are there anyway. It's just the market. It's all functional. 15%. Is that for full electrical vehicles or also plug in hybrid? No. I think the definition is EVs and plug in hybrids, and still the two together, but if you would ask me, I'd go for pure EVs. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I was running the numbers in my head, and I think The Netherlands are really, really close to the 15% if you include the plug in hybrids. Still though. I think we're... I would say we're up to 14% now. Yeah. And maybe another question, Peter, to you. I I thought the audience was relatively mild to the issue of net congestion, but some people said that's the main topic and, at least in Netherlands, we're struggling with that, of course. And one of the things is that permitting procedures take a lot of time, usually around eight or ten years while the constructions takes one or two years. So can you say a little bit more about speeding up of permitting procedures? Are you referring to the permitting of charging station? No. No. The grids. The the charging stations are much faster. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Because... And then then to to clarify that for non Dutch Yeah. Was that for for most charging stations, you don't need a a permit done in The Netherlands. It needs to be by the by the large scale for for it to to require, a permit. But in in, indeed, if you're getting a, a grid connection, it's... It can be can be quite troubling, in Netherlands, currently. As I said, this is this is this is not my responsibility. It's certainly not the responsibility of of of my ministry. This is more for the Ministry of Economic Affairs and and Climate. We're we're, of course, very much aware of, of of the issue with, with get... Getting permits. But I should also say that, the the reason that we are having permits is also because society wanted us, to have to have permits to protect a valuable, public space, to protect to protect, the environment, to protect, health. So there there there were good reasons... Good enough reasons for having permits. But having a a close review on whether they are still, the best thing, for our society, and that's that's very valid and it's being carefully looked at right now by my colleagues at the different ministry. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I would say that the combination of the developed market for solar and negative pricing, etcetera, and grid congestion are a logical reason why so many people said that, well, flexibility in the energy system is, yeah, so important. Annemarie, that's a clear bridge to a new question to you. Yeah. How do you see this market for flexibility, etcetera, working and what's the influence of all these new policies? Yeah. Yeah. I think I think, more flexibility in the market is is is crucial. Let's let's focus on on grid congestion because I do... I was also very surprised by the by the answers because what we hear back is whether you're talking to data centers, whether you're talking to transport companies, whether you're talking to industry. One of the biggest topics is we don't have capacity. We wanna grow. We we have no clue how how, how to do it. You could solve it, of course, by adding more grids in the ground, etcetera, and and you could also solve part of it with more flexibility. I think we need to do both. But given given the the complexity of rolling out the grid, right, we don't have enough people, everything is a part of it, etcetera, flexibility is is crucial. And I think it's also... It's basically the next phase where we as an energy system should should go into. Right? So being more smart about, about, solving the issue, rather than adding adding on more more copper in the ground. So, yeah, I think it's it's it's crucial to to do it more on Yeah. Both sides. Yeah. Do you see anything that some government could do to help companies like yours in speeding up flexibility in the market? That's a very broad question because to me, flexibility is also a very broad topic. Right? So you can you can talk about batteries. You could talk about steering behavior of using using, using electricity, for example. But I think definitely, definitely, the government could do a lot to to to improve, the situation if we're if we're focusing now on batteries, having... Making it easier to have co located batteries next to solar systems is one, for example. But there is already regulation with subsidies with regards to batteries behind the meter. That is amazing. And you also see that that our customers are very keen on on adding batteries behind the meter. And so I think that for a large part, the government is doing many, many, many good things. And there's also just a part of doing it as a as a market. Right? So adding more batteries, understanding how to do it in a very smart way, taking that journey together with our customers, developing financial engineering models to to to to have a good conversation with our customers, assimilating their their their situation behind the meter so that we can really sit next to the customer and say, this is your issue. These are all the things you could do. And if you do this, then you... This would be be be be, the result. So I think the government is doing couple of things, and and and we as a market should also just be smart about it. Yeah. And there are also strong market signals to invest in flexibilities. Yeah. Yeah. Not only dependent on government policy making. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think help is on the way, and it's actually coming out of Brussels, surprise, surprise. And that via the the grid package that was actually proposed at the end of last year, mid December. And one of the key aspects there is the attention there is for FCA, so flexible connection agreements, and actually allowing also for our sector a fast track permitting procedure if you're hooking up, something on, the charging side that is not more than a 100 kilowatts as a connection. Actually, we're pushing for a bit more leeway there, so maybe a 150 would be nicer, but also to do so in a pool. So if you're adding assets to the grid, that have demonstrated the the demonstrable, but at least you can demonstrate you can provide flexibility services to the grid with that assets, then you should receive priority in terms of getting, in line quicker, and actually getting that connection, which is quite novel. We fought hard, I would say, as a sector to get that in there. The question is, of course, how member states, especially on the grid side, because that of course is very much a subsidiary and national priority, lots of sovereignty around that, asset is what they will do to actually incorporate that again into national rules and regulation governing the grid. But at least the principle on recognizing that flexibility is an asset to the grid is something that Brussels is acutely aware of. And I'm hopeful that this will happen across the board, actually, not just in the landscape. Yeah. So when looking at items from the audience, one of the questions is, should we say that all new EVs that are sold should be able to accommodate a vehicle to grid to solve a net congestion. Anyone wants to respond to that? Well, it's it's about the question about regulating things. Right? So I think I should answer. Yeah. But the main answer is no, but there's a big but to that. So we very much believe in the, in in the greater opportunity and flexibility, electric vehicles, providing specifically to bi directional charging, and we're we'll soon be publishing our our strategic roadmap on bi directional charging. And, you'll you'll find... I hope you'll you'll you'll enjoy it, but it's... You'll... We're going to do a lot to support bi directional charging. But one of the things you also find in there that we would like, to have, certain parts, so our communication protocols such as ASK 15 or eight dash 20 to be, mandated at European level also on the vehicle side. It's already being mandated on the infrastructure side. It should also be mandated on the vehicle side. And we're also pushing that at at UN level as as as Netherlands. So... And that's the specific part we say yes, but then, of course, ISE 15, 11, eight dash 20 also provides other functionality. We think that if the basic the basic functions are are in a vehicle, some some very specific technical requirements, which make it a reliable, recharging service, that should be enough. It's, and that through market driven, and in the end, most or many OEMs will decide to, implement bi directional charging for their vehicle and that, if you do not... If you choose not to do that, you just have to find a different customer group. Right? But we think it's it can be very beneficial to the end user so many manufacturers will choose to do so themselves. So we don't think it's necessary to, to prescribe it in that sense, but some some basic functionalities such as ISVIF dot a dash 20, we do... Would like them to be prescribed. Yeah. Thanks. Interesting thing. One other question about grid congestion in the city of Utrecht. We... Where we are sitting now is very urgent. I live in the city of Utrecht and when I... Lost life for a minute. Yeah. Yeah. I think that was because we didn't move enough. Yeah. And then the city of Utrecht, we are front runners in, grid congestion, and we are front runners in vehicle, to grids, using, the electrical cars. So, yeah, sometimes a big problem is causing big solutions. What's your view on that, Arne? Yeah. I... We're very close to the Weebrive Solar Yeah. Initiative here in Utrecht as a digital platform that that powers that initiative. As you see, tremendous, peak shaving, that is possible, in that regime, which is again a really nice asset to contribute to to the grid at a local level. But, similarly, we also run a similar, well, very different. It's actually V 1 G, but it's, the largest virtual power plant that Europe currently has in the city of Rotterdam, with, I think, 50,000 stations, in that platform where the similar basically off peak charging takes place. So basically, the void peak, and it gets throttled to off peak, which is a tremendous asset. So grid congestion grid congestion is actually a blessing in disguise because it also helps build the the value added for a company like ours. Right? So, basically, there's several... You know, we we joke about this on the infrastructure side in, in Brussels sometimes. It's a bridge congestion actually also helps with the utilization. Right? Yep. Yeah. Because basically, you can't roll out further infrastructure, but it's good for the bottom line, and we have solutions in place to actually help, charging continue in a in a in a predictable fashion. Yeah. But on v two g, I think on the on the car side, I think it makes a lot of sense to make... If we give all our manufacturers a USB on their own right in terms of what kind of functionality to bring to the market around an EV. Right? Is it AC capable? Is it just a DC vehicle? Will it do both? Will it provide a v two g function out there at all? I think the market will solve, simple. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We dive much deeper into v two g in the next, webinar in September. And, Marie, when the market is changing so fast as we see now, can you say anything... Make any predictions about, winners and losers in the markets? I guess the company you're working on is a winner. Right? Or... Well, yeah. We we we we wanna win. Yeah. But what I in general see, by the way, is that, currently, the whole market is is is searching for the right things to do. So the typical behavior I see now with many energy companies is that they do everything. So they're really trying to do, for example, an EMS system, hardware, etcetera. Like, they they try to do everything, try to... Yeah. So so what I would predict, I think, is that it makes sense to figure out what you're really best at, what your, like... Where your core capability is, maybe add a capability, build it, but also partner. Because you see very nice niche companies popping up right now, that that have extremely good capabilities in, for example, trading or predicting or, maybe a specific hardware. And, I think it makes sense if if if the the companies that know we're good at this and we know how to partner very well with this, I think that might be one of the things that, that makes sense to to to do. Yeah. In a state...... Wanna lose? I know enough people in the energy sector that I'm not going to say anything about this in a webinar, but but I think if you stick really to old market models, then then you might you might lose because it's it's it's changing and it's going to change. Don't don't don't be too conservative. You agree? Yeah. You've got to flirt with the end consumer and build propositions that will basically be attractive. Right? So basically, if you're not doing or catering to demand in that sense, because I think we're now going into a mass market. I mean, last mile solutions have been in this market for a long time, and actually building it up to this level of scale has taken a long time, but now we're here. And And you also see that, big players who basically never took our industry very seriously are now weighing in and acquiring assets, left, right, and center, which is interesting to see because, they're sort of learning, you know, where they fit, in this ecosystem. But I think in our case, yeah, it's, it's all about making sure you're building propositions that consumers are waiting for and playing with energy flows is definitely a key component of that. Yeah. Yeah. Lisa, what's your prediction? I'm not going to the business side of of this. This is this is not my task, but if you're looking at who is going... Who is at risk of being left behind, that is, of course, also the less wealthy citizens. So Yep. It's a Yeah. Yep. More from that perspective. Buying electric vehicle, having solar panels on your roof, having a stationary battery are also... Are all quite, quite large in investments, and people that, can do so, can benefit can benefit from this energy transition, and and they are also driving force, so that's great. And I think, as Ernest said, we're moving to a mass market. So in the end, everyone will will move to, electro mobility, at least for person person vehicles. But, we don't need... We make sure we do make sure that we don't leave behind a lot of people, and making them distrust the energy transition. So that, of course, is also important to to to our work at the ministry to make sure that also the less wealthy citizens can can can can go along this transition. Yeah. It's a very fair point. I think even today, there was a report maybe you've read it that the poor households are very vulnerable as a result of the current higher energy prices. So it's very... Yeah. At this moment, a crucial thing to tackle. Yeah. Thanks for that perspective. We now switch back for a last poll to the audience. And the question is, what is the main societal benefits of EV charging infrastructure in the future energy system? So we heard some views from our panelists, but now it's time to share your view. Is the main, benefit, supporting renewable energy integration? Is it relieving grid congestion? Is it creating new revenue streams for businesses or none of the above? And, again, the pause open during thirty seconds. I wanted to say not a clear winner yet, but I think supporting renewable energy integration is leading the pack followed by relieving grid congestion. Yeah. That's that's what the result is. Do you recognize these findings, Annemarie? So so the first one was supporting renewable energy integration. And the second one was with congestion. I think it's the fourth option was none of the above, but I think it's all of the above. All of the above. Yeah. But we're we're we're getting into a more complex and and and and, fine system where, like, everything affects everything. So Yeah. I think all the above above, I would say. Yeah. Other than what we do have, I think. So I'm happy with the answer of incorporating renewable energy integration and electricity mix. And there's somewhat of a renewable energy paradox, right, at at present that we have. So we have, 50%, I think, of our electricity generation in Europe is now renewable. In The Netherlands, certainly, that's the case. But overall, electricity demand actually in most major economies that the EU is comprised of is going down. So why is that? Right? So, we have more renewables in the electricity mix, but the demand side is actually, not increasing. Now we all expect demand to increase due to server farm data, whatever, all that stuff and more EVs that are coming. Yeah? But we... I think at the EV sector, I think once all those vehicles hit our roads and also driven by vehicle legislation on reducing c o two emissions from from cars and also the fact that we in 2035 all being well, we would completely decarbonize passenger cars. So that's an extremely important driver, although that's also up for discussion at the moment in Brussels, and they're trying to build us some flexibilities would... Which would jeopardize their goal. But still, if we have all those vehicles on our roads, then we have a tremendous capacity to start harnessing and storing that energy and putting it back into either our homes or into the grid whenever we want. And then, having all those renewables and being able to capture them makes a lot of sense. But we have to work on the demand side. If we don't work on the demand side, then that paradox would kick in whereby the system costs would start really dictating electricity prices, which puts us on the back foot internationally and then from a competitive point of view. So driving renewables into the grid as being a major driver for, you know, promoting EVs and I think whatever governments can do to keep promoting EVs, that is a sound measure, if you would ask me. Yeah. Numbers to support your statement for the case in The Netherlands, we have 57% of renewable electricity in The Netherlands. It would have been 60% if we would have used solar and wind power better than we do now. So we throw away 3% of our total electricity demand in The Netherlands. So that's quite a lot actually. Yeah. Peter, what would you have thought it was the main benefit? Well, it's perhaps not the above. So, I think I would add to the third point. Right? So creating new revenue streams for businesses and then perhaps then it's then it's a bit predictive... Predictable, but then I would say not just businesses, but also households. So so end users. Right? So, I I think if we would have would have added that to the third bullet, then it would would be end up with a gold medal there instead. But, but, yeah, that that would have been my my answer. And I also think that, the the one, ending up, top, so supporting renewable energy transit... Integration. I I would add to that that it's also more specifically, it's about making our energy system more and more resilient and, that's also becoming more and more important, of course, due to the many many, crises, in in the world. That making our energy system more resilient is is is a major benefit, of of electric mobility and, of course, also, bidirectional charging. Yeah. Yeah. See, one of the questions from the audience and for our panel Nagi, How to make renewables investable? Again, a big question. Yeah. It's a summarized question, but how to make it investable? Using it directly, is what... It's it's... Really using it behind the meter makes a lot of sense. So trying to create behind the meter ecosystems where you have renewables, for example, on your rooftop or you have charging, maybe a battery flexibility here. That's definitely a no brainer from my view. And making it investable again, that's really a big puzzle overall. Right? So... But I would start with what I just mentioned. Yeah. It's in your optimization, adding adding... And our our prime minister, Hope Yetsa, would call you after this webinar, answering you. They would ask you, can you give me one brilliant idea to speed up the transition? What would you say to Pieter? To speed up the transition. Yeah. I would ask him to create a false departmental body, that basically brings together our infrastructure ministry, our energy ministry, our... If we have digital ministry and also our physical ministry together and create a governance or system of rules that will allow for, these energy flows that we wanna take part. So if you charge your place of work under a different rate by your employer and you go home and feed it back into your house, how would that work, right, from a tax perspective? You're actually transporting energy literally, in your car around around the country, but creating a framework that would basically start governing that type of behavior, becoming not only a consumer of energy but a prosumer, that's one of the themes we'll come back to I guess. But if we could have that joined up thinking, that's maybe not just at national level in The Netherlands, but that might also be very applicable in in Brussels as well. Because right now, what you regrettably see is is silo thinking still. And if this industry needs anything, it's, you know, if we gotta break down those silos and start working together on those synergies because they have... Yeah. They deliver so much. I agree. What would be your golden idea if a synthetic calls you? I think that's that's... I think a lot of lot of things are already possible. So, from a technological point of view, I realize that's... I know. So maybe if you don't say it was not fair to talk to them. But I... No. I think I think a lot of things are already possible, and I think that we should start doing specific things. Let me give an example. We have flexibility contracts in The Netherlands. Right? So there are possibilities to to to sign a flexible contract with your grid operator. But rolling that out, really scaling that, that's that's something that's not happening yet. And there are more possibilities to, to to to solve congestion, for example, and to to be more smart about your system. And and I think it's it's more about executing it. Right? It's more about executing it, doing it, learning, coming back, and maybe changing a little bit of policy, and then going back in the field again. So I'm not sure if would be the right person to talk to, but, I do have some other people to talk to then. Yeah.... When he's on the line. Yeah. Yeah. I think he knows those people. Yeah. These are... You have the privilege of advising ministers every day, so I'm gonna ask you a different question. Okay. I think that's a better idea. What would you advise advise, companies who are active in this field? What what should they do? What is helpful and what is not? Oh, thank you. I have some ideas about that. So, no. It's... That not not so much related to to our fear and great suggestion that we've been discussing a lot. As I said, one of my other responsibilities is on a market organization. And, in Europe, we've, we've developed a fantastic system which allows, roaming, which has specific rules, which has CPOs, which has mobility service providers, which works very well in many in many ways. But, must also say that the complex... Complexity of this value chain is often offloaded to the end user. They have to to solve it, and I'm specifically referring to price transparency and also managing your smart charging session, especially in a public situation. So I would ask the market, could you consider moving, to a rebate model where there's only one price in the market and the different partners in the value chain all get a part of get a part of that pie instead of having a basic price then adding a little bit on top of that price, which creates these enormous, four dimensional matrices on on prices, and that that makes smart charging, difficult and makes charging in general, less reliable. So if you want to make things easier for the end user and and keep the complexity in the in the sector because that's just necessary, that's just how it is, but not offload it to the end user. And could you perhaps consider moving to the re... Rebate model? That would be my my message. So last very interesting question, and I think it's more for the companies here at the table. The question is, what developments did you see since March? That's the war in Iran started and the closing of the Street Of Hormuz. Yeah. Does it change business on the money? Yeah. So so I think that typically the sectors that are heavy on on on on mobility, we we we talk to them more often now. So that's transport, that's Nesvel delivery. We definitely see that these sectors are more keen on on electrifying, electrifying their fleets. Some companies are faster than they anticipated earlier this year. And and so they they come and and ask for advice. What you also see is that they they have no clue where to start either. I mean, the transport sector, for example, is is is a is a sector with with many companies, thousands of companies, but also small small companies. They have a three times 80 in pair. Grid connection, they have no clue where to start. Maybe they can they can they can charge one or two trucks behind behind the meter. But they they come to us and ask for advice, and we do these trainings and together with a partner, TLN, it's a it's a transport and logistics association in Netherlands. And these trainings, we have quite a lot, and they're they're full. So they come, and they they they ask for advice. They really try to be informed about the situation. So we definitely see a shift there, and lots of questions and and and and companies that want to go faster. Yeah. Yeah. Lots of new business for last mile solutions. It's it's before and after. I think we already were going to mass market, but this has been a huge catalyst. So maybe we can decide the human tragedy on... In The Middle East, but we can send the Donald Trump a thank you note because basically, I think a lot of, consumers are aware that going EV makes sense for the environment. It makes sense, for your laws. It often did. But now there's also an energy security component. And I think it's really created a sense of awareness that we're extremely reliant on the import of fossil fuels from other regions of the world. And I think energy security is a huge topic in its own right and we were talking a bit about it today, but it's basically making sure that you're not relying on one particular supplier. So spread your eggs and multiple assets. But the basket that we control best is the one where basically we can control the generation of our electricity, we can control the consumption of electricity, we can decide when to use it, how to use it, and then perhaps provide it back into the grid. So I think the energy security, dimension, to what's happened, from the beginning of March, I think it's a huge mind shift. Yep. Also influencing doesn't in decision making? It is. But, I think that should, also point out, of course, in the first half that it's that it's that terrible what what is... What has happened. So... But then in in... Indeed, the the politics of DICKs are also changing. So as you might have heard, our parliament has requested the different ministries to come up with measures, to respond to the, to the energy crisis. And, of course, this request demands us to be creative and come up with new things which make a lasting difference. So not just measures which which, let's say, compensate people, but which would really helps us bring forward the energy transition. So that's... Has been... Also been the the explicit question, from from, our government, from our parliament. So, indeed, there's a there's a change there. Yeah. That's very clear. New sense of urgency to boost the things you're already probably doing. I really wanna thank all people who participate in the session and, especially, thank our members of our panel. Peter Loierstein from Ministry, Arne Richter from Lossmart Solutions, Anna Marie Gauter from Kenter and Grunders. There is a short survey on your screen, should be appearing now, to give us feedback. We would love to hear your comments, and suggestions also because we are organizing new webinars after summer. Your feedback helps. This session has been recorded. We will process it and distribute it to everyone who attended the meeting and maybe you can also find it on social media etcetera. Will be available on demand for sure. Our next episode is September 10. It's about vehicle to grid. We already touched the subject, then we dive deeper into it. October 1, we will be discussing role of consumers, also touched on that topic, but dive deeper into that and energy management, etcetera. So please, follow us again and feel very welcome. Stay connected with us and stay part of this conversation and stay part of the solutions because there's a lot to do, a lot of opportunities and a big urgency. So thanks to all of you and hope to see you soon. If you have any comments or questions to one of the members of the panel or the organization, I guess you can find us on LinkedIn, etcetera. Thanks a lot for joining and see you again.