The speakers at the Energy Transition as an Opportunity for the Slovene Economy conference were the director of ELES, Mr Aleksander Mervar, MSc, the director of the Strategic Innovation Department, Mr Uroš Salobir, MSc, and the manager of the NEDO project, Mr Gregor Omahen.
At the conference, which was organised by the Ministry of Infrastructure, the Ministry of Economic Development and Technology, and the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Slovenia on Thursday, April 26, the introductory speeches were given by the minister for infrastructure, Mr Peter Gašperšič, PhD, who presented the guidelines for the Energetic Concept of Slovenia, the minister for economic development and technology, Mr Zdravko Počivalšek and the vice-president of the European Commission for Energy Union, Mr Maroš Šefčovič, who presented the legislative framework for the transition to a low carbon society.
Among those who gave their introductory speech was the director of ELES’ strategic innovation department, Mr Uroš Salobir, MSc, who addressed the issue of the urgently needed changes if we wish to take advantage of the energy transition as an opportunity for the economy. He pointed out that energy companies need a stable innovative environment with regulatory incentives and adequate performance indicators that upgrade the innovation activity. “Energy companies that wish to succeed in this transition must place their innovation culture at the core of their operations, increase their preparedness to assume development risks, take the helm of the wider innovation environment, promote the launch of new pilots and demonstrations and direct the research sphere and local economy through innovations,” Mr Salobir concluded.
Young researchers and students then presented some of the development projects that are being carried out and had some interesting questions for Mr Maroš Šefčovič. The general manager of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Slovenia, Mrs Sonja Šmuc, MSc, presented five proposals connected to the Slovenian economy and science for promoting further development.
Mr Aleksander Mervar, MSc, director of ELES, participated in the roundtable entitled “Low carbon manufacture and the systematically efficient use of energy”. He pointed out that Slovenia already has one of the largest shares of RES in the manufacture of electric power in Europe. He added that the prices of electric power as the energy product of the future will be on the rise in the next 20 to 30 years, therefore we need to be careful in our choice of the direction and speed of the energy transition.
Mr Gregor Omahen, manager of the Slovenian-Japanese partnership in the area of smart communities and smart networks (the NEDO project) also participated in the roundtable on smart networks, cities and local communities, which was on the agenda in the second part of the conference.