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NETWORK / 14 / NOVEMBER 2019 NAPC CONFERENCE Getting the green networks up to speed Decarbonising heat will involve a future switch to hydrogen, but how should that hydrogen be produced? And as consumers and businesses adopt EVs and take to the roads, are the network operators fully prepared? Tom Grimwood reports on the topics that topped the agenda at this year's Network Asset Performance Conference in Birmingham. W hilst sub- stantial progress has been made in the electric - ity sector, the decarbonisation of transport and heat is further behind – and these two topics took centre stage at Septem - ber's Network Asset Protec- tion Conference. In terms of switching road transport from fossil fuels to electricity, there is less concern about producing enough megawatt-hours to meet the overall increase in demand from electric vehicles (EV) than ensuring there is the network capacity to deliver the power. Richard Hartshorn, EV readi - ness manager for Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks, felt that the networks would soon be put to the test. "A lot of our networks across the UK have been built with sufficient capacity to cope with demand growth 'as expected'. That was demand growth as expected in the 70s, 80s and maybe 90s. There are some networks that unsurprisingly won't have the capacity to cope with an EV be - ing equivalent of another whole household." He noted that this issue is most pressing at the low-voltage level. At the higher voltages, the "law of large numbers" helps to smooth out demand, making "an easier problem to manage". But for the low-voltage network, he explained, demand is spikier and harder to predict. In the driving seat This challenge is made more difficult by the fact that the rollout of EVs will be driven by consumers and their choices in large part. "The big risk for us is not necessarily the overall level of uptake of EVs, it's the speed with which they come onto the network," said Hartshorn. Responding reactively to increases in demand, or pro - actively investing ahead of its arrival, both present pitfalls, he said. "Being reactive means we have a lot customer interrup - tions, complaints and penalties to pay. And at the other end of the spectrum, we run the risk of stranded assets." Network operators need to find the middle-ground of a just- in-time approach to investment – the "Goldilocks" strategy. This means that "data is now pivotal to investment", accord - ing to Dan Wilson, asset data manager at Electricity North West. He suggested that a signif- icant change in culture will be needed to ensure that operators have the information they need to understand the impact of EVs on low-voltage networks and how best to respond to them. "Historically, the low-voltage network has always been the unsexy bit," Wilson told del - egates. "Everyone's always liked to do lots of data analysis on the grid and primary networks. But now I think we're getting to the point where – to really offer the true flexibility that we're going to have to offer in the future – it's understanding that low- voltage network." But, he warned, network op - erators can't let perfect become the energy of good. If workers are unsure exactly where a cable has been made many years before, then it is better to make an informed guess, rather than not recording it all. "We've always had this culture that we record asset data and it's got to be right, which is brilliant. It's fantastic," he described. "Operationally we've Delegates digesting the debate at this year's NAPC Conference DECARBONISATION OF TRANSPORT