Active Network Management (ANM) is a subject that you are going to hear a lot more about if you are involved in the installation, development & / or planning of distributed generation and / or energy storage projects.

As the complexity of energy flows across the electrical Grid becomes more and more complex, there is a requirement by the Distribution Network Operators (DNOs) and the Transmission Network Operator (TNO) to ensure that the physical limits remain within safe limits.

If we are being told that a large percentage of existing & new homes / businesses will be moving to some form of heat pump over the coming decade, how can we help them (and the people financing the investment) clarify that they have opted for the right overall system design that makes the best investment and low carbon case – this means the right combination of renewables & energy storage alongside their electrified heating system.

The key is to start from the heating basics.

Analysing the returns from energy storage is hard enough before you account for the possibility of returns from engaging with flexibility markets. However, how do you approach this if you are being offered the option to provide flexibility?

In this article we detail the different elements required to understand prior to engaging in flexibility and how they relate to your possible returns.

There is a lot of hype about at the moment about what is known as “Robotic Process Automation” or RPA. So much so, that the Economist (April 17th edition) recently ran an article about the rise of some unknown software businesses in this area. At Argand, we have developed our own RPA in relation to energy data and analysis and of specific interest to any business is the automated submission of energy meter readings and related forms.

A blog about how GridMAP can help you to model the optimum energy storage investment to get the most out of existing generation assets exporting to the Grid.

I promised myself I wouldn't write anything in this piece that was specifically about COVID-19. There's been too much interesting stuff written already.

However, I've realised that reflecting on the last eight to ten weeks of lockdown is a useful foundation for me to start this article – especially given its focus on how quality feeds into the next stage of society’s low carbon story.

Imagine you are a renewable energy developer – or maybe you are one.

You have an existing (or you’re developing a new) renewable asset (solar or wind for example) with it’s own Grid connection and you’d like to connect to a local industrial site via a physical private wire and generate income from a Power Purchase Agreement (PPA).

You’ll need a solution….

Whether you like it or not, the Electric Vehicle (EV) revolution is coming and is even more likely after the recent UK Government announcement that the sale of new diesel and petrol cars, including hybrids, will be banned from 2035.

This is good news, but it will also create numerous challenges that need to be overcome.

So, the UK Government has announced that they are going to revoke the export payment from March 2019.

You can find the Government’s response here https://tinyurl.com/ycnyo77n or a short article from the Solar Power Portal here https://tinyurl.com/ybst5z6w.

The industry is up in arms, which seems to be the simple response to a more complex scenario.

Argand Solution’s GridMAP application quickly models hundreds of investment scenarios to get the information that you need to make a sound financial investment.

We all know that “there’s no such thing as a free lunch,” but is that always the case? What if you’re offered free energy storage from a battery system at your business or home? Is this free - or is there a catch?

The nature of the energy markets is changing: as distributed generation of electricity through the installation of solar and wind increases, the need to balance these intermittent flows has become a greater priority.

Blockchain technology is here and it isn’t going away. The number of projects being developed by various organisations around the world using blockchain is increasing rapidly as people wake up to its potential.

Argand Solutions have begun exploring and developing in the world of blockchain.

Energy asset risk management is critical. Using the health analytics approach in the previous blog, we looked at some of the key analogies and why they make sense. In this next part of the blog we’re going to look at some examples of the actual issues to be aware. Plus, we’ll look at how real-time monitoring & analytics of these key factors can lead to lower asset failures, reduced degradation levels and longer capital lives. Overall this will lead to lower costs through risk mitigation.

Electrical Asset Risk Management & the Health Analogy
The emergence of “wearable technology” for the health & fitness market has grown hugely over the last few years. Fit Bit, Apple & others are tapping into the knowledge that a real-time understanding of your key health statistics will help to drive proactive and iterative actions to ensure longevity of health as well as lower health insurance costs and other financial benefits from better health.