Madrid, March 23rd, 2020 -​ Atos, a global leader in digital transformation, presents the results of the European project SHAR-Q, which it has led and coordinated for 3 years. The project is focused on optimizing energy storage systems and integrating them into electricity networks to improve the use of renewable energy sources and maximize the efficiency of business models developed, ensuring a reduction in costs at each stage of the energy value chain: generation, storage, distribution and consumption.

The project, financed with 4 million euros from the European Commission through the H2020 program, was based on the innovative concept of a virtual platform that enables collaboration between users who can be both generators and consumers of energy. The aim of the platform is to offer interoperability between the local energy generation and storage capacities and integration with the electrical energy distribution network, with clear benefits resulting from improved energy use ratios.

The platform was deployed in the three pilot demonstration scenarios:

• A solar laboratory in Portugal focused on distributed renewable production with shared storage capacities;
• A community of prosumers in Austria with a focus on collaboration and sharing of energy resources;
• An installation in Greece focused on services related to electric mobility.

The analysis of energy business processes enabled functional requirements for business models, based on integration and interoperability, to be defined and developed. Examples include:

• distributed flexibility management;
• collaboration between storage systems and the distribution network manager;
• collaboration between electric vehicles and renewable energy managers and “peer-to-peer” energy markets.

The validation results led to the development of minimum interoperability and integration requirements for local collaborative energy markets. These markets are led and promoted in the European Union's "Green Energy Package" and ensure the alignment of efficient operations management objectives for energy assets focused on resource usage and efficient management of economic decisions in a profit-focused market context.

According to Andrea Rossi, Head of Energy & Transport Market of the R&D group at Atos, "the project's objective has been to improve the digital transformation capacity of large communities (local ecosystems). Consequently, the results will be matured by taking advantage of various R&D projects to improve the scope and capabilities of the functionalities to manage, make more flexible and balance all aspects related to the energy sector value chain".

In addition to technical development, the SHAR-Q project has been supported and represented by important European actors in the energy sector, whose support has been key to ensure the consistency of the project results in accordance with market expectations and needs. In turn, the advisory committee provided its assessment at various critical stages of the project, which allowed the final results to be oriented towards a real environment and, likewise, to analyze new collaboration processes between the different actors in the energy value chain.

For more information, visit www.sharqproject.eu