Huawei explores the digitalization of electric power sector for 2030

By Rabab Zehra – Executive Editor, TECHx

Looking back over the last few years, it is clear that the worsening climate crisis has resulted in a paradigm shift in attitudes and behaviors. Instead of being a point of contention, global warming has precipitated the radical social change in the Middle East. This is also motivating countries to make meaningful changes, implement environmental cleanup measures, and work toward a net zero future.

Up until now, the voyage has been progressive, with each new victory bringing us one step closer to resolving the climate dilemma. 

In areas where climate change has posed serious obstacles to human survival and progress, promoting low-carbon sustainable development is a workable solution to environmental problems. Since this uses fewer high-carbon energy sources, the low-carbon economy emphasizes competition among various economic structures.

Enterprises are unquestionably the foundation of the low-carbon economy and are in charge of putting low-carbon strategies into action. However, within businesses, choices and actions related to low-carbon sustainable development are entangled with other aims, both individual and corporate.

In addition, in order to lead the energy transition and build the low carbon and net zero future that regional and national leaders envision, the larger energy sector still needs to adopt digital technologies.

The electric power sector, a fundamental enabler for all industries, has seen an emergence in the adoption of digital technology and is expected to climb as power demand rises to fuel economic development. This, in my opinion, is a result of the pandemic’s effects and the growing desire to pursue environmentally friendly and sustainable alternatives.

At the Huawei Global Electric Power Summit of HUAWEI CONNECT 2022 DUBAI, which was held concurrently with Gitex Technology Week 2022, Huawei published its white paper titled “Intelligent World 2030: Digitalization Trends in the Electric Power Industry.”

TECHx discovered from credible sources that Liu Jianming, Professor, Ph.D. Supervisor, and Chief Scientist of the Energy Internet Research Institute, Tsinghua University, took part in the review of the white paper. Liu was contacted by us so that we could have a thorough discussion regarding his thoughts on the white paper.

 ‘According to the white paper, against the backdrop of “green energy structure” and “interactive power supply mode,” the digital development of future power systems will be centered on the following dimensions: asset security and efficiency improvement, grid connection of new energy, power generation-grid-load-storage coordination and interaction, market-oriented green electricity trade, low-cost and efficient energy consumption.’  said Liu. 

In providing context for the white paper, Liu stated, “Based on the value attribute and technology maturity attribute, the white paper writers sorted out a large number of electric power digitalization scenarios and focused on six key business scenarios oriented to electric power digitalization by 2030.” 

‘The white paper also discusses six technical features of electric power digitalization: green networks, security and reliability, ubiquitous sensing, real-time network connection, endogenous intelligence, and service openness. To support the implementation of these features, it is required to build a comprehensive architecture, which should adopt a multilayer system of “cloud-pipe-edge-device + scenario-based application”, including the key elements of front-edge, back-cloud, and cloud-edge collaboration. The front edge implements massive data collection through computing and standardization. The back cloud converges complex services to the cloud through platformization and specialization. The cloud-edge collaboration promotes efficient and real-time service interaction through intelligence and integration. I believe the white paper provides excellent guidance for the development and application of power digitalization in countries around the world.’

‘I believe that ICT technologies will be more closely integrated with the power system in the future, helping the power industry go digital,’ Liu added about the future development trend of ICT technologies in the electric power industry. ‘Next-generation digital technologies such as IoT sensing, network communication, cloud computing, big data, AI, and blockchain are required with the extensive development of various service scenarios in the power system. We believe that the future technical system will be fully integrated and continuously upgraded to create a more open, efficient, and intelligent technical architecture, enabling the power industry’s digital transformation and supporting the construction of new power systems,’ he added.

TECHx also asked Liu about the white paper’s proposed six core business scenarios for electric power digitization in 2030. Whether he believes the six scenarios discussed in the book can adequately cover the future development of power systems.

‘The white paper proposes six core business scenarios: digital green power plant, digital power grid inspection, multi-source resilient distribution network, multi-energy collaboration and complementation, cross-domain power dispatching, and green and low-carbon enablement,’ according to Liu.

“The transmission lines in the power system are widely distributed, and the inspection workload is often heavy,” Chief Scientist said, citing Huawei’s Intelligent Substation Inspection Solution. “Huawei proposes an intelligent transmission line inspection solution that can implement corridor visualization and tower foundation security protection at the same time, monitoring risks in real-time and providing analysis and warnings. In this scenario, OPGW, wireless communication, tower foundation monitoring, and the solar power supply system are provided to achieve full-line coverage, all-weather running, and all-scenario AI analysis. The solution enables digital inspection of transmission lines in remote mountainous area.”

Regarding the question of whether the six scenarios presented in the white paper can accurately predict how the power system will develop in the future, ‘I believe that technology is always advancing and that there are still many more digital application scenarios for power systems. Only a few forecasts about potential development tendencies were given in the white paper. It will be regularly updated to include future scenarios for the digitalization of electric generation. Let’s wait and see what the digitalization of the electric power sector will offer us in 2030,” concluded Liu Jianming.

The comprehensive outline of the Intelligent World 2030 vision was presented in a 59-page white paper by Huawei on digitalization trends in the electric power sector. It appeared to be the result of thorough investigation into the context, goals, various possible outcomes, and key technical aspects of the digitalization of the electric power industry.

Overall, we can draw the conclusion that a digital revolution is about to sweep the power sector. Nevertheless, despite this revolution, there are still challenges with digitizing the power sector. Opportunities exist at every point along the value chain of the power industry for businesses to prosper despite these obstacles. Energy providers must transform how they operate in order to take advantage of these digital opportunities. For the power sector to fully benefit from all the advantages that digitization could offer, they must first develop a scalable and successfully embeddable digital transformation strategy.