This November marks one year since the ICLSG partnership was launched, at COP26, in Glasgow, UK. In just one year, we have built what started as a great idea into a tangible partnership, where innovations are shared, new research is undertaken and DSOs and communities collaborate to accelerate a net zero transition.
To mark the one year anniversary of ICLSG, we held virtual events in the Global North and the Global South. The events opened with this video which outlined how far ICLSG has come in one short year. Our topic was the worldwide challenge: “Network resilience in a decarbonising world”: how do we ensure electricity networks are resilient enough for today’s world, able to support a net zero future and also physically able to withstand the extreme weather events that are becoming increasingly common?
These events were also an opportunity to share early learnings from the ICLSG’s first research project, led by the University of Oxford and Enel Foundation. Investigating network resilience, this work has included a deep dive into the potential of microgrids and islanded networks, which in some circumstances can improve network resilience for communities. A full report on this research will be published in early 2023, with ICLSG partners having exclusive early access.
We were delighted that our discussions were joined by around 150 attendees from ten different countries, from many different types of organisation, including businesses, network operators, universities and local authorities. Over the next few years, we hope to build on this early contact to develop a truly global conversation, to ensure that climate change – the global problem that requires a local solution – is effectively answered.