The 20th Congress of APUA was held in Dakar from 14 to 19 July 2022. Régis Le Drézen, General Delegate of Think Smartgrids, went to Dakar at the invitation of Abel Didier Tella, General Manager of the Association of Power Utilities in Africa (APUA), in order to represent the French smart grids sector and to exchange with African partners, companies present on the continent, financiers and donors, as well as with African utilities.
On July 18, Régis Le Drézen spoke at a conference on the digitalization of networks and the associated cybersecurity risks. He recalled the central role of smart grids in the decarbonization of our energy system. Indeed, it is smart grids that will enable electricity networks to massively integrate decentralized renewable energies, but also decarbonized uses such as electric mobility and buildings, by providing flexibility to networks and optimizing electricity flows.
Among the many advantages to be gained from the digitalization of electrical networks cited by Régis Le Drézen :
- Optimize the outage times of electrical networks thanks to new means of communication and sensors – in France, a division by 10 of the outage times has been observed;
- Connecting renewable energies faster and at a lower cost thanks to computerized tools for forecasting the state of the network, production and consumption of electricity;
- Optimize both technical and non-technical losses ;
- And finally, optimize electricity consumption by using the data collected, with an obvious benefit for the end consumer’s bill.
Alongside this digitalization, cybersecurity issues are becoming increasingly important.
On this matter, Régis Le Drézen emphasized the three priorities for utilities: developing skills and training, making the necessary investments, and encouraging collaboration between the various utilities and cybersecurity experts.
Citing the example of smart meters, the first building block of this digitalization, Mr. Le Drézen recalled that the French Linky meter had been audited before its launch by French and European institutions to ensure its high level of cyber security. A dual key system, remote and local, has been put in place to prevent the interpretation of data by a hacker who manages to decode one of the two keys. Moreover, no sensitive information is collected. Enedis, the main French distribution network operator, has deployed 35 million smart meters in France.
Watch the replay: https://youtu.be/idqb_ZfWCHs
Think Smartgrids signed a Memorandum of Understanding with APUA last year that aims to accelerate the development of electricity access, facilitate the integration of renewable energy and deploy smart meters on a large scale. A training program is also being developed in collaboration with the African Network of Centers of Excellence in Electricity (ANCEE-RACEE).
For more information: contact@thinksmartgrids.fr