Industrie 4.0 als Befähiger für Energieflexibilität

Energy from renewable resources is not always readily available. Depending on the season and the weather, the power made available by solar parks or wind turbines varies, for example. Due to the continuous expansion of renewable energies, the volatility in the energy system will become more and more pronounced in the future. Preparing and adapting the industry to the changing supply structures is a major challenge for the next few decades. In the future, companies must be able to design their processes and operational organization in such a way that energy consumption can at least partially adapt flexibly to the volatile energy supply. In addition to developing technologies, Concepts and measures to make industrial processes more energetic, a second focus of future work is the development of a consistent IT infrastructure with which companies and energy providers can provide and exchange information from the production machine to the energy markets in the future. This leads to a paradigm shift in the operation of industrial processes - away from continuous and purely demand-driven energy consumption towards the adaptable, energy-flexible operation of industrial plants. This reference work presents the most important results of the research in the context of the Kopernikus project Synergy and clarifies trend-setting findings for further developments in the still young field of industrial energy flexibility.