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The Dutch energy transition 1 2 During the Climate Change Conference in Paris, twenty leading industrial counties announced the launch of ‘Mission Innovation’, an international coalition of countries that want to double their public investments in energy innovation within the next five years. The Netherlands joined this coalition in October. The members of Mission Innovation work together with the ‘Breakthrough Energy Coalition’, a private initiative affiliated with wealthy individuals like Bill Gates, Richard Branson, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos and Jack Ma. • Of the 181 million euros in public investments spent on energy research last year in the Netherlands, more than half (98 million euros, 54% of the total amount) fell under the heading of ‘sustainable energy sources’. • Research into energy savings received almost a quarter of the investments (43 million euros, 24% of the total sum). • Total investments in energy research rose between 2014 and 2015 by 18%. • These types of investments are expected to increase significantly in coming years. Investing in research into energy innovation is ‘hot’ Google, Philips, AkzoNobel and DSM will be purchasing energy on a large scale from 34 new windmills in Zeeland in the future. Krammer Wind Farm (production capacity: 100 megawatts) is a citizen initiative with 4,000 members in two cooperatives. This makes consumers an energy supplier to the business community. The number of energy cooperatives has grown rapidly in recent years and that growth is expected to continue. • There are more than 500 energy collectives in the Netherlands, 220 of which have the legal capacity of cooperative. • These cooperatives together represent 35 to 40 thousand members. • There are currently 82 megawatts of cooperative generation capacity established, around 3 percent of total wind production on land (3,000 megawatts). • The production of cooperative wind energy is expected to triple in coming years. • Investments in clean energy will increasingly exceed those in fossil fuels. Citizens to generate their own energy on a large scale 3 Buildings are becoming more energy-efficient and, in some cases, generate more energy than they consume. Both citizens and companies have access to innovative technologies that help them save more energy. The production, storage and distribution of clean energy is becoming more efficient and affordable. The government, public and private parties are increasingly entering into partnerships to achieve sustainability goals. In a nutshell, all lights are on green for an acceleration of the energy transition. Would you and/or your company also like to benefit from the possibilities offered by the energy transition? Contact Marc Schmitz, Executive Director of Rabo Project Finance. He can be reached at [email protected]. Sources: Nationale Energieverkenning 2016 and HIER Opgewekt 2016 Innovative energy technology available to all www.rabobank.com/highlights Handpicked essentials for today’s leaders Renewables Three developments to step up the pace Natural gas, oil and coal. In terms of energy use, the Netherlands will be dependent on these fossil fuels for quite some time, as will the business community and industry. But, in the meantime, almost all important conditions are in place for accelerating the energy transition. Three developments that will further boost the growth of sustainable energy in coming years. Hydrogen and fuel cells 0% 2008 2015 1 mln Nuclear energy 4% 2008 2015 7 mln Generation and storage techniques 6% 2010 2015 11 mln Fossil fuels 9% 2010 2015 17 mln Sustainable energy sources 54% 2010 2015 98 mln Energy savings 24% 2010 2015 43 mln Total investments in 2015 181 mln Other energy research 2% 2010 2015 4 mln Electricity production and heat from fossil fuels and nuclear energy Petroleum refineries Oil and gas extraction Networks Heat, geothermal energy and energy from water Biomass, biogas, biofuels and refining and other Wind Sun Energy savings 20 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 18 16 14 12 10 8 6 4 2 0 Investments (billions of euros) Net electricity import Renewable Natural gas Oil Coal Other Net electricity export 4000 Prognosis for primary energy consumption (petajoule) by NEV 2016 3500 3000 2500 2000 1500 1000 500 2000 2005 2010 2015 2020 2025 2030 2035 0 -500
