Faxes and algos

2018-2025+, Part I.

Chilly Gonzales begins his survey of algorithms in the year 2004. For various reasons, the energy industry lags behind. We start in 2018.

Do you remember 2018? Not that long ago, but it feels far away. Before the energy crisis, before the acceleration of battery projects. ISVs were the new thing.

The system is more fragile now than it was then. Extreme weather events and congestion patterns that were once occasional are normal now.

Navigate and orchestrate energy system complexity without algorithms? Increasingly impossible. We’re locked in.

Adoption of technology is not even. Differences in speed affect the potential of renewable energy. This is, perhaps, the critical theme.

How granular is the “data flow” around the “digital grid” (that we wish we had)?

Many German energy-sector firms still publish fax numbers: TSOs, Stadtwerke, aggregators, project developers, even algo-traders.

Perhaps the story is about culture more than it is about anything else.