From June 26 to 28, Connor and Kamaria from our group had the amazing opportunity to attend the International Energy Workshop (IEW) in Bonn, Germany! This workshop was hosted by the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) and included more than 100 presentations and three plenary sessions. It covered various topics, including energy supply and price forecasts, energy savings and efficiency, renewable and innovative energy technologies, environmental and climate policy, and the intersection between energy analysis, economics, and the natural sciences.

Kamaria presented “EV Grid Integration for BC (Canada),” which dealt with trip simulation and PyPSA integration methods to analyze electricity load from electric vehicles. In this project, optimal system costs derived from coordinated or uncoordinated charging were compared, which denoted the effectiveness of variable renewable energy sources.

Connor presented “Advancing participatory energy systems modelling,” of which key factors driving this project were to improve the societal representation within models, to provide inputs, data or research questions, to ensure the outputs are policy-relevant and have an impact, to highlight gaps in modelling approaches, and to support more open and inclusive modelling process. This presentation explains the main concept of participatory approaches and their discussions.