What is meant by resilient energy systems?

According to the International Energy Agency, IEA*: "Resilience refers to the ability of the energy system to cope with a dangerous event or trend and to respond in a way that maintains its essential functions, identity and structure".

The IEA further defines the resilience "value chain", although in today's world it is much more than weather events:

• Robustness: the ability of an energy system to withstand extreme weather events as well as gradual changes and continue to function.
• Resource capability: the ability to effectively manage operations during extreme weather events.
• Recovery: the ability to restore operations to desired performance levels after an outage.

In more detail, with the application of resilience thinking in socio-ecological systems, it can be defined** as follows: "Resilience is the ability of a system to manage change and continue to evolve. It is all about how to absorb disturbances to spur renewal. "Seven principles are formulated for how to apply resilience thinking:

1. Promote mental models of complexity
2. Supporting social learning and memory
3. Promoting polycentric governance
4. Broaden participation
5. Handle slow variables and feedbacks
6. Maintain diversity and redundancy
7. Manage connections and modularity

Within the competence centre RESILIENT, we have a requirement that each individual research project must contribute to resilience. This is done at different levels, directly or indirectly, and generally with more focus on solutions to ensure robustness and prevent problems, than on recovery.

*) Source: IEA Workshop on Energy resilience
**) Source: Professor Stephane Barthel, University of Gävle

Related