"Better a bird in the hand than a pigeon on the roof" or "Who dares wins"?
The more security-oriented people are, the more they devalue options that lie in the future (this phenomenon is known as 'temporal discounting') - short-term gain is preferred to the uncertainty of greater success further in the future. To alleviate this kind of 'fear of the future', people need a sense of agency, the feeling that they can take their happiness into their own hands.
Energy efficiency measures are such preferred short-term gains and are still on everyone's lips when it comes to implementing the energy transition. However, the progress we are making in energy efficiency is no longer great in many sectors and the potential has been exhausted in many companies. In order to remain capable of acting in the implementation of the energy transition, we therefore need another tool that is no less effective - process flexibilization.
Compensating for the forecasting error with the help of flexibility
Flexibility is one of the tools that the system needs to compensate for the forecasting error of renewables. So far, however, there has often been a lack of incentive systems for retrofitting, planning security for refinancing investments and a suitable regulatory framework for implementation. All of this has already been created for the efficiency measures tool. The necessary regulatory framework conditions for these two options may differ greatly, but the legislator has already taken action here. However, in order to create planning and refinancing security for flexibilization measures, one or two instruments from the area of energy efficiency promotion could certainly be opened up for flexibilization offensives.
Unfortunately, flexibilization often runs counter to the desired efficiency efforts. After all, most processes work most efficiently when they do not leave their optimum operating point, i.e. when they run at full capacity. From an individual perspective, the optimum operating point may even lead to faster success in terms of energy consumption and CO2 savings, but the energy transition must be considered systemically and, from a system perspective, (fossil) energy consumption and CO2 emissions are lowest when renewable energy is consumed when it is available. A line-driven process takes no account of the weather forecast, which is, however, becoming an increasingly decisive factor in our energy production.
Energy efficiency and flexibilization measures in harmony
In order to take this into account, energy efficiency and flexibilization measures should be treated equally. The system needs both. However, where flexibility is possible, efficiency targets should not lead to the elimination of investment in flexibility, but rather to efficiency improvement targets being waived with the simultaneous provision of load flexibility. This associated upgrading of flexibility projects has the potential to give many companies a new ability to act and new prospects for participating in the energy transition project.
