Renewable Island Energy Systems: Challenges and Opportunities - From Feasible Scenarios to Implementable Pathways
Moderator
Pedro Cabrera is an Associate Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria (ULPGC), where he coordinates the Group for the Research on Renewable Energy Systems (GRRES). His research focuses on the water–energy nexus and the application of Smart Energy Systems concepts in island contexts, with particular emphasis on Power-to-Water systems and the development of intelligent solutions for integrating renewable energy into desalination and improving the efficiency of water and energy resource management. He completed his PhD in 2018 and has since worked on renewable energy integration, machine learning, intelligent control, and sustainable energy systems planning. His research addresses innovative pathways for the energy transition, with emphasis on sector coupling, system flexibility, and the efficient use of local resources. He has also contributed to the development of the MATLAB Toolbox for EnergyPLAN, a tool designed to support advanced energy systems analysis and planning through the integration of MATLAB and EnergyPLAN.
Islands face distinctive energy challenges, including dependence on imported fossil fuels, weak or isolated electricity grids, high energy costs, limited land availability and significant seasonal variations in demand. At the same time, their clearly defined system boundaries and abundant renewable resources make them valuable environments for developing and demonstrating innovative energy solutions. Achieving high shares of variable renewable energy requires more than increasing wind and solar capacity. Storage, demand-side flexibility and coordination between electricity, water, transport, heating and cooling can improve system reliability and reduce renewable curtailment. Desalination plants, pumping stations, water storage and electric mobility can provide particularly valuable flexibility in island systems. However, there is no single pathway suitable for every island. Batteries, pumped-hydroelectric storage, hydrogen, Power-to-X and interconnections present different advantages depending on system size, geography, available resources and infrastructure. Although many studies demonstrate that 100% renewable island energy systems are technically feasible, their economic viability, grid stability, territorial requirements, governance and practical implementation remain insufficiently addressed. This panel will bring together experts in energy-system planning, renewable integration, desalination, storage and sector coupling. By combining modelling experience with lessons from demonstration projects, the discussion will examine how technically feasible scenarios can be transformed into reliable, affordable and implementable transition pathways.
Speakers
Islands should be among the first and most successful adopters of the energy transition. Energy costs on islands are typically high, and electricity systems have often relied heavily on expensive imported diesel fuel, creating strong economic incentives for renewable energy deployment. Even before the emergence of battery storage and advanced demand-response technologies, integrating significant shares, typically up to 20% wind and up to 10% solar generation was technically feasible. Today, with mature battery technologies and the growing flexibility offered by electrified demand, island energy systems can, from a techno-economic perspective, achieve near 100% renewable energy supply. Transport electrification offers particularly attractive opportunities for islands, where travel distances are limited and charging infrastructure requirements are relatively modest. In addition, much of the demand for industrial and residential heat can be electrified, further reducing dependence on imported fossil fuels. Yet despite these advantages, many islands have not become pioneers of the clean energy transition. The primary obstacles are often not technical or economic but institutional and socio-political. New energy sectors require local supply chains, maintenance services, skilled personnel, and innovative business models, all of which can be difficult to establish in small and geographically isolated communities. These emerging industries must also compete with entrenched interests linked to existing fossil fuel supply chains. As a result, larger islands with more diversified economies and competitive markets tend to progress faster, while smaller islands can become trapped in a transition stalemate. Overcoming this inertia often requires strong political leadership, targeted public support, or external financial assistance. At the same time, policy barriers such as regulated national electricity pricing, insufficient local market structures, and limited opportunities for community participation can prevent islands from utilizing the flexibility tools that are essential for high shares of renewable energy.
Islands serve as critical testbeds for the clean energy transition, yet their decarbonization requires strategies distinct from mainland paradigms. Due to geographical isolation, insular energy profiles are uniquely dominated by sectors that differ significantly in relative weight from mainland analyses—most notably maritime transport, which can account for nearly 50% of total energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions, and energy-intensive water supply/desalination. Integrating high shares of Variable Renewable Energy Sources (vRES) into isolated grids creates severe stability challenges, shifting the need for flexibility onto demand-side management.
This talk will deal with evaluating the role of sector coupling and Demand Response (DR) as primary flexibility solutions through advanced energy system modeling applied to the case study of Favignana Island, Italy, assessing the integration of Power-to-Heat, Power-to-Transport (including maritime sector decarbonization), and Power-to-Water frameworks alongside technical grid stability constraints.
Results demonstrate that coupling the power grid with island-specific end-use sectors effectively absorbs non-dispatchable renewable excess, mitigates curtailment, and supports system stability. Compared to standalone electricity storage, sector coupling delivers superior carbon avoidance and economic savings while addressing the core drivers of insular emissions. Ultimately, this talk will support the statement that successful island decarbonization depends on prioritizing key local end-use sectors through tailored sector-coupling strategies rather than replicating mainland energy transition pathways.
In the past, islands were regarded as test beds and blueprints for renewable energy systems. Since then, large-scale systems have been implemented not only on islands but also on the mainland, and promising technological approaches such as sector coupling, electrification and inverter-based power systems are being driven forward with a view to mainland situations rather than island scenarios. Furthermore, coastal islands are increasingly becoming physical nodes and central energy hubs of continental infrastructure. Does this diminish the relevance of islands — or does it change their function?
The latter. Islands may progress faster reaching 100% RES and thus still act as laboratories for fully inverter-based supply systems — but as early-arriving edge cases rather than scale models. What transfers is operational experience on system strength, protection and grid code requirements, not architectures.
Furthermore, the energy transition is more than just the implementation of technologies. It also requires public acceptance and adjustments to energy markets and energy consumption. Here, isolation offers the advantage of being able to evaluate the actual results of individual measures without these being overshadowed by other measures within a larger system. The diversity of islands is not an obstacle to replication, but the sample itself — provided it is treated as a comparative typology rather than a collection of individual cases. Islands can thus continue to serve as test beds and models, though less for technology than for the economic and institutional adjustments the transition still requires. And being the only energy systems whose entire balance boundary can realistically be instrumented, they remain the natural validation cases for bridging the gap between theory and practical implementation.
Research Under Constraints: Enabling Global Collaboration for Sustainable Innovations
Moderator
Kabuba is an Associate Professor and Work Integrated Learning Coordinator in the Department of Chemical and Metallurgical Engineering, Vaal University Technology. Kabuba hold Doctoral’ s degree in Extraction Metallurgy, Master’s degree in Chemical Engineering from the University of Johannesburg; B.Eng. and B.Sc in Chemical Engineering from the University of Lubumbashi (DR Congo). He successfully completed Strengthening Postgraduate Supervision at Rhodes University in 2020 and the Managing and Leading People Programme (LPP) at University of the Witwatersrand in 2019. He has more than 19 years’ experience in academia which he gained at University of Johannesburg and Vaal University of Technology. Kabuba’s teaching interests and expertise are in Chemical Process Industries, Chemical Process Control, Thermodynamics as well as Applied Thermodynamics. He is a recipient of several awards and scholarships for academic excellence. He has extensive track record in human capacity development having supervised 109 Bachelor’s, 11 Master’s and 3 Doctoral students to completion. He has published more than 90 international peer reviewed and refereed scientific articles in journals, conferences, book chapters and book. His research interests are mainly in the broad areas of Wastewater treatment, Catalysis, Hydrometallurgy and Neural Network Applications.
Groundbreaking solutions to energy, water, and environmental challenges are often developed in regions where researchers face significant constraints, including limited funding, infrastructure, and opportunities for international engagement. This panel brings together award-winning scientists from Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East to share how they have advanced impactful research under challenging conditions and contributed to sustainable development in their regions. Through regional case studies and personal experiences, panelists will discuss barriers to scientific collaboration, mobility, and publication, while highlighting practical solutions such as international partnerships, hybrid participation, and open science approaches. The session will explore how global research ecosystems can better integrate underrepresented regions and how conferences, networks, and publishing models can foster more inclusive and effective scientific collaboration. Together, the discussion will offer a systems-level perspective on strengthening innovation and accelerating sustainable solutions worldwide.
Speakers
Scientific excellence should not be determined by access to advanced laboratories alone. As a researcher in Syria, I have experienced the challenges of conducting meaningful research under severe limitations, including restricted access to analytical instrumentation, research funding, chemicals, and international collaboration. Rather than preventing scientific progress, these constraints have encouraged creativity, resilience, and innovative approaches to research.
My presentation will share practical experiences in conducting internationally recognized research despite limited resources, building collaborations across borders, publishing in high-impact journals, and transforming locally available materials into sustainable research opportunities. I will also discuss how international initiatives such as OWSD have empowered researchers working in challenging environments and how stronger global partnerships can help bridge the scientific gap between resource-limited and well-equipped institutions.
The presentation aims to stimulate discussion on practical mechanisms to make global scientific collaboration more inclusive, equitable, and sustainable.
The Energy Transition Paradox: Data Centres as Extensive Energy Consumers and the Backbone of Digitalization, Electrification, and Smart Energy Systems
Moderator
Goran Krajacic, Ph.D., (http://powerlab.fsb.hr/gkrajacic/) is working as associate professor at DEPEE (UZ FSB) and head of Power Engineering and Energy Management Chair. His field of work includes energy markets, research in energy planning, energy system optimization; island energy system modelling and optimization, development of models for simulation of energy systems, renewable energy sources, energy storage, energy economics and policy. Since his employment at DEPEE he has been working on the many international and EU projects as well as on national project Smart Energy Storage for Sustainable Development of Energy Systems. He worked on development of SEAPs for local communities on the islands and development of financial mechanisms for support of the energy storage technologies. He was also involved in development of Strategy for self-sufficient island Unije as well as several other strategies for achieving 100% RES energy systems on the islands. Currently he is coordinating FSB participation in the project H2020-LC-SC3-2018-ES-SCC- INSULAE- Maximizing the impact of innovative energy approaches in the EU islands. Since 2002 he has been a member of Local organising committee of Sustainable Development of Energy, Water and Environment Systems Conference (SDEWES). He is also SDEWES Centre Secretary since 2009. The results of his scientific work were published in the more than 80 papers, according SCOPUS database his h index is 32.
Artificial Intelligence and the broader push for digitalization are fundamental to the global energy transition. Cloud infrastructure provides the indispensable computational backbone required for the widespread electrification of transport, industry, and heating, as well as the real-time balancing of smart energy systems. However, this data-intensive paradigm introduces a critical paradox: the very digital infrastructure necessary to decarbonize the global energy system is rapidly becoming one of its most intensive and concentrated electrical loads.
According to the International Energy Agency report "Key Questions on Energy and AI", global data centre electricity consumption reached 485 TWh in 2025 and is projected to roughly double to 950 TWh by 2030, capturing nearly 3% of total global electricity demand. The immense physical realities of AI computation are pushing data centres to the absolute limits of current infrastructure. The IEA projects that by 2027, a single AI server rack that is no larger than a household refrigerator could draw a peak power demand equivalent to 65 households, while requiring the evacuation of heat comparable to 30 natural gas boilers. Yet, this unprecedented energy footprint simultaneously presents major opportunities for grid integration and sector coupling. Because AI model training and usage induce rapid load swings (often exceeding 50% of rated capacity within a single second), data centres are rapidly adopting advanced energy storage. By 2030, an estimated 20 to 25 GW of battery storage could be installed in data centres globally. With the appropriate market incentives and regulatory frameworks, this transforms data centres from passive, heavy consumers into highly flexible, grid-friendly assets that can stabilize intermittent renewable energy generation. This scientific panel brings together experts in long-term energy planning, thermodynamic management, and digital infrastructure to explore the symbiotic relationship between IT networks and smart energy systems.
