Our TEESlab team and the Decision Support Systems Laboratory (DSS Lab), in collaboration with the Public Power Company (PPC), co-organised the workshop entitled “Pathways to climate neutrality in Europe with a spotlight in Greece: Challenges, uncertainties, solutions” on the 30th of June 2022 at Glyfada, Greece. The joint workshop took place within the framework of the activities undertaken under the Horizon 2020 projects “SENTINEL” and “PARIS REINFORCE”.
The aim of the workshop was to gather stakeholders and field experts on the Greek energy system to discuss critical issues of the energy transition at both the national and the EU level and to explore potential challenges and solutions moving forward, also considering recent geopolitical and policy developments around Europe.
The workshop consisted of two plenary sessions with presentations by the “SENTINEL” and the “PARIS REINFORCE” partners, and one interactive session with breakout groups where participants engaged in interesting follow-up discussions.
The workshop kicked-off with Prof. Dr. Alexandros Flamos welcoming participants and providing an overview of the agenda and the purpose of the workshop. Next, Prof. Dr. Anthony Patt and Assoc. Prof. Dr. Haris Doukas gave a short presentation of the key aspects, objectives, and progress so far of the “SENTINEL” and “PARIS REINFORCE” projects respectively.
Moving on to the 1st plenary session, Dr. Gabriel D. Oreggioni, Dr. Souran Chatterjee, Dr. Mark Roelfsema, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Jakob Zinck Thellufsen, and Asst. Prof. Dr. Stefan Pfenninger presented modelling results regarding the transition pathways to climate neutrality in Europe, based on the work conducted under the “SENTINEL” case studies. During the presentations, key points on how to eliminate fossil fuels and reach carbon neutrality across the entire European energy system and how can the decarbonisation of final energy uses contribute to meeting the European Union’s emission reduction targets were highlighted.
The 2nd plenary session included presentations from Dr. Vassilis Stavrakas, Dr. Alexandros Nikas, and Dr. Philine Warnke focusing on the decarbonisation pathways and the role of natural gas in Greece. Presenters provided an overview of their modelling results and scenarios for the Greek power sector. After presentations in both sessions, participants expressed their questions regarding the key messages that were presented and they were engaged in fruitful discussions with the workshop’s presenters.
An interactive session followed, where participants and presenters were divided into four break-out groups to further interact with each other and discuss the barriers and the drivers for the energy transition in Greece and Europe. In addition, the “SENTINEL” modelling teams discussed the SENTINEL Modelling Platform and received feedback on how to further improve it in order to meet the needs of different end users as well as to better support policymaking in Greece.
Participants were able to engage with different stakeholders and exchange their scientific knowledge and expertise on energy transition and decarbonisation issues, aiming at better understanding the main challenges and exploring innovative and sustainable solutions to achieve climate neutrality at both the national and the European level.