A multidisciplinary workshop promoted by EERA JP Economic, Environmental and Social Impacts and JP Photovoltaic Solar Energy

A pioneer technology for RES electricity production, PV systems have been gaining more and more relevance for the past decades as a crucial component of the EU strategies for supporting the energy transition.  Beyond their potential in terms of electricity production at very low cost, PV systems are also characterized by a higher degree of flexibility of application compared to other RES technologies, ranging from the big solar farm to the stand-alone panel, from the agrovoltaic plants in the countryside to the rooftop installation in urban areas. PV systems are not only interesting for the energy transition from a technological point of view but also from the social point of view, concerning the empowerment of citizens who should gain a role at the center of the transition itself. Differently from other RES technologies, the modularity and scalability of the PV systems make them feasible to be installed by many different individual and collective actors of the energy system, shifting their role from passive consumers to active prosumers.

The climate crisis and the energy crisis have made the European commission publish an updated European solar strategy. In this new strategy targets for PV deployment in Europe have been defined to make the union independent from Russian gas and oil: over 320 GW of solar photovoltaic by 2025 (more than doubling compared to 2020) and almost 600 GW by 2030. That means we need to install, on average, approximately 45 GW per year.

Given their social and technical relevance it is more and more urgent to start considering the actual feasibility and sustainability of these ambitious targets considering both the technological and material constraints and the many social, economic, and regulatory factors that might hamper the deployment process.

The objective of the workshop therefore is to feed a dialogue and promote a knowledge exchange among two wide disciplinary domains, the hard-technological and the socio-environmental-economic, that are equally crucial for making the scaling up of the PV systems feasible and sustainable.

The ambition is to find answers to fundamental questions about the PV exploitation in the next years such as: What are the material and technological constraints for PV deployment? What are the main social aspects to be addressed in order to guarantee the needed rate of adoption by individual and collective actors? What economic, regulatory, and financial conditions are needed? How can the technical and non-technical aspects be aligned for the deployment to be feasible and sustainable?

Agenda

The workshop is intended to last an entire day and will be split into three main slots

Morning 9.30 – 12.30

Presentations from experts within and beyond the JPs membership to address the main topics and define the boundaries of the social and technological challenges

9.30 – 10.15

Nigel Taylor - European Commission JRC - Policy and regulation

10.30 – 11.30 Presentations from JP PV

Hanna Dittmar - Solar Power Europe - The industry and the ETIP perspective

Nouha Gazbour - CEA - Photovoltaic modules : What is the real environmental impact of the new technologies?

Ivan Gordon - IMEC Grand Challenges of PV in the clean energy transition

11.30 – 12.30 Presentations from JP E3S

Valentina Cavanna - UNITO - Environmental regulatory framework of PV in Italy: recent developments

Chiara Candelise -Bocconi/ Imperial College - The role of solar mini-grids for electricity access and climate change mitigation in India

Rudolf Kapeller EIT-JK

Angela Ciotola - KIT - A risk-based assessment for the future solar technologies market

Afternoon 14.00 – 18.00

14.00 – 14.30 Wrap-up of the morning session to identify a few clusters of topics to be discussed in -depth

14.30 – 16.00 Round table/World café to discuss the clusters identified

16.00 – 18.00 Starting Exploring opportunities to collaborate: 2023 – 2024 Horizon calls