Technology can be an innovatior’s best friend

When tech is the start of innovation

We have been at the Energy Networks Association (ENA) Innovation summit and WOW! There really are some smart people with some incredible kit, robots wheeling around, virtual reality goggles making people in suits crawl around on the floor, very enjoyable. Technology isn’t the end goal of innovation though. Solving people’s problems is.

With that in mind our ‘Award for Most Useful Technology' goes to Advanced Infrastructure providers of data and visualisation tools for the energy transition. We spent way too long monopolising the time of the stand team but here's what we took away:

Advanced Infrastructure's platform can supercharge the decision capabilities of those hoping to accelerate the energy transition in place. Their tool can tell you where to target heat pumps in Hull or Smart Tariffs in Sheffield. Using accessible data that anyone can understand and query. Their platform is being used across the industry to plan and target energy projects.

This is great news for anyone considering local energy planning because we can ask meaningful questions like "where are people in electrically heated homes and in fuel poverty?" or "If I want to electrify rural heating in North Yorkshire where should I start?"

When we start asking these questions WITH tools like Advanced Infrastructures platform, we can start finding out not only what problem we are solving, but for whom, where they live and what solutions might fit their circumstances.

So while Ally focusses on the people in the problem space, we can recognise a fabulously useful bit of tech when we see it!