POWER December 2020 - 9

GLOBAL MONITOR
integrated planning between the electricity
sector and other sectors.
Investment Will Be Crucial for Future
System Security.
Despite impressive
growth in wind and solar PV installment
in recent years, overall spending in the
power sector " appears to be less than
what will be needed to meet forthcoming
security challenges, " the IEA said.
Resources seeing notable investment
slumps, especially owing to the pandemic,
include new large-scale dispatchable
low-carbon power plants, such as hydropower
and nuclear. Spending on natural
gas power has also stagnated, and even
battery storage investment saw a " leveling
off " in 2019. " These trends are clearly
misaligned with the future needs of sustainable
and resilient power systems, "
the IEA said.
" Maintaining reliability in
the face of greater supply and demand
variability will require greater and more
timely investments in networks and flexible
resources-including demand side,
distributed, and storage resources-to
ensure that power systems are sufficiently
flexible and diverse at all times. "
A Risky Link Between Power Supply
Security and Gas Deliverability. As
coal, lignite, and nuclear phaseouts continue,
more countries are turning to natural
gas power to provide flexibility. But
this is creating " a more intimate link " between
security of electricity supply and
natural gas deliverability. " This makes it
necessary to assess the deliverability of
the gas system, especially when considering
declining domestic production and
potential closures of gas storage sites, "
the IEA warned.
Cybersecurity Is a Continuous Concern.
The IEA lauded digitalization's capabilities
to improve power plant efficiency,
cost savings, and outage times, as well
as to mobilize an array of end-use devices
to respond to the power sector's needs.
" Connected devices and the Internet of
Things, together with other smart grid
technologies, can unlock larger demand
response resources, improve energy efficiency,
and facilitate the integration of
higher shares of variable renewables in a
cost-effective and secure manner, " it said.
However, the growth in connected devices
and distributed energy resources is
also " expanding the potential cyberattack
surface of electricity systems, " it warned.
Since the 2015 attack on the western
POWER MAG AD_HALF PG_ESSENTIAL_FAST TRACK_HORIZON HRSG.pdf 1 8/24/2020 8:46:42 AM
Ukraine power grid, incidents have increased
dramatically. However, while efforts
to address cyber risks are growing
across the entire global value chain, and
governments are implementing policy approaches
to cyber resilience, investments
and regulatory efforts must keep pace
with evolving cyber threats, it said.
Increasing Pressure from Climate
Change. Climate change is resulting in rising
global temperatures, erratic patterns
of precipitation, sea level rise, and more
frequent or intense extreme weather
events, and this has " significant implications
for electricity security, " the IEA said.
For generation, the impacts of climate
change can reduce the efficiency and alter
the availability and generation potential
of both thermal and renewable facilities.
Transmission and distribution networks
can also suffer higher losses, changes in
transfer capacity, and physical damage.
Climate change's most uncertain impact,
meanwhile, may be its effect on electricity
demand, which already varies according
to cooling and heating needs. The IEA
warned that, so far, even though several
countries recognize these risks, only 17
IEA member countries have incorporated
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POWER December 2020

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of POWER December 2020