Soaring temperatures and extreme weather have become more common across the globe, Facchin explains. We see these weather events happening more frequently than ever before, signaling that efforts to tackle climate change haven’t been enough. That’s why it’s critical for all stakeholders to take an even more proactive approach.
“There is a need for us to support decarbonization across all of the sectors and the industries and certainly the energy space, which is a large contributor of CO emissions,” says Facchin. “If we just continue with the speed that we've been on this journey, we will be nowhere near the goal of carbon neutrality by 2050 or 2060.”
This underscores the need for greater collaboration between public and private sectors to accelerate actions toward carbon neutrality. “This is a global challenge that will only get solved by global solutions,” says Facchin.
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Emerging technologies—such as electrification of infrastructure and transportation—have created new possibilities. But the regulatory environment, which can delay implementation of those solutions, is a central roadblock.
“There is enough technology out there today available that can be deployed to do most of what we need to do to deliver carbon neutrality,” says Facchin. But “it takes anything between five
and 10 years to ... deploy the technology” due to regulatory delays such as long permitting and execution processes.
Another growing challenge is cybersecurity. As power grids have become digitized to handle the complexities of increased electricity consumption, they’ve also become more exposed to cyber threats. In response, Hitachi Energy has developed a broad portfolio of digital solutions required to manage the future power system, while considering this increased risk. Examples range from enterprise software solutions to remote monitoring services.
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