DNV Energy Industry Insights 2024: Leading a Data-Driven Transition, makes the case that digitalisation is directly linked to efficiency and climate protection, giving such initiatives the same urgent priority as the decarbonisation.

Out of a survey of 1,300 senior energy industry professionals, DNV divided the highest and lowest scoring respondents into ‘digital leaders’ and ‘digital laggards’.

Digitalisation, the paper contends, paves the path to net-zero allowing real-time monitoring and controls, rapid, automated, data-driven decision-making, and optimisation and balancing.

As a result, Digital Leaders were considerably more optimistic about reaching revenue, profit, and decarbonisation targets, are also much more likely to say they are leading the race to adapt to the energy transition and that they have a clear plan to improve their environmental, social, and governance (ESG) performance.

And Digital leaders are already far ahead of laggards in using digital technologies and data to decarbonise and adapt to the energy transition. For instance, only 21 per cent of Laggards say they have sufficient quality data to tackle decarbonisation in their operations, compared to 68 per cent of leaders.

With so much data to interpret and analyse, various types of AI are becoming indispensable in the energy industry, and it is estimated that by 2050, AI will support a $1.3tr decrease in clean energy generation costs globally through demand management, help reduce grid equipment costs by $188bn, and reduce the overall power system costs by 6-13 per cent through intelligent flexibility in the management of devices and grids.

---