Enel X: Transforming business for net zero

Enel X is focused on electrifying end-user consumption, seeking new technologies and business models to support the transition to net zero for businesses globally that are facing economic and practical challenges such as global inflation, supply chain limitations, climate change, and rising and fluctuating energy prices.

The year 2022 was the sixth hottest on record since 1880 and was dominated by the Russia-Ukraine conflict and its impact on the prices of electricity and raw materials in Europe with many of the countries dependent to some extent on Russian gas.

These and other trends are encouraging companies to take a closer look at their carbon footprint and decarbonisation options in line with national and global targets, as well as their energy consumption and how it can be greener, cheaper, and more efficient.

Organisations are facing an energy trilemma of security, sustainability, and affordability, impacting business performance as they seek to ensure operational resiliency while at the same time decreasing their carbon emissions and reducing their costs. Managing these challenges individually can create trade-offs. An integrated, 360-degree approach to this trilemma must be adopted with solutions that can also mitigate risks, create visibility, and generate revenue.

“The final goal of navigating this trilemma for businesses should be to increase their competitive advantage,” says Emanuele Ranieri, Head of B2B at Enel X Global Retail, a company a part of Italian energy giant Enel to bring innovative digital solutions to assist companies worldwide in this task.

“Enterprises are on the search for solutions that go beyond commodity and can offer additional services and business benefits, taking advantage of the leverage provided by technological innovation.”

Enel X, solutions and services

Initially, Enel X’s solutions and service offerings were based on those within the company’s portfolio but in the five years since its establishment, new energy solutions have been added to create an integrated end-to-end offering.

“We want to become the energy partner of choice for C&I [Commercial and Industrial] companies,” says Ranieri, explaining that the first objective is to understand the customer’s objectives and priorities.

“Then we can implement a wide range of solutions that can cover 100% of their energy-related needs – from advisory services that help the customer translate their sustainability and energy goals into actionable road maps, to financing projects, to optimising their energy demand through on-site or offsite renewable energy products and energy attribute certificates.”

Among these, he adds that heat pumps are becoming increasingly important as C&I customers look to electrify their industrial processes, as are demand response or flexibility services, which enables the opportunity for them to monetise their industrial assets in the energy market and thus maximise the value of their investment while also building resilience.

“Ultimately the solution will depend on where the customer is on its transition journey and then we can adapt it to the size of the customer and the availability of the technology in the market. As energy tends to be one of the largest costs for a C&I business, the solution is likely to be more tailored to gain the most competitive advantage.”

Market trends

The Greenhouse Gas Protocol, the world’s most widely-used greenhouse gas accounting standard, presents three “Scopes” of emissions which are sources of greenhouse gas emissions that a company creates, both directly within its own operations i.e. Scope 1 and  2 – and indirectly within its value chain, Scope 3.

“With Scope 1 and 2 and now increasingly Scope 3 targets becoming the concern for companies, one of the solutions seeing the most demand in all geographical regions is for self-consumption, such as solar photovoltaic (PV) plus behind-the-meter battery storage,” says Ranieri.

“Companies are becoming more willing to invest in this kind of solution,” he says, commenting that “sometimes they have the money to invest and sometimes they ask us to invest, so we can move from spot sale to fully owning the asset or offering it as-a-service.”

A second trend that Ranieri mentions is fleet electrification, particularly in Latin America where Chile and Colombia are among the world leaders in the switch to e-buses for public and private transport.

“There we can provide a turnkey solution with both the buses and charging infrastructure both for public transportation companies and large industrial operations such as mining companies wanting to decarbonise transportation services for their employees.”

In Europe, the newly announced Green Deal Industrial Plan is expected to be a driver of corporate decarbonisation. Ranieri cites accelerated permitting and increased funding as key benefits.

“Most of the time required to put behind the meter assets in operation, up to a year, is due to permitting. So if we can speed up that we will certainly boost technology adoption both at grid-scale and at the customer level.”

However, he cautions that the lack of human resource skills could quickly become a bottleneck for project development. While resource upskilling is one of the ‘pillars’ of the plan, if one considers heat pumps as an example the shortage is well into the thousands.

Similarly, the supply chain needs attention to make it more resilient so that project timings and targets can be met.

Project innovations

In addition to fleet electrification projects, Ranieri mentions Enel X’s specialist activities in demand response and flexibility among the most innovative.

These include a virtual power plant initiative with a vehicle-to-grid solution with the e-scooter company Gogoro in Taiwan and a “first of a kind” dynamic frequency response initiative in Ireland with Microsoft.

“In the Microsoft project, data centres are installing grid-interactive UPS systems in partnership with a leading UPS provider. Enel X then enrols that battery asset into Irish grid balancing services, helping maintain system stability while increasing the amount of renewables onto the grid.”

More broadly Ranieri also cites the mounting experience of Enel X with large customers as the ‘unique energy partner’ that is able to deliver on the business-energy trilemma.

“More and more we experience that businesses are looking for one single player able to provide a fully integrated solution with a commodity – for example combining the PV on-site with a PPA off-site and behind-the-meter storage. These are becoming more standardised and affordable also for the small and medium enterprises.”

Looking ahead with Enel X

Looking to the future, Ranieri says that while Enel X aims to capture the potential of new innovations, its approach is ‘customer-centric’ and very much driven by customers’ business objectives and energy priorities.

“One of the areas that will grow, particularly after the energy and gas crisis of 2022, is our investment in competencies and in the scouting of technology for industrial process electrification, so starting to support customers directly in their core business operation with the substitution of gas with electricity production,” he says.

As an example, he mentions interest expressed by the food and beverage sector with initial estimates that it could reduce the total cost of operation in addition to helping to meet the sector’s overall decarbonisation targets.

“Our mission is to electrify end-user consumption and for sure we will be able to find all the new technologies and business models that could simplify the life of our customers in managing the energy trilemma.”

To find out more about Enel X visit their website here