SUSTAINABILITY
44
“
T he only way that major electricity users will be able to be sustain the costs of managing electricity in the future will be by generating and storing their own electricity and selling back to the grid ,” says Carl Ennis , Head of Product and System Sales , Smart Infrastructure , UK and Ireland , who takes over as CEO of Siemens UK in January 2020 , at this year ’ s UK Energy Storage Conference ( UKES 2019 ).
In the UK , there is a national imperative to decarbonise and have cleaner air in our cities and regions . Most large electricity users are increasingly committed to reducing their CO2 footprint and overall use of energy , and Siemens is also committed to being carbon neutral globally by 2030 . The company is already well underway with new smart buildings in Switzerland and South Africa , having been opened this year , plus extensive work being carried out and planned on existing buildings worldwide . With a portfolio of over 1mn sqm of space and spending some € 300m on new construction projects annually , Siemens has a global workforce of 379,000 involved in the manufacture of everything from trains and wind power to hospital equipment and energy management systems , plus extensive R & D facilities .
DECEMBER 2019