Part two of an exclusiveà‚ interview with Roberto Zangrandi, Secretary General of EDSOà‚ (European Distribution System Operators).à‚
By Nigel Blackaby
Nigel Blackaby: We talk about a ‘Just Transition’, but is it possible to retrain everybody or do we have to accept that some people are going to be left behind?
Roberto Zangrandi: It is a re-training that becomes automatic with the evolution of the grids. There will not be any DSO that will give up retraining and re-skilling that enables its activity to develop. Of course, you will have some companies that will be faster. But since the transition is a pervasive concept, every DSO will have any way to face the retraining. No, there will not be anybody left behind.
And I don’t see any anybody in our sector choosing to ‘stay behind’. It’s like the evolution of the credit card or bank card for cashless payments. It was quite difficult at the beginning and there were early adopters ” but now it is it is universal. It is the same thing: once you see what the benefit of that kind of progress ” which is digitalization ” then you go for it.
Nigel Blackaby: What would you describe as the most important attribute required for somebody who wants to come into the energy sector? What would you be looking for from tomorrow’s DSO engineer or employee?
Roberto Zangrandi: Energy has always been seen as an attractive job and it is becoming even more attractive because you can experiment, and the result of the experiment is immediate. What you propose as a technician or an engineer can dramatically improve the performance of a grid.
The grid is one of the most the simple concepts in the world ” but also one of the most delicate systems in the world. So every improvement and every addition, or even subtraction, can change and improve the management of the grid itself and the system as a whole.
And the challenges are daily ” this is the exciting part. And the other exciting part is that the new generation of technicians, engineers and other employees must consider the role of artificial intelligence and other digitalized tools at their disposal.
Read part one of our exclusive interview here.
To learn more about this topic, tune in to the Enlit Europe webinar,
Re-skilling the Power Sector Workforce for Tomorrow’s Challenges, which airs live on September 30 and will be available on-demand thereafter. To register, click here.
