ÖBO - pioneers in connecting properties for more energy efficient cities

Örebrobostäder (ÖBO) is a non-profit real estate company and has for a long time been working in an innovative way to develop technical systems with the purpose of reducing energy consumption and power outage in their properties. Using this, they also want to create the best conditions to implement the vision of the smart town.

The first step is to observe buildings as living resources in an energy efficient city - for a resource efficient Sweden, that contributes to the smallest possible climate footprint.

It is also crucial to have the city perspective - in other words, start with individual buildings, then proceed with blocks and city counties, to then cover the whole city. This way of thinking requires visionaries, the will to create change, and courage to proceed with future-proof solutions within a strong innovative energy area.

- Today ÖBO's buildings are connected with one another, but also with the electricity grid and the district heating grid. This is due to a cloud service where energy and power resources can be managed in a flexible way depending on the demand, says Jonas Tannerstad.

He mentions that the first step was not to start controlling the power, but to primarily reduce the energy consumption through energy efficiency measures. ÖBO did this fundamental work already back in the early 2000s, and has thereafter been able to take the next step in the development and connect all of the buildings to store and share energy. However, they quickly realized that there were bottlenecks and in-lock effects in their property system that limited their opportunities for development.

This was the starting point for a redo surrounding their limited system for property automation, and instead move over to the open system used in the industry. This has been a deal breaker in order to get 100% control, together with flexible opportunities for development. Today, all of the energy management is occurring from an open and independent platform for property automation that they have developed together with the innovation company Power2U.

The interesting part of this is that the platform is open for others to use, where ÖBO is more than happy to see other property owners following their footsteps.

In 2015 was it more than necessary to look over the market for new innovative energy systems, since the need for real-time measurements of the energy flow and control of power outlets became more acute. They started to observe a shortage of available power in the electricity grid. Shortly thereafter they found Ferroamp, which had during a couple of years developed a system for both phase balancing and control of loads and power.

- Nowadays, the EnergyHub-system from Ferroamp is becoming the standard solution in both the ROT-project and new productions within ÖBO, even though we may not instal solar cells from the start, says Jonas Tannerstad. It can be smart to first measure, analyze, and evaluate the energy consumption and power outlet in the building, in order to then continue with the energy investments, such as solar cells and battery storage.

ÖBO lives by the principle of Produce, Store, and Share, which Jonas Tannerstad believes should be the new normal way of proceeding with all energy management in the future. It is a simple principle that implies that available energy gets shared, the excess gets stored, and when there is a demand, more energy gets produced and supplied to the system. It gives a good overview, is cost efficient, and gives a better decision basis for future energy investments.

Another important part of their digitization work has been to visualize their energy data. Here Ferroamp's cloud service EnergyCloud contributed, so that their operations technicians and engineers get a visual interface, with both a good overview picture and detailed energy data. This makes their daily work for energy and power optimization easier.

Old building standards and outdated legislation in the field of energy has also resulted in challenges for ÖBO to use Ferroamp’s technology to its full potential. A partnership together with Örebro county and electricity company E.ON has started within the new city district Tamarinden, where smart and future oriented energy solutions will be implemented in larger scales. This district includes about 700 apartments, two pre-schools, and a couple of stores. Renewable energy is going to be produced, stored, and shared between the properties here, and a DC-based electricity grid is a part of the solution. Ground preparations are currently underway and some infrastructure is being placed underground. Construction start is planned for the year 2022.

The new district Tamarinden will be a pilot project, both to implement the new technology from, among others, Ferroamp, and to challenge the law and legislation in the field. However, firstly the Energy Market Inspectorate needs to approve the pilot project for the new district as a test facility. If, by any chance, an approval is not given, then the local electricity grid company has a right to build and run the electricity grid - which is ÖBO’s plan b.

- It is a systematic and legal mistake that new buildings - and existing buildings in need of renovation - are not being supplied with the possibilities from all of the new technologies already from the start, says Jonas Tannerstad. The risk is that buildings - even if they are within the same real estate company - are being supplied with different technological solutions, which makes it even more difficult when the different systems are being connected on a common platform in the future.

An interesting aspect is that real estate companies could become our local power companies, with the capacity to provide Svenska Kraftnät with both resources for frequency regulation and capacity for power balancing. ÖBO has tried doing this with, among others, Stena Fastigheter. A requirement for this type of collaboration is that the partners are in the same electricity area.

Ferroamp is implying that they are playing a large role in the future energy conversion and transformation of the Swedish electricity grid, where both solar cells and future battery storage are essential elements.

- Calculations for battery storage are getting better, at the same time the price for them are going down. Contributory to a good calculation for battery storage are many - for example, self-usage of solar energy is increasing - the dependence of the electricity companies increasing price tariffs for the future power outlets are decreasing - and the batteries can be used in some aggregating energy services, where a couple of batteries are being gathered in a battery pool (that today needs to be able to offer at least 100kW). There is a proposal from Svenska Kraftnät that battery pools not only should be paid for providing power, but also should be able to get paid to receive power from them, concludes Björn Jernström, Founder and CTO at Ferroamp.