Energy Management Systems: Not Just For Battery Storage?

Julie Horn is a Senior Strategy and Business Development at Virya Energy, specializing in renewable energy growth strategies. With deep expertise in solar, energy storage, EV charging, and smart energy management, she has led strategic initiatives, business development, and innovative product roadmaps. Julie holds dual master's degrees from Solvay Business School and has served as an expert evaluator for the European Commission.

Tobias Mitter is Managing Director and Chief Technical Officer at gridX, Europe's leading smart-energy company based in Munich and Aachen offering advanced energy management solutions. With the XENON digital energy platform, gridX has launched a technology that connects all types of decentralised energy resources and makes it possible to optimise energy flows in any context. After completing his Master's in Business Informatics and Information Science at Saarland University, Tobias gained professional experience at digital startups and scale-ups, as well as at Boston Consulting Group and IBM. His primary focus areas included digital platforms, IoT-based solutions, and digital business models, particularly in the energy and automotive sectors. In 2020, he joined E.ON in senior roles, most recently serving as Director of E.ON Inhouse Consulting, the company's internal consulting arm. On February 1, 2023, Tobias took on the role of Chief Technology Officer and Managing Director at gridX, where he is responsible for product development, the engineering division, and production at the smart-energy company.

Keno Leites started his working life in the ship building industry in 1998. At the German Shipyard Blohm + Voss (today thyssenkrupp Marine Systems) he worked in the project department for ships and yachts, in charge of design and negotiation of small cruise liners, mega yachts and different merchant ships. In this role he was in charge of the design of the propulsion and auxiliary systems, HVAC, fire fighting, power distribution, ICMS, entertainment. Since October 2005 he worked in the research and development/product development department, being in charge of projects regarding ship machinery and electric systems with special focus on alternative energy systems and concepts. During this time, he was project manager of various development projects (i.e. high temperature superconduction, LNG systems). Since 2009 Keno Leites was coordinator and manager of the joint development projects SchIBZ/MultiSchIBZ, for the development of hybrid fuel cell systems for oceangoing vessels. In 2022 Keno Leites moved to Zeppelin Power Systems GmbH as Head of the Fuel Cell Competence Center. He is responsible for the development of fuel cell and battery based systems for the various product areas of ZPS. With his team he conducts projects with regard to electrification, batteries and fuel cells for diverse applications. These start with a system analysis for a detailed understanding of the energy consumer and result in design and delivery of the energy system.

Lukas is a leader of P3's work on charging infrastructure and energy technologies and serves automotive OEMs, utilities, charge point operators, charge point manufacturers, suppliers, and private-equity investors in Europe and North America. In his role as Principal Charging & Energy, he focuses on helping clients develop new charging infrastructure and energy products as well as optimize rollout and operations of these products. Additionally, he is responsible for P3's energy lab in Osnabrück, Germany, that offers testing, engineering and benchmarking services in order to improve reliability and interoperability between technologies and products across the e-mobility and energy ecosystem.

Stefan Feilmeier has extensive experience in energy management systems, focusing on energy storage applications and sectoral coupling. With a background in informatics and leadership experience in the German Air Force, he has been shaping the development of the FENECON Energy Management System (FEMS) for over a decade. Passionate about renewable energy and open-source software, he actively drives innovation in the field. He is Deputy CEO of FENECON GmbH and Chairman of the OpenEMS Association e.V.

Lakshimi Narayanan Palaniswamy is a doctoral candidate at the Battery Technology Center of Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT). After completing his master's degree in Electrical Power Engineering at RWTH Aachen University, Germany, with a focus on modelling and state estimation of electrochemical energy storage systems, he is now concentrating on operation strategy development within the context of multi-energy systems. In the System Control and Analysis group at the Institute of Electrical Engineering, KIT, Lakshimi is responsible for developing an energy management system for a real-life hybrid energy storage demonstrator coupled to a heat sector. Here, he is enhancing his expertise in modelling storage systems and developing optimization algorithms for economical and lifespan-enhancing dispatch of energy storage systems.