The Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) comprises experts in the field of both FAIR 
research data and software and energy system research. Its purpose is to reflect major decisions from the Steering Committee and to consult the consortium on content-related questions. The committee comes together annually in a meeting organized by the Coordination Office of NFDI4Energy. 

The first meeting of the SAB was an online meeting and took place on May 13, 2024. Around 12 scientific representatives from around the world participated. The main objective was to introduce participants to one another, to present NFDI(4Energy) in general and to present the consortium´s first insights and interim results.

The Industrial Advisory Board (IAB) supports the inclusion of both requirements and limiting factors from the energy-technical and -economical practice into the development of services in NFID4Energy. Just as the SAB, the IAB comes together in an annual meeting organized by the Coordination Office of NFDI4Energy.

The first meeting of the IAB took place online on May 15, 2024, with around ten industrial partners participating. Since it was the first meeting of the committee, the main goal was that the participants get to know each other, become familiar with NFDI4Energy, and to share the consortium´s first insights and interim results. 

In this section, we introduce the task areas (TAs) of NFDI4Energy to provide a clearer understanding of our objectives and make our consortium´s work more tangible. The work in NFDI4Energy is structured in seven task areas - in this edition, we will present TAs 1-3, shedding light on NFDI4Energy topics regarding energy researchers (TA1), society and policy (TA2), and energy-related industry (TA3). These TAs have the lead in covering the stakeholder involvement and community process.

 Task Area (TA) 1: Building and Serving the Energy Research Community

▶ Brief overview: Task Area 1 will collect and update service requirements by the energy modeling and simulation communities. TA1 is devoted to creating services for sharing best practices and community guidelines as well as a central platform to serve as an access point to the services. Continuously monitoring, adapting, and improving of offerings according to community feedback are envisioned. Also, TA1 develops guidelines, materials, and tutorials for best practices in energy system research.
▶ (Interim) Results: TA1 has conducted an extensive requirements analysis through interviews and workshops with energy researchers. Currently, TA1 performs an in-depth analysis of the collected material. These results will lead the further developments of the service portfolio by NFDI4Energy and its partners.
▶ Next steps: The requirements from the scientific audience will be further extracted and orchestrated with the findings of other Task Areas in NFDI4Energy. Also, TA1 will focus on the integration of the base services provided by the BASE4NFDI consortium.

 Task Area (TA) 2: Integrating Society and Policy in Energy Research

▶ Brief overview: The primary objective of TA2 is to include societal stakeholders, ranging from citizens to policymakers, and societal factors into energy research. Through this engagement, we aim to give greater consideration to the societal challenges inherent in energy system transformation and foster both interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research collaborations over the long term. Our contribution involves identifying energy modelling use cases within the NFDI4Energy context, where enhanced data collection from, and communication of results to, societal stakeholders can elevate research quality. These use cases aim to identify service features that actively involve societal stakeholders and facilitate the participation of social science energy researchers, such as political scientists and sociologists, in the planned NFDI4Energy services.

▶ (Interim) Results:

• We identified a lack of systematic typology for gathering energy policy instrument data during the initial stages of social and political data collection. Consequently, we proposed a well-defined and theoretically grounded ontology, which was well received by stakeholders and the Open Energy Ontology (OEO). We are refining this typology through feedback from academic and policy data communities to enhance the new research data infrastructure.

• To examine societal, political and economic challenges related to energy system transformation, specific research topics and case study regions have been selected. Over the next years, new data will be collected using qualitative research methods, and scenario analysis will integrate socio-technical factors. The research procedure will be documented, and potential challenges and requirements for the NFDI4Energy services will be evaluated.

▶ Next steps:

• Regulation and policy are crucial for driving the energy transition but are often inadequately incorporated into energy modelling. This is partly due to the scarcity or inaccessibility of open-access social and political research datasets. We aim to develop practices for collecting this data to facilitate its use in empirical analysis and modelling.

• In our ongoing design science research, we are developing an interactive energy policy comparison tool for open data platforms. This tool should help energy researchers communicate model outcomes to local decision-makers by offering advice on key model elements, corresponding interactive design elements, and associated metadata. Our design knowledge is drawn from a software artifact review and effective model communication analysis.

• How is the demand side represented in models for long-term energy system scenario studies for Germany and Europe? We aim to provide an overview about the assumptions and parameterizations used to model future energy service demand in different sectors like transport or buildings. Are such demand levels modelled endogenously or extrapolated from current data, and what kind of corresponding explicit or implicit societal narratives are applied?

Task Area (TA) 3: Transparency and Involvement of the Energy-Related Industry

▶ Brief Overview: The main goal of TA3 is to involve the energy-related industry for the successful development of community services for energy system research. On the one side, industry partners can contribute with technical as well as business-related data sets. On the other side, industry partners can also be users of our services and access existing data or services provided by NFDI4Energy, e.g., to validate new business models. 
▶ (Interim) Results: TA3 has conducted the first NFDI4Energy design thinking workshop with energy-related industry on November 9, 2023. Furthermore, TA3 published results based on the first work at the NFDI4Energy conference: “Drivers and Challenges of Open Data from an Energy Industry Perspective”.
▶ Next Steps:
•    Conduct a survey about the data management requirements of industry partners.
•    Organize interviews with industry partners to better understand their requirements.

NFDI4Energy at ABM4Energy Conference

On March 21- 22, 2024 NFDI4Energy representatives joined the ABM4Energy Conference on Agent-Based Modeling for Energy Economics and Energy Policy in Freiburg im Breisgau, Germany. The conference provided a platform for researchers and practitioners to delve into discussions on agent-based modeling in energy-related topics. The event featured presentations and workshops, with a keynote by NFDI4Energy´s spokesperson Astrid Nieße. Discussions at the event underscored the need for research data management, emphasizing the importance of unified data and processes for modelers.

NFDI4Energy at the Openmod24

NFDI4Energy representatives participated in the annual Openmod24 workshop on energy systems modelling in Grenoble, France, on March 26 - 28, 2024. With 35 lightning talks and poster sessions, participants engaged in exchange about various themes like optimization models, sector coupling, and long-term energy planning. During a lightning talk session, NFDI4Energy was presented, emphasizing the adherence to the FAIR principles and the overall goal to enhance accessibility and collaboration in energy system research. The key consensus was that leveraging open-source models and data is fundamental for advancing energy system research. This aligns well with the work in NFDI4Energy.

NFDI4Energy at GeoDPA24

On April 24, 2024 NFDI4Energy joined the GeoDPA24 in Oldenburg. Our representatives presented our consortium-poster during the Energy Poster Session with Networking and enjoyed discussions with researchers working in Energy Meteorology, Solar Resource Assessment, Solar Forecasting, Energy Infrastructure Detection by Remote Sensing Techniqes, and Energy Transition.

NFDI4Energy at the kickoff of the project Software CaRD

On May 30 and 31, 2024, NFDI4Energy representatives joined the kickoff event of the project Software CaRD. The Software CaRD project aims to improve software publication processes by focusing on metadata curation and enhancement. By leveraging a user-friendly dashboard, researchers will efficiently handle metadata, adhere to institutional policies, and obtain valuable insights for evaluation and reporting. This open-source tool supports the FAIR4RS principles and enables the development of high-quality software research in the field. Representatives of our NFDI4Energy team presented the tool SMECS (Software Metadata Extraction and Curation Software) which is already able to extract software metadata from GitHub and GitLab. Also, SMECS allows researchers to curate their software metadata and export it as CodeMeta json. 

NFDI4Energy at the DPE Forum

On June 4 and 5, 2024, NFDI4Energy representatives joined the DPE (Digital Platform Economy) Forum in Passau. The event centered around the digital platform economy, featured top-tier speakers and inspiring presenters from diverse disciplines such as business management, information systems, economics, communication science, marketing, and law. NFDI4Energy representatives presented first results of their research on launch strategies of non-private digital platforms. 

NFDITalk featuring NFDI4Energy

On June 17, 2024, our NFDI4Energy Spokespoerson Astrid Nieße gave a talk titled "FAIR Research Artifacts for Energy Research", which was embedded into the NFDITalk series. The presentation was recorded and can be watched on Youtube.

NFDI4Energy at the Research Data Day in Bremen

On June 18, 2024, the Research Data Day in Bremen offered the possibility to come together and share insights on the challenges and best practices in handling research data. Through poster-sessions, talks, and information booths participants could connect in the field of research data (Management). Togehter with other consortia of the National Research Data Infrastructure (NFDI) we present our work, promoting sustainable data infrastructures.

Many thanks to our representatives for their time and engagement that allowed NFDI4Energy to be represented at these events!

Upcoming Events

If you want to get in touch with NFDI4Energy representatives, you can find them at the following upcoming events:

Dialogtag Wirtschaft und Technologie: July 17, 2024 - Karlsruhe, Germany

19. Internationale Tagung Wirtschaftsinformatik: September 9, 2024 - Würzburg, Germany

KonKIS 24: September 18, 2024 - Göttingen, Germany

DACH+ Conference on Energy Informatics: October 10-11, 2024 - Lugano, Italy

EOSC Symposium: October 21, 2024 - Berlin, Germany

We look forward to meeting you there!