FORTUM CORPORATION PRESS RELEASE 18 JANUARY 2018
Fortum and Ericsson have signed an agreement to bring the Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) systems of Ericsson’s data centre in Kirkkonummi to the demand response markets as part of Fortum’s growing virtual battery.
Before Ericsson, already more than one thousand household customers have been connected to the virtual battery developed by Fortum’s Spring project. Ericsson Finland is Spring’s first corporate customer. Through the collaboration, Ericsson’s 5G technology will be showcased in operation – enabling faster, more reliable and real-time data communication.
The energy system is evolving globally with the increase in renewable energy, consumers’ smart consumption and energy efficiency. In the upcoming years, new technologies and digitalisation in the ICT sector will exponentially increase the volume of data to be processed and communicated and will accelerate data processing.
“The energy and ICT sectors are both facing tremendous change. The cooperation being launched with Ericsson offers us a wonderful opportunity to showcase synergies between sectors and to generate commercial benefit for our customers,” says Fortum’s Business Development Manager Ilari Alaperä.
“5G opens enormous new opportunity for energy producers, enabling new energy sources and virtual power plants to be connected – thanks to low latency and high reliability of the technology. Our global challenge is to reduce CO2 emissions; with this project and in collaboration with Fortum, we are setting a leading example for the rest of the world on how reducing CO2 can be a reality with technology already today,” says Olli Sirkka, Head of Ericsson Finland.
Demand response markets are opening quickly around the world. In Sweden the grid company Svenska kraftnät selected Spring’s virtual battery for the first demand response power reserve pilot project. The project will be launched in Sweden in the first quarter of 2018.
Fortum Corporation
Group Communications
Further information:
Ilari Alaperä, Business Development Manager, Fortum, +358 40 688 5559
Anette Asp, Ericsson Media Relations, anette [dot] asp [at] ericsson [dot] com (anette[dot]asp[at]ericsson[dot]com), +46 72 507 4440
More about the topic: https://www.fortum.com/media/2017/12/swedish-electricity-transmission-system-operator-svenska-kraftnat-selected-spring