In this episode of ‘Expedition North Holland: puzzling with space’, Koen Bugter visits a place where the problems with the power supply are acutely felt: the Boekelermeer, an industrial estate under Alkmaar.
Companies that want to establish themselves here cannot currently be connected to the energy grid. One of those companies is De Moerkey Brewery. They are already on the Boekelermeer, but are growing fast and would like to move within the site. The waiting time for a new connection: ten years. In order to be able to move sooner, they are now examining their entire production chain.
Make way for renewable energy
Remarkably, the Boekelermeer is not only an example of where things go wrong, but also of where solutions are being worked on.
Koen speaks with the New Energy Coalition, an organization that focuses on various forms of renewable energy to make companies less dependent on the power grid. The site includes a hydrogen filling station, a digester and a gasifier, wind turbines and a solar meadow. Experiments are also being conducted with local energy networks, in which companies divide the power they generate among themselves so that as little as possible is lost.
Transformer station
Even with all alternative forms of energy and the self-sufficiency of companies, it will remain necessary for connections to the existing energy network, Koen van Liander, the network manager, learns. They hope to install a transformer station on or around the Boekelermeer sometime in the coming years. In any case, they already have the support of a large part of the NH Panel.