450 px Taipei Visit

The Deputy Mayor of Taipei City Government visited Birmingham Energy Institute (BEI) to share ambition, explore collaborations and discuss different approaches to energy innovation.

Chia-Ji Teng’s visit was part of a full-day of events organised by Energy Capital. Before arriving at the University of Birmingham, the visitors met the Mayor of the West Midlands Combined Authority, Andy Street and toured a developing regional Energy Innovation Zone (EIZ) at Tyseley Energy Park.

During the visit, the Deputy Mayor and his delegation heard how the EIZ will integrate low carbon technologies and support the development of business models and infrastructure that will enable new approaches to produce clean, low-carbon energy.

The delegation then arrived on campus to meet with leading experts from across the BEI including; Professor Martin Freer, Professor Yulong Ding, Dr David Boardman, Professor Robert Steinberger-Wilckens, Professor David Maddison and Dr Yongliang Li.

Deputy Director of the Birmingham Energy Institute, Dr David Boardman commented: “We were delighted to welcome the City of Taipei and our discussions highlighted that we share many common ambitions linked to regional-scale decorbonisation of energy.  We are looking forward to further detailed discussion and possible collaboration.”

The group discussed their respective energy transformation ambitions. Chai-Ji’s ambition for the city of Taipei is to develop green transportation systems, energy efficient buildings and a decarbonised manufacturing sector. In order to support this ambition, the Taipei delegation were particularly interested to share knowledge around the BEI’s approach to helping to shape energy policy, both regionally and nationally.

The Deputy Mayor and his delegation also visited the University’s Liquid Air Energy Storage (LAES) pilot facility to hear how it could contribute to solving Taipei’s sustainable energy supply challenges. The energy storage plant works by utilising excess electricity, often ‘wrong time’ renewable electricity to compress air, transforming it into a liquid at -196oC that can be stored. When the stored energy is required, the liquid is allowed to expand and drive a turbine to generate electricity.

The group also learned about applications of the University of Birmingham’s world-leading energy storage research, led by Professor Yulong Ding. They were keen to hear how the research is providing global solutions to the challenge of managing distributed energy supply to deliver sustainable, low-carbon energy systems.