Strengthening its drive towards energy transition, LF Energy announced the addition of five innovative open source projects, all emerging out of establishments like the US Department of Energy’s SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory and industrial organisations such as GE, AmpLabs among others. These projects, emphasising advancements in digital energy technologies such as battery storage, grid resilience, EV charging, transmission facility ratings, and open source sustainability research, are crucial in constructing an open source tech stack for hastening the energy transition.
These new ventures will prove instrumental in fulfilling LF Energy's objective of pursuing a decarbonised energy system by employing open source technologies and cooperative development approaches. Alongside this, a free white paper detailing the best practices to ensure cybersecurity in energy infrastructure has also been released by LF Energy and the Open Source Security Foundation, focusing on utilising open source technologies securely.
2023 witnessed an impressive growth in LF Energy, with the addition of nine new members and nine new projects, underlining the burgeoning backing for open source solutions for power systems. The year also saw the Foundation’s unique aggregate contributors across all hosted projects increase by 30%, and lines of code hosted swell by 22%. With the induction of five new technical projects, industry players will now be offered novel resources for enhancing battery storage, grid resilience, EV charging, transmission facility ratings, and open source sustainability research, further augmenting LF Energy's mission of building a technology ecosystem to support rapid decarbonisation.
The LF Energy Technical Advisory Council has approved these five new projects. Among them, the Battery Data Alliance, contributed by AmpLabs, aims to unify software handling protocols for batteries. CitrineOS, a reliable open source software for charger management contributed by S44, is looking to boost the adoption of the OCCP 2.0.1 protocol, resulting in more reliable charging networks globally. Meanwhile, the Grid Resilience and Intelligence Platform (GRIP), offered by the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, is designed to aid electric grid operators in anticipating, mitigating, and recovering from extreme weather events. Open Sustainable Technology serves as an informative platform exploring the impact and potential of the open source movement for sustainable technology development. Lastly, the Transmission Ratings and Operating Limits Information Exchange (TROLIE), promised by MISO Energy and GE Vernova, aspires to establish an open conformance standard and foster a software ecosystem for the exchange of transmission facility ratings and related data.
LF Energy and OpenSSF have also released a whitepaper on cybersecurity in energy infrastructure. This paper outlines best practices for open source development within the energy sector, focusing on four key areas – the evolution of energy systems, the role of open source in energy, the current state of cybersecurity in energy, and best practices in open source for cybersecurity. This can serve as a valuable resource for utilities, vendors, and other stakeholders in their quest to enhance cybersecurity and safeguard valuable energy assets.
"LF Energy’s momentum is truly astounding, however we cannot move fast enough to build the technologies necessary to accelerate the energy transition. I call on all energy stakeholders to get involved by open sourcing their internal tools, contributing to open source communities both at LF Energy and elsewhere,” said LF Energy Interim Executive Director Arpit Joshipura, emphasising the need for extensive efforts in decarbonising power systems to mitigate the worst effects of climate change.