EDF_REGISTRATION_DOCUMENT_2017

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PRESENTATION OF EDF GROUP Research & development, patents and licences

Energies and Territories: designing and modelling local energy systems; ■ developing the tools and technologies to deliver an innovative service offering for sustainable towns, cities and territories in France and internationally. The programme that drives this activity is responsible for the B2G market in order to develop a range of forecasting, optimisation and piloting tools centred on individual and collective self-consumption, as well as supply and service offerings for residential and tertiary customers, on behalf of EDF SA and its subsidiaries EDF ENR-Solaire and Store & Forecast. R&D is examining new economic models centred on the aggregation of different types of flexible demand (demand response, deferred consumption, self-consumption, renewable energies, energy planning and management on a local level). For instance, research has been conducted into new uses for electricity, such as electric mobility, heat pumps and more economic buildings. R&D has launched a demonstrator, on an industrial site, of its industrial high-temperature heat pump prototype, allowing waste heat recovery on customer's processes. A co-development initiative has been launched with equipment manufacturers, which will ultimately lead to a reduction in the cost of heat pumps for the tertiary, commercial and residential sectors. Lastly, innovations relating to smart energy management for electricity used for heating have been developed, in particular for residential heat pumps and the modernisation of storage tanks in order to make them compatible with innovative control modes, such as off-peak periods for solar energy. Moreover, work has intensified on the operating safety of industrial electrical networks, and a specific project on smart lighting has been initiated to support the development of solutions for Citelum. This work is a component of a broader project destined to produce a range of offers of the EDF group for the Smart Factory, in line with the objectives outlined in the Factory of the Future initiative launched by the government. As for client relations, to allow residential clients to be aware of their electricity use and its budgetary impact between two bills, EDF has designed and developed a prototype range of features compatible with smart meters, including an application for smart phones and PCs that allows consumers to estimate their bill, taking into account their own particular characteristics, seasonal variations in their electricity consumption, and their past consumption history. EDF R&D is also working on research initiatives to combat energy vulnerability, for instance by designing relevant client relations offers and resources. R&D continued to develop a new offering of energy services this time combining electricity supply, control of electric heating by connected thermostat and the digital customer interface for a new EDF subsidiary. 2017 also saw the launch of new customer interfaces, using techniques linked to artificial intelligence, in particular chatbots, (voice-exchange devices). In sustainable territories, to address the needs of cities that are seeking to optimise infrastructures and their management (e.g. for transport, waste treatment, buildings, energy production, and networks) and aspiring to become sustainable, “smart cities”, R&D is developing urban engineering resources for EDF sales staff in France, such as the study performed for the Nice urban district. R&D particularly supported work organised around the Local Energy Pilot concept. R&D renewed its partnership with the city of Singapore to develop decision-support tools for town planning. With these tools, collaboration with the Singaporean authorities covers the following areas: energy efficiency of buildings and their air-conditioning systems as well as household waste collection. It also includes the possibility of addressing issues such as the incorporation of photovoltaics into buildings, green roofs, and local water recycling. This modelling is coupled with innovative 3D visualisation tools at the level of individual buildings or a neighbourhood, allowing the impacts of planning decisions, for instance on greenhouse gas emissions, to be studied. The experience gained has now made it possible to develop a project in Lyon for the new Gerland neighbourhood, for the Lyon metropolitan area, which received the timely delivery of seven energy management modules, much to their satisfaction. Electric mobility is an important dimension of sustainable cities: electric transport opens up the prospect of a fundamental transformation of modes of travel Battery storage is the key technology for electric transport. R&D research in this respect consists, firstly, in characterising battery safety and performance in the lab, and secondly, in innovating in the realm of breakthrough technologies with the potential to deliver significant improvements in battery life and/or cost. R&D is also studying non mobile applications for the reuse of batteries that were originally used in electric vehicles (combining them with renewable energies, system services, etc.). In the longer term, R&D will adopt a similar approach for the hydrogen (H2) technologies that are used for mobility, including electrolysers and charging stations, as well as fuel cells for heavy transport and light vehicles.

Developing and experimenting with 1.6.2.1 new energy services for clients The development of energy efficiency and distributed renewable energies, regulatory and technological changes (digitisation) as well as market deregulation, have all led to profound changes in the relationship between energy firms and their clients. They allow clients to become actively involved in their consumption and production of energy, on an individual or regional scale. In this context, the challenges for the EDF group's marketers and specialised subsidiaries are multiple: the development of price categories in order to adapt them to conditions of ■ intensified competition and to anticipate the end of regulated sales tariffs; the desire to develop electricity use in building and transport, built on a low ■ carbon mix to preserve market share threatened by the emergence of a new environmental regulation for 2020, to succeed the 2012 Thermal Regulation (RT); demand-side management: Green deal in the United Kingdom, energy savings ■ certificates in France, suppliers must fulfil their increasing obligations; the development of smart technologies: the deployment of smart meters, easier ■ access to client consumption data and the emergence of connected objects will open, for the public, access to new services permitted by new smart technologies (remote operating, increasingly customised offers, etc.); changes in client relations, which are becoming increasingly digital, with more ■ demanding client expectations accompanied by changing behaviours. However, the modernisation of this relationship should not obscure the accompanying increase in clients’ energy vulnerability, which calls for an appropriate response from the Company; the increased power wielded by local territories within the framework of the ■ Energy Transition Law and the NOTRe Law: the regional authorities, already active in the fields of urban planning and public energy distribution, can increasingly take responsibility for their future energy strategies. The notion of sustainable territories, which combines aspects of planning (eco-districts) and mobility (electric vehicles), is becoming a key structural component in local policies. New potential areas of service are emerging at the intersection of the development of smart technologies and the shift in power to local territories; the emergence of demand among customers to become stakeholders in their ■ own electricity generation through private energy generation and consumption; the development of the performance of our specialised subsidiaries in their ■ respective areas of activity. To rise to these challenges, EDF R&D is focusing its action around three priority areas: this theme is shared among each of the following three areas, according to the ■ market targeted; energy efficiency and low-carbon use: innovating to develop new uses for ■ electricity (heat pumps for buildings and industry, lighting, and electric mobility) ultimately in order to stimulate future electricity demand and effective energy solutions in the long term for all customer segments, in a way that is compatible with new regulatory frameworks, developing comprehensive energy supply and energy services solutions for industry and the tertiary sector. The programme under which this activity is run also manages the B2B market; Smart Home and Customer relations: developing methods and tools for the ■ modernisation of customer relations in order to enhance commercial performance and cut costs through the use of new information technologies and associated data processing, (consumption data and Internet data) - Big Data logic - and new price offerings encouraging dynamic demand management to meet the new flexibility requirements of the electricity system; producing tools to develop downstream energy services for the residential market, with the functionalities of the Linky meters and smart devices. The programme which drives this activity also manages the B2C market;

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EDF I Reference Document 2017