Siemens Australia sees opportunity amongst the many challenges that our country and our world face today. Social trends in Australia and across the world indicate that we will be facing the most significant challenges we have ever confronted. These challenges are created by global megatrends such as Climate Change, Demographic Change, Urbanisation and Globalisation. Some of the local issues arising from these megatrends emerge in the areas of Water, Energy, Environment, Healthcare, Productivity, Mobility, Safety and Security.

But the real test will be how we address these challenges and how a country like Australia adapts to significant changes. As these issues confront us it is human nature to stay firmly focused on the immense challenge before us, but at Siemens, the team sees these challenges as exciting opportunities.

To develop a compelling vision on how to Picture Australia's Future, Siemens commissioned an extensive and collaborative research project that involved over 22 validation partners, 85 research groups from around the country assessing over 150 existing reports to validate the findings. These validation partners developed a series of testing protocols to complete a full assessment of Australia's two biggest challenges water and energy. These testing models assessed Australia's potential to create a more viable and sustainable energy mix, deal with our increased energy demands, secure our water supply and cope with the demand of a larger population by 2030.

Led by Albert Goller, Chairman and Managing Director of Siemens Australia, Albert sees the future of Australia's growth firmly and strongly imbedded in our abilities to harness our natural resources that we have in abundance.

"Australia has the potential to produce more renewable energy than many of the other superpowers of the world, including Russia, China and the US."

"To do this technology and innovation can play a pivotal role in Australia's capacity to restore, secure and manage the availability of water and provide sustainable energy through growth." Mr Goller said.

But where have we come from?

Australia is a growing nation, we are unique, a nation rich in reserves of natural resources; including coal, minerals, gas and uranium. These natural resources have made our energy costs inexpensive and readily accessible. This combined with the fact that these natural resources have historically provided Australia with significant financial and economic strength make it difficult for our business and industry experts to explore other competitive or more lucrative economic advantages.

But Australia is also rich in other natural sources of energy. A country blessed with natural sunlight and wide open spaces, Siemens pictures a future where Australia leads the rest of the world in the generation of renewable power.

Siemens picture of the future

In response to our unique situation, Siemens has created a technology blueprint which clearly defines how Australia can achieve water availability and sustainable energy by 2030. Using only the latest technology that is available today, Siemens has provided a blueprint to address some of Australia's greatest challenges and transform them into opportunities for our future generations.

This technology blueprint is steered by how Siemens sees the future of water and energy in Australia, which can be summarised by the following:

Picture the Future of energy...

• where we provide sustainable energy to all Australians,
• where we export clean electricity to South East Asia,·
• where energy efficiency becomes a way of life, and,·
• where Australia's road transport fleet is fully electrified, powered by renewable energy.

Picture the Future of water...

• where water is always available to support Australia's growth,
• where we continue to have the world's highest quality water,·
• where Australia has the world's best practice farming and irrigation, and,·
• where we can assist mother nature in restoring her natural inland water resources.

How do we get there?

Siemens sees Australia making measurable changes over the next 20 years in the way that we source our energy, and further to this the potential we have to diversify our energy mix.

The Siemens picture sees Australia sourcing 40 percent of their total energy supply from a mix of energy efficient and sustainable renewables Of this around 30 percent of this mix will be a combination of wind and solar energy produced comprehensively by our own natural resources.

We no longer source the majority of our energy from fossil fuels but where we cleverly integrate our solar and gas supplies together and transition away from a reliance on coal towards renewable energy.

Siemens proposes that the technology blueprint for Energy should include a high voltage DC transmission supply, capable of transmitting and exporting electricity to South-East Asia.

It is Siemens vision to implement smart-grid technologies to allow the matching of demand to renewable generation thereby greatly increasing the precision of our energy grid. Given the immense potential that exists in this space, Siemens sees Australia as leading the world in energy and providing new and innovative solutions that will link up with vast distances from east to west and north to south.

Critical to our success will be a reinvigoration of our supply-chain and a reinvention of a society dependent on cars. In the Siemens picture, our car fleet will be electrified and powered by renewable energy, reducing our carbon emissions and allowing us to meet or exceed our carbon emissions targets.

In water the picture also has incredible potential for growth. The prediction that the Siemens research has uncovered suggests that by 2030 over 45 percent of our urban water supply will come from saltwater desalination. Like our potential to build growth in our energy sector Siemens also sees incredible potential in the capacity to convert our abundant supply of saltwater to clean, safe and chemical free drinking water. Technological advancements will see us successfully producing water with 65 percent less energy - ensuring our environmental footprint is reduced by up to 80 percent. And by 2030, these advancements might secure an even higher efficiency level.

In the future the reuse of wastewater will become commonplace. By 2030, 22 percent of urban water, that is currently unused, will be reused for irrigation both industrial and outdoor use - including school sporting fields and outdoor recreation areas.

The wastewater plants will support themselves by producing their own power through the extraction of plant waste and effluent to be retreated and used as biogas. Extracting nitrogen and phosphorus from this wastewater could also provide the local agriculture industry with an alternative fertiliser source.

Like energy, essential to our success in water availability will be to maximise our water reserves through the use of technological instrumentation available to support a fully integrated and connected smart water grid. Farmers would have the capacity to track and precisely monitor the use of their water giving us greater control on how much water we take from our natural streams and rivers.

The vision however complex, in combination, has immense potential and ensures that Australia leads the world in the supply, distribution and preservation of water and energy for ourselves and neighbouring countries.

Our efforts to move in a sustainable direction over the next 20 years could provide Australia with a competitive advantage over the world. The Siemens Picture the Future blueprint positions us for this future, it is achievable and Siemens has the will to start today.

Siemens Picture the Future: Australia, Energy and Water (PTF), is the first research in Australia focussing on technology as the enabler for a sustainable future. It is the culmination of work done in Australia and Germany involving numerous Siemens researchers and a validation process with 22 of Australia's leading industry bodies including the CSIRO, ABARE, the Bureau of Meteorology, The Clean Energy Council, University Technology Sydney, The University of Newcastle, Monash University, Parsons Brinckerhoff, South East Water, and The Warren Centre for Advanced Engineering.

Commenting on the significance of the research, Paul Graham from the CSIRO said: "Siemens Picture the Future research provides valuable targets for using Australian-based greenhouse gas abatement options in the energy and transport sectors that simultaneously enhance our industrial base while addressing climate change. It helps us imagine how we can transform our electricity sector in a way that enhances its role in the economy as well as its contribution to greenhouse gas reduction."

Chris Davis from University of Technology Sydney reflected on the findings of the research for Australia's future in water supply saying; "Making urban water systems sustainable for the long haul is challenging and demands complex interventions. Companies like Siemens, which can produce everything from a membrane water purification plant to a washing machine and, crucially, can integrate and control all the components intelligently, are the way of the future."

Albert Goller, Chairman and Managing Director for Siemens Australia Ltd started with Siemens in Germany in 1973 and moved through a successful career in executive positions. Since arriving in Australia, Albert and has seen Siemens grow into a technology solutions provider in water, energy, environment, healthcare, productivity, mobility, safety and security.

Key findings from the Picture the Future: Australia - Water and Energy research has now been released. A research brief can be downloaded by visiting www.siemens.com.au/ptf