Trends Identified
Peer-to-peer energy trading & transmission
Example of Organizationsactive in the area: Open Utility (UK/Netherlands), Power Ledger (Australia), LO energy (US), Energy Web Foundation (Switzerland).
2018
Table of disruptive technologies
Imperial College London
People
There is an implicit narrative about how the future will look: the big advances will be in “hard” disciplines like digital technology or material science. After all, some of our most spectacular successes in recent history, from space travel to the internet to smartphones, have been founded on work in these hard disciplines. This, it is said, is why education in the STEM fields is of utmost importance, because those will be the jobs of the future. The common vision of the future is of gleaming computers and sterile glass and steel constructions. But perhaps we are at an inflexion point, and rumblings of this change are already starting to become visible.
2017
Foresigth
Singapore, The Centre for Strategic Futures
People and behaviour: we move in mysterious ways
The notion that individuals are gradually becoming significant drivers of change has been widely reported, particularly in the popular media. In 2006, Time magazine elected ‘You’ (the individual) as person of the year – before the boom in social media and before the Arab Spring revolts, more recent events that reinforce the perception that people, their beliefs and behaviours may increasingly interact with the international and EU landscape. On the one hand, the use of ICTs for censorship in certain states and declining participation level in Western elections suggests that the keynote of this development is divergence. On the other hand, there is a commonly stated expectation that globalisation acts as an integrative and harmonising force and that we should witness a convergence of values affecting how people think and behave as a result. The emergence of a common ethos would influence some of the themes we discussed earlier, including the identity and values of the middle class, declining fertility levels, the diffusion and the use of technologies and migration flows. Yet, the evidence also points to potential divergence in values, as embodied by grassroots populist movements, online activism focusing on specific causes and political or religious extremisms.
2013
Europe's Societal Challenges: An analysis of global societal trends to 2030 and their impact on the EU
RAND Corporation
People and change: Strategy & Execution
Talent remains a major issue, but results fall short – suggesting competitiveness is hampered while opportunities lie within reach. Two-thirds of CEOs want recruitment, motivation and development improved. But they give HR a low vote of confidence. Leaders and all-around performers prove hardest to find, while organisational structures get in the way of collaborative people. Senior or middle management weaknesses are blamed most often for hindering change programmes. A gap separates vision from execution. Discipline is needed to drive strategies through tactics, structures and results.
2008
11th Annual global CEO Survey
PWC
Perfect Online Privacy
Computer scientists are perfecting a cryptographic tool for proving something without revealing the information underlying the proof.
2018
10 Breakthrough Technologies 2018
MIT Technology Review
Perovskite Solar Cells
The silicon solar cells that currently dominate the world market suffer from three fundamental limitations. A promising new way of making high-efficiency solar cells, using perovskites instead of silicon, could address all three at once and supercharge the production of electricity from sunlight. The first major limitation of silicon photovoltaic (PV) cells is that they are made from a material that is rarely found in nature in the pure, elemental form needed. While there is no shortage of silicon in the form of silicon dioxide (beach sand), it takes tremendous amounts of energy to get rid of the oxygen attached to it. Typically, manufacturers melt silicon dioxide at 1500–2000 degrees Celsius in an electrode arc furnace. The energy needed to run such furnaces sets a fundamental lower limit on the production cost of silicon PV cells and also adds to the emissions of greenhouse gases from their manufacture. Perovskites—a wide-ranging class of materials in which organic molecules, made mostly of carbon and hydrogen, bind with a metal such as lead and a halogen such as chlorine in a three-dimensional crystal lattice—can be made much more cheaply and with fewer emissions.Manufacturers can mix up batches of liquid solutions and then deposit the perovskites as thin films on surfaces of virtually any shape, no furnace needed. The film itself weighs very little. Those features thus eliminate the second big limitation of silicon solar cells, which is their rigidity and weight. Silicon PV cells work best when they are flat and housed in large, heavy panels. But those panels make large-scale installations very expensive, which is in part why you typically see them on rooftops and big solar “farms.” The third major limitation of conventional solar cells is their power conversion efficiency, which has been stuck at 25 percent for 15 years. When they were first described, perovskites offered much lower efficiency. In 2009, perovskite cells made of lead, iodide and methylammonium converted less than 4 percent of the sunlight that hit them into electricity. But the pace of improvement in perovskites has been phenomenal, thanks in part to the fact that thousands of different chemical compositions are possible within this class of material. By 2016, perovskite solar-cell efficiencies were above 20 percent—a five-fold improvement in just seven years and a stunning doubling in efficiency within just the past two years. They are now commercially competitive with silicon PV cells, and the efficiency limits of perovskites could be far higher still. Whereas silicon PV technology is now mature, perovskite PVs continue to improve rapidly. Researchers still need to answer some important questions about perovskites, such as how durable they will be when exposed to years of weathering and how to industrialize their production to churn out quantities large enough to compete with silicon wafers in the global market. But even a relatively small initial supply of these new cells could be important in bringing solar power to remote locations that are not yet connected to any electrical grid. When paired with emerging battery technology, perovskite solar cells could help transform the lives of 1.2 billion people who currently lack reliable electricity (see “Next Generation Batteries page 7”).
2016
Top 10 Emerging Technologies of 2016
World Economic Forum (WEF)
Persistent jobless growth
The term ‘persistent jobless growth’ refers to the phenomenon in which economies exiting recessions demonstrate economic growth while merely maintaining – or, in some cases, decreasing – their level of employment. The scale and signi cance of this problem is evident in the high placing
of this trend, an increase even over last year’s report, when persistent structural employment was ranked as the third most concerning trend.
2014
Outlook on the global agenda 2015
World Economic Forum (WEF)
Personal digital shields
Example of Organizationsactive in the area:2 No example found.
2018
Table of disruptive technologies
Imperial College London
Personal Lifelog
Personal lifelog collects and classifies all the information that has been obtained or experienced during one’s daily life. The technology facilitates search and retrieval of information whenever it is needed.
2009
KISTEP 10 Emerging Technologies 2009
South Korea, Korea Institute of S&T Evaluation and Planning (KISTEP)
Personalised medicine
Personalised medicine has the potential to offer safer and better treatments and diets, earlier diagnostics and prevention. No longer based on averages or statistics, but on what you need, when you need it, while taking into account your specific genome, biochemistry, environment and behaviour. Citizens will actively manage their health through sensoring devices, mobile apps etc. which can eventually lead to advanced tools such as personal medical avatar.
2015
Preparing the Commission for future opportunities - Foresight network fiches 2030
European Strategy and Policy Analysis System (ESPAS)