SDG7 and green hydrogen: a solution for the energy of the future
Nov 12, 2024
Sustainable
On the occasion of Women’s Entrepreneurship Day, we talk to Carmen Peña, CSIC researcher and winner of this year’s Ingenia Energy Challenge ‘External Proposal’ award, and Mayte Bolumar, Maintenance Manager at Saggas and winner of the ‘Enterprising Woman’ award.
Carmen Peña, a researcher at CSIC, and Mayte Bolumar, Maintenance Manager at Saggas, are the two women winners of the latest edition of the Ingenia Energy Challenge, in which up to 40% of the participants were women. This 19 November, Women’s Entrepreneurship Day, we take a closer look at their projects and the main requirements they consider necessary for an enterprising woman to succeed.
Peña is part of the team behind the CSIC-Structural assessment of gas pipelines for hydrogen transmission project, which won the ‘External Proposal’ award. It focuses on testing the integrity of hydrogen pipelines and reused gas pipelines so that they can be certified for hydrogen transmission. All this using technology patented by the CSIC.
“At this stage of the energy transition, it is essential to ensure the integrity of infrastructures and, through the technology we have developed, we are helping to make the use of hydrogen safer,” she stresses.
She also acknowledges that developing a project in the energy sector is already fraught with challenges in a number of areas, from complying with specific rules and regulations to attracting investment.
However, the biggest challenge in getting her initiative off the ground was translating the technology developed in the laboratory into a real robotic and digital application. “Thanks to the multidisciplinary team that makes up HIGHVISION and the opportunity to test in a real environment with Enagás, we are close to reaching the market,” she says.
Thanks to the multidisciplinary team that makes up HIGHVISION and the opportunity to test in a real environment with Enagás, we are close to reaching the market
The CSIC researcher believes that behind the success of an enterprising woman lies a combination of two skills: “The first is the ability to adapt to change, for example, in my case, getting out of the laboratory. The second is a collaborative mentality, putting the team first”.
She also understands that women’s leadership does not offer a unique perspective, “but it does take more account of the impact of decisions in the long term, and this is a quality of great value in the energy transition we are currently in”.
For Peña, winning the Ingenia Energy Challenge is recognition of more than 10 years of research in this field, as well as a “very important” opportunity to develop professionally through the Enagás Emprende acceleration programmes, together with the advice of technical and business experts from Enagás.
For Peña, winning the Ingenia Energy Challenge is recognition of more than 10 years of research in this field
“All of us in the team are delighted with the impetus that this award has given to our technology, which is helping to advance the energy transition,” she concludes.
For her part, Mayte Bolumar, Maintenance Manager at Saggas, won the ‘Enterprising Woman’ award in the Ingenia Energy Challenge, thanks to the AZIM project, which aims to develop a mobile application for technical consultancy and training on the requirements for the inspection and maintenance of ATEX equipment in natural gas and renewable gas facilities, “which will be part of the energy transition and must be accompanied by a high level of training to maintain the safety and integrity of treatment and production terminals,” she says.
For Bolumar, the award has given her “a very pleasant dose of energy”. “Many Saggas colleagues have congratulated me, as have other colleagues, my friends and my family. They have all made me very happy. I am a person who enjoys personal relationships and with a certain obsession to work on practical and useful things, so I have a new incentive that the AZIM project can take shape to make life easier for energy professionals,” she confesses.
Similarly, she points out that the biggest challenge she has faced with AZIM has been learning how to communicate the project in an “orderly” way and with a “viable” business plan. “In my daily life as a maintenance and engineering professional, I am not used to this kind of entrepreneurial vision, but taking the time and pausing to sort out creative ideas that add value to the sector has been a very rewarding challenge,” she adds.
The biggest challenge she has faced with AZIM has been to learn how to communicate the project in an “orderly” way and with a “viable” business plan
The Maintenance Manager at Saggas is very clear about the “key” skills for success as an enterprising woman: “Having an overview and a certain empathy to identify needs that can become an entrepreneurial opportunity that makes life easier for other professionals. In addition, using clear, simple and enthusiastic language to communicate the business project are very useful qualities when looking for the necessary support and potential customers”.
She is also “very proud” of the fact that in recent years Spain has seen a greater presence of women in the engineering and Oil&Gas sectors than in other European countries. And she adds: “I can’t say if the female point of view is different, but of course diversity is always enriching. Promoting women’s leadership has given us all the opportunity to discover very bright women who may not have been given the voice they deserve years ago,” she stresses.