The last user meeting was the biggest we ever had. We had very productive and inspiring discussions about using oemof (especially solph). Because of the size we gathered opinions in subgroups instead of making decisions about future developments in the plenary. Another reason for this also led to some other changes: Typically, we start with user presentations showing use-cases as well as open questions. This, however was scheduled as a point of the agenda of the parallel RET.Con. So, instead of gradually going to the core, we started with developer topics.
The RET.Con itself was opened by Thuringia’s Minister of Energy, Bernhard Stengele. So, probably for the first time at an oemof user meeting, attendees listened to a political speech instead of a scientific talk. Besides the emphasis of the importance of neutrally conducted and comprehensibly communicated science for the energy transition, the minister was addressing the dangers of far-right activities on international cooperation. While this is a severe topic in particular in the state of Thuringia, Nordhausen and especially the University of Applied Science that hosted us felt open and diverse. We got the feedback that the atmosphere at the user meeting was welcoming and inspiring. Thank you! Rumours say this particular user meeting will be also legendary for the undersupply of kohlrabi.
The presentations can be found in the public directory of cloud.oemof.org, where we now collect all presentations ever given at oemof meetings.