Following the success of 2023, IEG’s event is set to relaunch with a record-breaking edition focused on innovation and international reach, featuring a high-level conference program. Among the new features for 2024 is a new exhibition area dedicated to energy storage, complementing the six already known – Solar, Wind, Hydrogen, Energy Efficiency, e-mobility, and Sustainable City.
KEY 2024 will be held at the Rimini Expo Centre from February 28 to March 1.
Increasingly focused on innovation and international reach, the event aims to provide a comprehensive overview of the renewable energy sector and ongoing changes. KEY – The Energy Transition Expo, IEG‘s (Italian Exhibition Group) energy transition fair, returns to Rimini from February 28 to March 1, 2024, for its second edition, packed with new features.
The event, now a reference point for European, Mediterranean, and African markets, is expanding its exhibition space, enriching the conference program, opening up more to international markets, and exploring new sector trends. The goal is clear: to strengthen its role as an excellent network for energy transition stakeholders and surpass the success of 2023.
Last year, KEY – The Energy Transition Expo concluded its three days with impressive numbers: over 33,000 attendees, more than 600 companies, 31% of which were international, and hundreds of foreign buyers from North Africa, Sub-Saharan Africa, Europe, Eastern Europe, the Balkans, Asia, the Middle East, and Latin America.
KEY 2024 is ready to become a showcase for innovation and confirm its role as a catalyst for the green tech community.
The Energy Transition Requires Collaboration
The latest edition of the World Energy Outlook (WEO), the most authoritative global source of energy analysis and projections, is clear: by 2030, clean technologies will play a significantly greater role than they do today in the global energy system.
Under current policy settings, renewable energies will contribute 80% to the new electricity production capacity globally by 2030, with solar power alone representing more than half of this expansion. The number of electric cars on the roads worldwide will increase tenfold; heat pumps and other electric heating systems will outsell fossil fuel boilers; new offshore wind projects will catalyze three times the investments allocated to the oil and gas sector.
“The transition to clean energy is happening worldwide and is unstoppable. It’s not a matter of ‘if,’ it’s just a matter of ‘how soon’ – and the sooner, the better for all of us,” stated IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol. “Governments, companies, and investors must support the transitions to clean energy rather than hinder them. The benefits offered are immense, including new industrial opportunities and jobs, greater energy security, cleaner air, universal access to energy, and a safer climate for everyone.”
In this context, sector fairs and even more so a broad-reaching event like KEY 2024 have the precise task of creating that network of connections, exchanges, and opportunities on which the transition can grow. And IEG’s three-day event does so with a comprehensive program and even larger exhibition space.
The New Features of KEY 2024
There are many new features for 2024, starting with an increase in exhibiting brands (+30%) and the number of international buyers (+25%). The second independent edition of KEY – The Energy Transition Expo will feature 16 halls, four more than in 2023. This increase in space is also linked to the introduction of a new thematic and product area alongside the six already known. It’s KSE – Key Storage Expo, focused on stationary storage, from residential to utility scale, including commercial and industrial applications, with the ambition to further expand the offering in the future.
KSE fully addresses one of the latest needs of the wind and photovoltaic sectors, whose progressive growth is increasing the demand for flexibility from the grid. And not only that. Energy storage is also a fundamental ingredient in contributing from the ground up to the ecological transition and energy independence.
On the topic of storage, we highlight some must-attend events among the conferences scheduled for KEY 2024: the meeting “The Futures Market for Electrical Storage Systems” organized by ANIE on February 29; “Networks and Storage: Enablers of the Energy Transition in Italy,” promoted by ANIE and Elettricità Futura on February 29; the international conference “Addressing the Challenges of Europe’s Solar & Storage Boom (Large-scale Focus),” curated by Ibesa – International Alliance for Battery and Energy Storage on Friday, March 1; and “New Solutions for Long-Term Storage,” organized by Coordinamento Free also on March 1.
The energy storage exhibition area completes the already rich offering dedicated to the energy transition, which includes six other technological pillars:
- SEC – SOLAR EXHIBITION & CONFERENCE – the area dedicated to photovoltaics in all its forms, from small residential systems to large ground-mounted plants, including the new trend of agrivoltaics.
- HYE – HYDROGEN EXPO – the technological showcase dedicated to green and low-carbon hydrogen and the most interesting projects.
- EFFI – ENERGY EFFICIENCY EXPO – EFFI highlights energy efficiency at 360°, showcasing technologies such as cogeneration, geothermal, heat pumps, and energy digitalization systems, to name a few.
- WEM – WIND EXPO FOR MED – the area dedicated to wind energy displays technologies and services for the realization and management of both onshore and offshore plants.
- SUSTAINABLE CITY – a space focused on new urban transformation trends, according to smart city models.
- EME – e-MOBILITY EXPO – Charging infrastructure, car batteries, fleet electrification: these are some of the themes that will dominate the exhibition area.
Adding to the picture are the Sustainable Building District, created in collaboration with the main partner Green Building Council Italia, and the Innovation District, in collaboration with ANGI (National Association of Young Innovators). This latter district has been further enriched in this edition and reorganized into four paths:
- “Innovation” for exhibitors present at the fair to showcase their most innovative technologies and solutions;
- “Start-up” for innovative Italian and international start-ups and SMEs that have developed cutting-edge solutions in the field of energy transition;
- “Networking” with an agora for conferences and pitches, where people can meet, network, share ideas, and develop new sustainable projects and businesses;
- “Talk” to gather testimonies from innovative entities and the main stakeholders of the event.
Celebrating innovation related to the energy transition will also be two other new features of 2024. We are talking about the “Innovative Start-Up Award,” reserved for the 30 start-ups selected through the Call for Start-Up & Scale-Up present at the fair that will have distinguished themselves for highly innovative projects in the renewable energy and energy transition market, and the Lorenzo Cagnoni Award for innovation dedicated to exhibitors for the seven innovative projects presented in each product sector of KEY.
To get a free ticket and participate in KEY, click here: KEY Expo 2024 Registration
