Disclaimer: This summary has been generated by AI. It is experimental, and feedback is welcomed. Please reach out to info@qconlondon.com with any comments or concerns.
The presentation titled Kraken's Serverless Architecture for Keeping the Grid Green by Kevin Bowman explores the role of technology in the transition to green energy. The presentation discusses the challenges and solutions involved in integrating renewable energy sources into the grid using modern cloud architectures.
Key Points:
- The Problem: London, powered by the UK grid, relies heavily on renewable energy, but sources like wind are unpredictable, necessitating technology to maintain grid stability.
- Renewable Energy Challenges: Wind and solar power fluctuations need to be managed using technology like battery storage and inverters to balance AC and DC currents on the grid.
- Architectural Solutions: Kraken Technology uses serverless managed services in the cloud, focusing on adding value through technology without reinventing existing solutions.
- Battery and Energy Management: Battery storage is crucial for matching supply with demand, and the system makes use of control systems and telemetry to optimize battery usage.
- Electric Vehicles: EVs are treated as aggregated batteries, which contributes to grid stability, allowing for smarter energy usage and cost optimization.
- Data Management: The infrastructure processes enormous amounts of data using systems like AWS and Microservices, which allows for efficient computation and energy grid management.
- Importance of Cloud Services: Using AWS Lambda and other services, Kraken can focus on core business logic, delegating infrastructure management to AWS.
Takeaways:
- Avoid reinventing solutions unnecessarily and leverage existing cloud technologies for better scalability and reliability.
- Focus on non-functional requirements such as reliability, security, and scalability from the beginning.
- Facilitate the green energy revolution through innovative technology, ensuring a sustainable future.
The presentation emphasizes the importance of technology in sustainable energy and how serverless cloud architectures play a crucial role in helping the grid remain efficient and green.
This is the end of the AI-generated content.
The green energy transition is real, and happening, but it needs technology to make it successful. Everything from renewable energy generation onto the grid, to how consumers use energy, needs technology to be effective and keep up with today's demands. This talk will cover how Kraken Technology uses modern cloud architectures to enable energy grids to scale and meet the demands of the future.
Speaker

Kevin Bowman
Platform Engineering @KrakenTech (Octopus Energy), Previously @SkyBet and Others, Passionate About Removing Friction From Getting Stuff Successfully Into Production
Kevin works on the cloud platform to enable grid flexbility services at Kraken Technology, part of Octopus Energy, and has a passion for smooth-running production operations and enabling a frictionless journey for engineering teams to get their software in front of customers. His background covers a wide variety of software, devops, architecture, and cloud systems, in a range of industries from telecoms to media to renewable energy.