Energy community through the lenses of smart cities and energy independence
An analytical reflection on the state-of-the-art agenda of energy-oriented technologies implementation within the cities and communities, connecting the challenge of the energy crisis due to European dependence on Russian gas.
Looking at EU statistics data, focusing on the residential sector, we can see that households hold more than a quarter (28%) of final energy. At the same time, a closer look at residential energy consumption by sector indicates that natural gas prevails in space heating.
It is essential to outline what is meant by “energy community” as a conception or entity, focusing on the context of the European Union. According to European Commission Joint Research Centre, it is a “way to organise collective energy actions around open, democratic participation and governance and the provision of benefits for the members or the local community”.
With its REPowerEU Communication, the European Commission has laid out a plan to diversify away from Russian gas, which currently makes up 32% of Europe’s residential sector gas consumption. The study analyses the activities addressed throughout technologies to society on the road towards decarbonising cities and communities.
At the same time, the EU Clean Energy for All Europeans package brings into the EU legal framework a conception of energy community as a prominent way for citizen as well as community involvement. The goal is to make the energy system more sustainable, with group stakeholders invested in collective energy actions within open, democratic participation towards the decarbonisation of the energy sector. The terms Local Energy Community and Citizen Energy Community are included in legislation referring to common rules for internal electricity markets within the recast of the Energy Directive, while the term Renewable Energy Community is contained in the Renewable energy Directive.
What is a Smart Cities Marketplace Platform? The Smart Cities Marketplace was created by merging the two former Commission projects “Marketplace of the European Innovation Partnership on Smart Cities and Communities” (EIP-SCC) and the “Smart Cities Information System” (SCIS) into one single platform. It is a major market-changing undertaking that aims to bring cities, industries, SMEs, investors, researchers and other smart city actors together.
By exploring the demonstration sides within the cities an analytical map depicted below allocation demonstration sites and quantitative distribution of this initiatives within the countries around the Europe.
Within the scraping of activity clusters defined within the Platform it is distinguish the share of primary clusters within the number of demonstration sides.
To sum up, the “building aspects” activity cluster prevails reinforcing one of the key principles of building renovation, “energy efficiency first” (as well outlined throughout the key documents, such as in the European Green Deal, and the EU strategy on Energy System Integration, Renowation Wave for Europe)with prominent potential to investigate demonstrations sides in the Mediterranean region (e.g. Spain) compared to European Northern countries.
Plurality of energy activities involves the variety of stakeholders. It poses a need for greater use of sensitivity and trade-off analyses to explore the effects of activities by the design strategies considering the synergies between inclusive and local community-centered approaches and dimensions of sustainability within EU’s REPowerEU Plan.
In this regard, the vision of frontiers for future study of energy community phenomena as social innovation seen through lenses of spatial-technical feasibility analysis of small residential renewable generation as a solution for the increase in demand problem, the scale of self-sufficiency, socio-economic issues, and social engagement.
