Citizen science and citizen energy communities are pluralistic terms that refer to a constellation of methods, projects, and outreach activities; however, citizen science and citizen energy communities are rarely, if ever, explicitly aligned. Our sea...
Successful energy transformation is interconnected with greater citizenry participation as prosumers. The search for novel solutions to implement the transition to renewable energy that will neutralize the barriers to this process, e.g., the reluctan...
The worldwide targets for carbon-neutral societies increased the penetration of distributed generation and storage. Smart cities now play a key role in achieving these targets by considering the alliances of their demand and supply assets as local ci...
The liberalization of energy retail markets empowered consumers with the ability to be part of new emerging entities, such as Citizen Energy Communities. With the increasing penetration of decentralized variable generation, communities have the advan...
Despite the fact that power grids have been planned and utilized using centralized networks for many years, there are now significant changes occurring as a result of the growing number of distributed energy resources, the development of energy stora...
The analysis focuses on the practices of Italian renewable energy communities (RECs) which fall within the so-called civic energy sector, as well as citizen-led initiatives, which are widespread, especially in several regions of Southern Italy (Sicil...
The increasing penetrations of distributed renewable generation lead to the need for Citizen Energy Communities. Citizen Energy Communities may be able to be active market players and solve local imbalances. The liberalization of the electricity sect...
Over the last few decades, the electricity sector has experienced several changes, resulting in different electricity markets (EMs) models and paradigms. In particular, liberalization has led to the establishment of a wholesale market for electricity...
Global warming contributes to the worldwide goal of a sustainable carbon-neutral society. Currently, hydroelectric, wind and solar power plants are the most competitive renewable technologies. They are limited to the primary resource availability, bu...
29 November 2021
Energy communities organise collective and citizen-driven energy actions that will help pave the way for a clean energy transition, while moving citizens to the forefront. The energy market is rapidly transforming and so is the role of the consumer....
Active participation of citizens in the sustainable energy transition—particularly in energy communities—is explicitly desired by the European Union and considered vital for a successful transformation of Europe’s energy system. Cur...
Cities are responsible for 65% of energy consumption and for the 70% of CO2 emissions. Incisive actions are fundamental to bring cities towards climate neutrality by 2050 working by and for the citizens. For this reason, the “100 climate-neutra...
One organizational innovation introduced by the clean energy for all Europeans package (CEP) is that of the energy community (EC), including the renewable energy community (REC) and citizen energy community (CEC). The translation of related directive...
The Renewable Energy Directive and the Electricity Market Directive, both parts of the Clean Energy for all Europeans Package (issued in 2019), provide supranational rules for renewable energy communities and citizen energy communities. Since nationa...
Citizen energy in general and renewable energy communities (RECs) in particular are becoming key vehicles for decentralisation, but also for the democratisation of the energy system. These initiatives are now more diverse than ever and are likely to...
Background: This study examines the relationship between energy usage, health issues, and pro-environmental behaviour (PEB) in Kyrgyzstan amidst the country’s commitment to transition from coal-based energy to renewable sources, in line with the Pari...
9 December 2021
New energy communities that produce, store, trade and distribute renewable energy guided by innovative digital platforms are currently emerging in many EU member states. Expectations about these communities and their contribution to a ‘just eng...
Renewable energy communities, first outlined in the European Directives and recently transposed into the Italian regulatory framework, are introduced as innovative entities capable of fostering cooperation between active and passive users involved in...
In the energy sector, prosumers are becoming relevant entities for energy management systems since they can share energy with their citizen energy community (CEC). Thus, this paper proposes a novel methodology based on demand response (DR) participat...
Community energy (CE) initiatives have been progressively spreading across Europe and are increasingly proposed as innovative and alternative approaches to guarantee higher citizen participation in the transition toward cleaner energy systems. This p...
By analyzing survey data on nuclear energy policy in South Korea, this study examined the influence of citizens’ knowledge on the perceptions of and attitudes to government communication initiatives that are characterized by symmetry and transp...
The emergence of energy communities represents a promising option to democratize the energy system by empowering consumers to take a more active role. This can aid in achieving energy and environmental goals as well as encouraging more equitable dist...
The shift towards the integration of and transition to renewable energy has led to an increase in renewable energy communities (RECs) and smart grids (SGs). The significance of these RECs is mainly energy self-sufficiency, energy independence, and en...
This paper provides novel additional evidence on the characteristics of Collective Action Initiatives (CAIs), investigating their role within the European energy sector. It analyses and presents results of a survey administered in six European countr...
In recent years, a rapid increase in the adoption of renewable energy sources and in the transition from a centralized electricity generation system to an increasingly distributed one has occurred. Within this scenario, in line with the European dire...
Every country has objectives for climate change, and public policies are implemented to achieve those commitments. This paper aims to review the different public policies used to promote the integration of photovoltaic technology into smart grids, ta...
“Community energy” is a highly contested issue not only in the German energy transition governance but also in the recent legislative procedure to recast energy market legislation within the EU’s “Winter Package”. This p...
Innovations in technical, financial, and social areas are crucial prerequisites for an effective and sustainable energy transition. In this context, the construction of a new energy structure and the motivation of the consumer towards a change in the...
This study explores the virtual net-metering (VNM) option for enabling inclusive investment opportunities in renewable energy for self-consumption in Bangladesh. It focuses on consumers, such as households and businesses in multi-family and multi-sto...
In liberalized markets, consumers can choose their electricity suppliers or be part of an energy community. The problem with communities is that they may not have enough weight to trade in markets, which can be overcome by forming coalitions. Electri...
Increasingly, discussions on sustainability, in particular in relation to energy transition, are finding their way to the regional and local political arena. Although for analysing transition pathways on these sub-national scales, conceptual framewor...
The Clean Energy package recognizes and offers a favorable regulatory framework for citizens and energy communities with renewable energy sources. However, various countries’ national regulations will be highly important for the successful deve...
Cities constitute three quarters of global energy consumption and the built environment is responsible for significant use of final energy (62%) and greenhouse gas emissions (55%). Energy has now become a strategic issue for local authorities (LAs) a...
In recent times, there has been a significant shift from centralized energy systems to decentralized ones. These systems aim to satisfy local energy needs using renewable resources within the community. This approach leads to decreased complexity and...
The Smart Energy Community topic has attracted a lot of interest from policy, research centres, companies and private citizens since 2018, when in Europe the recast of the Renewable Energy Directive, and later in 2019 the Internal Electricity Market...
Energy communities using renewable energy sources directly contributes to reduction of climate change gas emissions and energy consumption in the European Union. In addition, energy communities enable citizens to transform from (passive) consumers to...
This paper poses the question: ‘can energy innovation initiatives in Innovation Playgrounds foster a new ‘energy urbanity’ through active citizen participation in the energy transition?’ The concept of ‘Innovation Playgrounds’ and an accompanying Fra...
Energy communities are a transformative force in the electricity markets and ancillary services, reshaping the energy landscape through collective action. This paper explores the successful strategies adopted by these communities, highlighting real-w...
This paper describes Smiling Earth, a mobile app to increase citizens’ awareness about their own carbon footprint, by integrating energy and transport-related data. The main aim of our work is to explore the ways in which Information and Commun...
European policymakers are encouraging national lawmakers to grant citizens a larger role in the process of energy transition. One way to achieve this is to promote the set-up of local energy communities. This article describes the impact of a particu...
Opportunities for citizens to become prosumers have grown rapidly with renewable energy (RE) technologies reaching grid parity. The European Union’s ability to harness this potential depends on empowering energy citizens, fostering active engag...
The Climate Pact and the European Green Deal constitute the main components of the European Union (EU)’s climate change policy. Energy transition, that is, transformation to a zero-carbon global energy system, is one of the main pillars of climate ch...
The development of energy communities has the potential to support the energy transition owing to the direct engagement of people who have the chance to become “prosumers” of energy. In properly explaining the benefits that this phenomeno...
Renewable energy sources, in particular those based on solar radiation, are growing rapidly and are planned to play an instrumental role in building power systems to reach the 2030 and 2050 energy and climate mitigation objectives. However, new actor...
In this paper, the application of demand-side flexibility to residential users and energy communities is discussed. From the H2020 project HOLISDER, it appears that selected Key Exploitable Results are not commercially interesting on their own as fle...
Information and Communication Technology (ICT) is at the heart of the smart city approach, which constitutes the next level of cities’ and communities’ development across the globe. Thereby, ICT serves as the gluing component enabling dif...
This paper focuses on understanding the difference between East and West Japan with respect to citizens’ subjective views on renewable energy. A comparative analysis was performed for cities in the east and west because renewable energy is a na...
This paper contributes to the state of the art of applications of artificial intelligence (AI) in energy systems with a focus on the phenomenon of social acceptance of energy projects. The aim of the paper is to present a novel AI-powered communicati...
To achieve the “well below 2 degrees” targets, a new ecosystem needs to be defined where citizens become more active, co-managing with relevant stakeholders, the government, and third parties. This means moving from the traditional concep...
Transition to a sustainable future requires not only technical but also societal changes, including changes in behavioral patterns and consumer roles. Renewable energy communities embody such changes: they are mainly residential communities that brea...
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