Nordic Energy Research is pleased to announce that Technopolis Group has been selected to carry out the study Energy Communities.

Citizen Energy Communities in the Nordics and in Europe

The Nordic countries are looking for ways to enable a clean energy transition – electricity grids that empower citizens are key to this.

Distributed energy technologies that allow for active consumer participation in electricity markets, while prioritising local energy production from renewable sources, could boost public acceptance and attract investment in renewable energy projects.

The European Union recognises this, and has, via Electricity Market Directive (2019/944; “Electricity Directive”), established a new concept of “Citizen Energy Communities”. These are collective actions that foster citizens’ participation across the energy system, such as generating, consuming, sharing or selling electricity, providing flexibility services through demand-response and storage, or operating the electricity grid to certain standards.

Citizen Energy Communities already exist in various forms in Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, and other European countries. An exchange of lessons learned and common experiences will support Nordic energy authorities in their implementation of Article 16.

Mapping the right conditions for future energy systems

Historically, the integrated Nordic electricity system grew out of local electricity production and grids that were gradually connected, and formed the first regional and eventually national grids, later expanding across the Nordic synchronous area. It is hoped that by looking at different ways energy communities have been implemented in the Nordics and Europe, the right conditions for their future development can be established.

“We look forward to this interesting assignment, utilising many of our offices across Europe with local expertise when collecting and analysing implementation models and lessons learned. We trust this study will provide useful insights and input to the Nordics countries’ implementation of Article 16.”

Sebastian Eriksson Berggren, Technopolis Group, Sweden

The study builds, among other things, on the 2019 Nordic Council of Ministers report on distributed electricity production and self-consumption in the Nordics, as well as concepts introduced in the European Commission’s legislation, such as the Electricity Market Directive 2019/944 and the recast Renewable Energy Directive (RED II). Nordic Energy Research acts as the contracting partner on behalf of the Nordic Electricity Market Group. The work is funded by the Nordic Council of Ministers.