Enabling Energy Communities to SHINE across Europe

SHINE brings together the strengths, resources & innovations of four previous LIFE ENERCOM projects to accelerate the energy community movement across Europe. SHINE will equip Local and Regional Authorities with the skills and tools they need to maximise opportunities and support for community energy.

Citizens at the heart of the clean energy transition

The need for a clean energy transition has never been stronger. To reduce the existential threat of climate change there is an urgent need to increase energy efficiency and enable a rapid shift away from fossil fuels.

According to the COP28 agreement, renewable energy production needs to triple and energy efficiency needs to double by 2030 to limit global warming to 1.5°C. With cities accounting for close to 80% of global energy consumption and 70% of global carbon emissions, empowering citizens and cities to form ground-breaking partnerships to accelerate the clean energy transition is crucial.

In Europe, there is huge potential to accelerate the clean energy transition while putting citizens at its heart. Integrating citizen participation is key to addressing the current issues; boosting energy democracy, triggering investment and reducing energy poverty, whilst supporting the ambitions set out in the EU’s Energy Efficiency, Renewable Energy and Energy Performance of Buildings Directives.

The benefits are manifold as clean energy not only often outperforms fossil fuel-based sources of generation but also provides stimulus to employment and local economies while boosting energy security and resilience. This is where the important role of energy communities comes into play. They not only enable and democratise access to clean energy but contribute to greater awareness and public acceptance.

Project Activities

SHINE will empower LRAs to maximise community energy opportunities. It will support the Just Transition objectives by helping cities and citizens affected by the shift from fossil fuels to clean energy. SHINE will build capacity, provide tools, and trigger investment in clean energy and retrofitting, advancing energy-efficient, renewable, and climate-resilient economies.

Our concrete actions are:

Optimising Europe’s One-Stop Shop (OSS) for Energy Communities: SHINE will review and enhance existing ENERCOM tools, integrating them into REScoop.eu’s Energy Community Platform to create a new, comprehensive portal for LRAs. These tools, including a community energy accreditation scheme for municipalities, a match-making tool, business models, and adaptable templates, will be translated and shared on four national OSSs tailored to local contexts.

Knowledge Exchange and Capacity Building: The project will foster collaboration between LRAs, communities, and experts through peer-to-peer exchange, training, and technical support. The establishment of Europe’s first international working group on community energy OSSs will ensure the sharing of best practices, improving the sustainability and scalability of community energy support services, and boosting the evidence base on their impact.

Implementation of Local Support Services: In each pilot area, LRAs will establish in-person OSSs to directly support community-led projects focusing on district heating, cooling, retrofitting, and renewable energy generation. These services will be designed with sustainability and local needs at their core.

Dissemination and Replication: The developed tools, services, and methodologies will be disseminated through a strong Ambassador network, emphasizing replicable, sustainable models, and embedding inclusion, gender, and energy equity.

Pilot cities

To achieve its objectives, SHINE will initially focus on four pilot areas in four countries, all of which are at different stages in their community energy journey: Belgium (frontrunner), Italy and Spain (Advanced) and Poland (Emerging). They have been chosen as they include a range of different situations: a small coastal town, 2 large cities and a region, reflecting the diversity of European LRAs. What unites all 4 pilots is their ambitions for community energy and their need for support in enabling new projects to happen. They will have replication in 11 additional Ambassador countries.

Antwerp (Belgium)

The BE cluster comprises two citizen energy cooperatives (ZuidtrAnt and Klimaan) from the Tandems sister project and Kamp C, the centre of sustainability and innovation of the province of Antwerp which represents 69 municipalities, with a population of 1.8m. ZuidtrAnt works with 30 municipalities in the region, while Klimaan represents 20 municipalities in the Riverland region and the city of Mechelen.

SHINE focus on providing tools and services to enable large, inspiring citizen-driven projects to be implemented, providing replicable models. The BE cluster will enable the energy cooperatives to become important stakeholders in the development and implementation of Antwerp’s 13 Energy Landscapes (ELs), ensuring that citizens are directly involved in the large projects necessary to become a CO2 neutral province by 2050.

Warsaw (Poland)

The capital of Poland has developed innovative initiatives to move away from fossil fuels towards cleaner energy sources and increased energy efficiency. Warsaw aims to be a sustainable and smart city by investing in renewable energy sources, energy management system and increasing energy efficiency in municipal buildings. Due to legal limitations, participation in Energy Communities, and limited know-how of investors, there are no registered Energy Communities in Warsaw.

SHINE’s partners, support services and tools, and the help of of national expert CoopTechHub, Warsaw will support the creation of at least two energy communities, one One-Stop-Shop and increase the renewable energy sources.

Verona (Italy)

Verona joined the Covenant of Mayors in 2008 and has set ambitious targets to reduce GHG by 40% by 2030 and climate neutrality by 2050. Action plans have been developed focusing on the decarbonization of municipal and residential building stock, large-scale energy upgrades and RES in buildings to cover electric and thermal consumption. However, Verona needs further support to enable this to happen and there is currently only one embryonic energy community in the city.

SHINE will enable Verona to accelerate the city’s decarbonisation process through supporting community energy, setting up a new in-person One-Stop-Shop service. This will be aided through the support of Ambiente Italia (heating & cooling & technical expert) and E’Nostra (policy expert), who will be the national experts for the Italian pilot and who will bring in the support of expert cities such as Parma. The OSS will provide information and training on community energy and technical support for the design, development and activation of new projects.

Malgrat de Mar (Spain)

The coastal town of Malgrat de Mar in the Metropolitan Area of Barcelona is commitmentted to enhance community-driven renewable energy projects. Since joining the Covenant of Mayors in 2016, Malgrat set ambitious climate targets to reduce its emissions by 40% by 2030, focusing on renewable energy projects, public building retrofits and bringing innovation through participation in EU-Funded projects. It also supports citizens to actively take part in community-led initiatives. Despite these efforts, citizen engagement and participation in energy projects remains a challenge, as the municipality lacks the resources to run awareness campaigns, educational initiatives and other support services.

SHINE will help by enabling the set-up of a new physical and online One-Stop-Shop, offering support services and training on community engagement to empower citizens and drive community-led energy projects.

SHINE