MUSE GRIDS has participated in Sustainable Places 2020, an European fair that focuses on dissemination and research of sustainability-focused projects. This year’s edition took place online through 27-29 October and saw a wide variety of EU-funded projects present.

The project organised a Workshop on 28 October along with its sister projects Compile, MERLON and IELectrix, from 14.00 to 17.00, titled “Energy Communities in Practice: the Whats and the Hows“. The introductory session of the Workshop was composed of presentations by the 4 Consortiums of the overall work and objectives of each: Katarina Valalaki from Hypertech, Alessandra Cuneo from RINA, Andrej Gubina, from the University of Lubljana, and Pierre-Jacques le Quellec from Enedis presented the projects coordinated by their organisations, respectively – MERLON, MUSE GRIDS, Compile, and IElectrix.

The coordinators of MUSE GRIDS, MERLON, IElectrix and Nikos Chrysanthopoulos from Hypertech (representing MERLON) then delved into an interactive session, divided into four main blocks: technology, social acceptance, business and regulation were the topics tackled. The audience was asked to reply to a few polls related to the four topics, sharing their point of view; the four project representatives then commented on the results, sharing their own experience within the projects. Much was said upon the importance of trusting and transparent interactions needed with energy citizens.

The third and final block of the Workshop saw Guilherme Luz, from PROSEU, Thomas Mikkelsen from GECO Global and Joachim Hacker from the Gussing Renewable Energy Center sharing their views on the most successful technical, economic and business practices to attract citizens to become part of an energy community.

The Workshop received overall great participation from attendees, and showed, once again, how the collaboration between sister projects focusing on energy communities is essential to underline their communal aspect. MUSE GRIDS thanks all projects involved and looks forward to future collaborations – hopefully in person!