Periodic Reporting for period 2 - RENAISSANCE (RENewAble Integration and SuStainAbility iN energy CommunitiEs)
Reporting period: 2020-11-01 to 2021-10-31
Renaissance project is an Innovation Action (IA) which aim is to deliver a community-driven scalable and replicable approach, to implement new business models and technologies supporting clean production and shared distribution of energy in local communities.
In the first phase the Consortium will collect data to identify stable and equitable business cases in four Local Energy Communities (LEC) across Europe, thank to MAMCA analysis.
The resulting scenarios will support the co-design of the ReEnergise tool, which will help identifying the optimal configuration for an integrated and decarbonised Local Energy Systems (LES). The tool will be tested in each Pilot Site and followed by a financial viability assessment.
Thereafter an innovative platform for integrated management and value delivery across all actors will be implemented and interoperability realised.
As a consequence, the energy communities of prosumers at demonstrator sites will be fully connected and the use of RES will likely increase beyond 27% .
In the last phase, the RENAISSANCE approach will be simulated under market conditions connecting 10 sites across the globe, to demonstrate its scalability and replicability.
To deliver a proven community-driven approach which is scalable and replicable globally, RENAISSANCE will:
- bring to the market a set of tools that allow identifying business cases for clean integrated systems in any local environment
- allow dynamic mapping of energy vectors and associated financial values
- identify new business models to activate a critical mass of local stakeholders
In the first phase the Consortium will collect data to identify stable and equitable business cases in four Local Energy Communities (LEC) across Europe, thank to MAMCA analysis.
The resulting scenarios will support the co-design of the ReEnergise tool, which will help identifying the optimal configuration for an integrated and decarbonised Local Energy Systems (LES). The tool will be tested in each Pilot Site and followed by a financial viability assessment.
Thereafter an innovative platform for integrated management and value delivery across all actors will be implemented and interoperability realised.
As a consequence, the energy communities of prosumers at demonstrator sites will be fully connected and the use of RES will likely increase beyond 27% .
In the last phase, the RENAISSANCE approach will be simulated under market conditions connecting 10 sites across the globe, to demonstrate its scalability and replicability.
To deliver a proven community-driven approach which is scalable and replicable globally, RENAISSANCE will:
- bring to the market a set of tools that allow identifying business cases for clean integrated systems in any local environment
- allow dynamic mapping of energy vectors and associated financial values
- identify new business models to activate a critical mass of local stakeholders
RP02 has been a most productive stage: during RP01, a lot of preparatory work took place (equipment installation in the Pilot Sites, stakeholder engagement preparation ana implementation of first phases) together with the early-stage development of the Renaissance tools (optimization tool, Renaissance Information Platform, Energy Node Integration, smart contract design). Entering RP02, all WPs were fully operational, and the following activities have been undertaken:
• Management and coordination, risk management, quality strategy, data management, reporting (including 1st Periodic Report and D1.2 First year progress report)
• Investigation and reporting on the energy end-users’ priorities regarding their energy supply and local energy community (LEC) design (updated version of D2.1 Report on ranking of technology-business designs for demo sites, re-submitted as agreed during 1st Periodic Reporting)
• Finalization of the development of the smart contracts (D3.3 Smart contracts detailed design and implementation)
• Assessment and validation of the functional operation of the smart contracts (D3.4 Assessment and Validation of Energy Agreement)
• Design and development of the Energy Nodes design, as part of the RENAISSANCE Platform (D4.2 Energy Nodes Integration Report)
• Development of the technical architectural design, deployment and management of a blockchain network for LECs (D4.3 – Log-Oriented Architecture Design and Implementation of the Renaissance Blockchain)
• Development of smart energy services and offer them via an advanced digital platform to demonstrate the (re)applicability of design and management approaches for integrated local energy systems (D4.4 – Social Collaboration Engine and Personal Assistant)
• Analysis of the cyber-security threat landscape for Smart Grids and of the legal framework across the European Union and EU-wide cybersecurity-standards for Smart
Grids, applicable at European Union level, is provided together with the most indicative risk assessment methodologies (D4.5 RP Wide Security Implementation Report)
• Pilot Site development (equipment installation, set up of operations) continue in RP02 (D5.3 Start of optimized pilots)
• The first assessment of the Pilot Sites operation was completed (D5.4 Validation Report)
• WP6 has been in full operation mode and the Consortium has been focusing on replicability and scalability on a global level (T6.2 T6.4)
• Dissemination of project results has rolled out, with event participation and organization and also with multiple publications
• Management and coordination, risk management, quality strategy, data management, reporting (including 1st Periodic Report and D1.2 First year progress report)
• Investigation and reporting on the energy end-users’ priorities regarding their energy supply and local energy community (LEC) design (updated version of D2.1 Report on ranking of technology-business designs for demo sites, re-submitted as agreed during 1st Periodic Reporting)
• Finalization of the development of the smart contracts (D3.3 Smart contracts detailed design and implementation)
• Assessment and validation of the functional operation of the smart contracts (D3.4 Assessment and Validation of Energy Agreement)
• Design and development of the Energy Nodes design, as part of the RENAISSANCE Platform (D4.2 Energy Nodes Integration Report)
• Development of the technical architectural design, deployment and management of a blockchain network for LECs (D4.3 – Log-Oriented Architecture Design and Implementation of the Renaissance Blockchain)
• Development of smart energy services and offer them via an advanced digital platform to demonstrate the (re)applicability of design and management approaches for integrated local energy systems (D4.4 – Social Collaboration Engine and Personal Assistant)
• Analysis of the cyber-security threat landscape for Smart Grids and of the legal framework across the European Union and EU-wide cybersecurity-standards for Smart
Grids, applicable at European Union level, is provided together with the most indicative risk assessment methodologies (D4.5 RP Wide Security Implementation Report)
• Pilot Site development (equipment installation, set up of operations) continue in RP02 (D5.3 Start of optimized pilots)
• The first assessment of the Pilot Sites operation was completed (D5.4 Validation Report)
• WP6 has been in full operation mode and the Consortium has been focusing on replicability and scalability on a global level (T6.2 T6.4)
• Dissemination of project results has rolled out, with event participation and organization and also with multiple publications
RENAISSANCE will mature its approach through 3 tiers of demonstrators, which will bring its TRL from 6 to 9. The base is the site of the Vrije Universiteit Brussel, where advanced generation, storage and management hardware is installed, and highly detailed data is made open source. RENAISSANCE will be demonstrated in 3 sites with different settings; a publicly controlled urban community (GR), an end-user driven urban community (NL) an and-user driven remote community (ES). Finally, the integrated approach will be presented to sites in India, USA, Poland, UK to be ´localised´ and tested against market conditions.
The RENAISSANCE project aims to activate the high potential of replicability of smart grid solutions provided by the RENAISSANCE approach. The approach is a breakthrough in reaching widely applicable and replicable pathways for local energy systems, in particular relevant for small to medium sized communities. To maximise the expected impact, RENAISSANCE has set up an approach for in-project demonstration, replication and wide validation for key markets within Europe and at global level.
Consumer activation will be explored in two ways; where possible, the percentage of consumers in a defined catchment area voluntarily switching to RENAISSANCE energy communities, and as secondary indicator, the percentage of consumer in a defined catchment actively using supporting applications.
The EC maintains as 2030 target for RES share in Gross Final Energy Consumption of 27%. While there are ambitions to localising, there are no targets for local RES. As baseline, RENAISSANCE therefore aims to demonstrate the commercial feasibility of achieving the 2030 target of 27% of energy production at local level. By offsetting non-RES with RES, the annual CO2 emissions savings - measured against CO2 loads for national energy mixes – for the project are 565 tonnes per year.
The RENAISSANCE project could potentially have a major impact on the overall average costs and environmental impact of energy consumption in Europe once replicated at large scale – across all low voltage energy nodes of Europe. Assumptions; other energy islands have a similar local RES capacity as the demonstrators, and the strategic value of oversized DSO/TSO connections is not taken into account.
Policy recommendations towards local authorities and the EC that can foster the development of smart clusters will be developed. Also, policy measures to foster the roll-out and replication of the energy island will be formulated.
The RENAISSANCE project aims to activate the high potential of replicability of smart grid solutions provided by the RENAISSANCE approach. The approach is a breakthrough in reaching widely applicable and replicable pathways for local energy systems, in particular relevant for small to medium sized communities. To maximise the expected impact, RENAISSANCE has set up an approach for in-project demonstration, replication and wide validation for key markets within Europe and at global level.
Consumer activation will be explored in two ways; where possible, the percentage of consumers in a defined catchment area voluntarily switching to RENAISSANCE energy communities, and as secondary indicator, the percentage of consumer in a defined catchment actively using supporting applications.
The EC maintains as 2030 target for RES share in Gross Final Energy Consumption of 27%. While there are ambitions to localising, there are no targets for local RES. As baseline, RENAISSANCE therefore aims to demonstrate the commercial feasibility of achieving the 2030 target of 27% of energy production at local level. By offsetting non-RES with RES, the annual CO2 emissions savings - measured against CO2 loads for national energy mixes – for the project are 565 tonnes per year.
The RENAISSANCE project could potentially have a major impact on the overall average costs and environmental impact of energy consumption in Europe once replicated at large scale – across all low voltage energy nodes of Europe. Assumptions; other energy islands have a similar local RES capacity as the demonstrators, and the strategic value of oversized DSO/TSO connections is not taken into account.
Policy recommendations towards local authorities and the EC that can foster the development of smart clusters will be developed. Also, policy measures to foster the roll-out and replication of the energy island will be formulated.