Project description
Smarter energy on Borkum island
Years ago, a project for a new coal-fired power plant on the island of Borkum in Germany generated concerns over air quality, which led to the decision to make the island fully decarbonised by 2030. The EU-funded ISLANDER project will design a process to make Borkum a fully autonomous and decarbonised energy island system. The project will focus on the introduction of distributed renewable energy + small-scale storage (RESS) systems and complementary short-to-seasonal, large-scale electricity storage and seawater district heating. This will be coupled with heat storage to make use of the heat of the North Sea water as a heating and cooling source. ISLANDER will also demonstrate the deployment of an electric vehicle charging network, a smart IT platform and an optimisation tool to optimally design zero-carbon island energy systems.
Objective
Borkum is an island of about 30 km2 and 5,500 residents, located 20 miles from the north-western coast of Germany. Following concerns of the population regarding air quality due to a new coal fired power plant, Borkum started on a path towards renewable energy many years ago. Following several initiatives in that direction including a citizen dialogue, the island decided to become emission-free and fully decarbonized by 2030.
Within this framework, the ISLANDER project will showcase the process of making Borkum a fully autonomous and decarbonised island energy system. Specifically, the project will focus on delivering:
a) Distributed RESS systems (Renewable Energy + Small-scale Storage).
b) Complementary short-to-seasonal, large-scale electricity storage.
c) Seawater district heating coupled with heat storage and sized for 100 residential units, to make use of the heat of the North Sea water as a source of heating and cooling.
d) Deployment of an EV charging network.
e) A smart IT platform conceived to holistically perform the optimal aggregation of all these components while also implementing Demand Response (DR).
f) An optimisation tool to optimally design zero-carbon island energy systems.
To achieve such 2030 objectives of financing and maintaining the further roll-out of renewables and storage technologies across the island, the ISLANDER partners will facilitate the kick-start of a Renewable Energy Community in Borkum right during the project following a concrete roadmap.
Additionally, and as part of an ambitious plan to replicate the project results, the partners have developed a 3-wave replication strategy including:
Wave 1) Replication in the Follower islands,
Wave 2) Replication in the related archipelagos.
Wave 3) Further replication to the rest of EU islands.
Fields of science
- engineering and technologyenvironmental engineeringenergy and fuelsrenewable energy
- engineering and technologymechanical engineeringthermodynamic engineeringheat engineering
- engineering and technologyenvironmental engineeringenergy and fuelsfossil energycoal
- engineering and technologyenvironmental engineeringair pollution engineering
- social sciencespolitical sciencespolitical policiescivil society
Keywords
Programme(s)
Funding Scheme
IA - Innovation actionCoordinator
41092 Sevilla
Spain