Project description
Community solar solution to energise poor households
Access to affordable renewable energy is important in Europe's green transition and meeting the Paris Climate Agreement goals. While the share of renewable energy has more than doubled between 2004 and 2019, not all households are able to afford renewable energy systems. In this context, the EU-funded Sun4All project will design a financial support scheme for renewable energy access for energy-poor households. Specifically, it will offer vulnerable consumers the opportunity to subscribe to community solar. The beneficiaries of the programme will be co-owners of a local photovoltaic plant, and the revenues produced through the generation and selling of the energy will be used to reduce energy bills.
Objective
Ensuring that vulnerable households have access to renewable energies is equitable, helps to cover energy needs, and can support multiple policy goals, such as affordable energy, job creation, and improved public health. Although the need is great, many households may not be able to afford RES installations or may be inhibited from participating in the energy transition for other reasons such as lack of access to information, difficulties to access finance or ownership patterns.
EuroSolar for All (Sun4All) sets up a financial support scheme for renewable energy access for energy poor households. The programme offers vulnerable consumers the opportunity to subscribe to community solar. The general scheme is based on the existing New York’s initiative named “Solar for All” and will be adapted and implemented in 4 cities and regions in Europe: Barcelona (ES), Communauté de Communes Coeur de Savoie (FR), Rome (IT) and Almada (PT).
The overall idea is to offer solar shares to vulnerable consumers instead of a traditional social subsidy (p.e to pay utility bill arrears). The beneficiaries of the programme will be co-owners of a local PV plant and the revenues produced through the generation and selling of the energy will be used to reduce energy bills. Besides, ES4All presents other multiple co benefits:
-Beneficiaries save money through a free community solar subscription
-Access is ensured whether participants are renters or homeowners ensuring their participation into the energy transition and leaving no one behind.
-Eurosolar for All facilitates behaviour change and provides tailored advice to beneficiaries.
-The programme optimizes social subsidies by transforming them into a profitable investment for the beneficiaries
After testing and evaluating the model in these 4 cities and regions, replication and up-scaling of the programme is foreseen in at least 10 other EU cities and planned in other cities and regions to become an established programme in Europe.
Fields of science
Programme(s)
Funding Scheme
CSA - Coordination and support actionCoordinator
08007 Barcelona
Spain
The organization defined itself as SME (small and medium-sized enterprise) at the time the Grant Agreement was signed.