Secondary network of energy communities
The energy communities that have flourished in recent years are becoming an interesting tool to combat climate change. That is why we should continue to strengthen all these projects, responding to the needs they may have. In fact, once they are created, the real challenge for energy communities is to keep moving forward.
Thus, taking advantage of the experience of each project, at Udalbiltza we are building a secondary network with the aim of offering the services they need and sharing resources.
Energy Communities weaving networks of relationships
The world of energy has changed a lot in recent years. In the face of the climate crisis that we are experiencing, we are obliged to take measures to reduce CO2 emissions and to move towards decarbonisation. For this reason, on 11 December 2018, Europe published the concept of Energy Communities for the first time in Directive 2018/2001. Since then, the European directive has been adapted with the aim of placing energy users at the centre of the energy system. This regulatory package has been called “Clean Energy for All Europeans” and has developed a legal framework for it.
Thus, following European proposals, energy communities are the new agents of the energy system, with the aim of promoting the energy transition necessary to face climate change and reduce CO2 emissions, and in this sense, states are defining legislation for energy communities. Meanwhile, the municipalities of Hego Euskal Herria have already begun to create energy communities with the aim of mobilizing citizens on the road to the energy transition. We could almost say that there is not a single region in our country that has not developed this type of work and that, in one way or another, progress is being made on the path of energy sovereignty.
However, in Ipar Euskal Herria the situation is different. Rather than creating communities, they have focused on shared self-consumption and, in general, they create photovoltaic projects in Lapurdi, Nafarroa Beherea and Zuberoa hand in hand with local agents.
Secondary network
Once created, the biggest challenge for energy communities is usually to keep moving forward.
Thus, taking advantage of the experience of each project, in Udalbiltza we are building a secondary network. This was the mandate that Udalbiltza received at the meetings of the energy communities that it organized in 2023 (Antzuola) and 2024 (Legorreta): to start taking steps to build a secondary network, with the aim of being a useful tool for the development of energy communities.
In fact, several energy communities have already begun to interact with each other to learn from each other’s successes and failures, to join forces and move forward to share resources. Therefore, Udalbiltza will promote a network at the level of the Basque Country so that these actions are valid for all the energy communities that are in operation. In the process of formation, energy communities are at the center, and we are building the network according to their desires and needs.
This structure would provide professionalized management and support to energy communities with a long-term vision, helping them to carry out the projects they are working on. The final result will be an independent entity with its own legal structure. The role of Udalbiltza is to direct the process, and then it would take a step back so that the structure takes its own path.
