Energy Communities Are an Opportunity for Citizens to Produce and Share Energy Themselves

Citizens can unite and jointly invest in the production of their own energy through energy communities, it was stated on Thursday at the ‘Good Energy’ conference organized by the Green Energy Cooperative in partnership with the European Commission’s Representation in Croatia.

The President of the Assembly of the Green Energy Cooperative Goran Čačić said that energy communities are an opportunity for all citizens of the European Union to independently produce, share, and sell renewable energy. For example, a group of homeowners, small businesses, and public institutions in a neighborhood can install a shared solar power plant through an energy community and independently produce the energy they need.

– This is a way that allows ordinary citizens to unite and jointly invest in the production of their own energy. Citizen energy is where citizens are the owners of the production facility and they make decisions about what to do with that energy. Our idea is for citizens to share that energy among themselves, that is, to consume the produced energy in the production facility at home – said Čačić.

He highlighted the example of people living in multi-apartment buildings who do not have their own roof on which they can place a power plant, who could unite and invest in a shared power plant on the roof of a nearby building.

The key advantage of such citizen participation in the energy market is that the economic, as well as social benefits of renewable energy as a local resource, remain in the local community, he noted.

Energy Communities Legalized in 2021, but Only One Established

He pointed out that energy communities were introduced into the Croatian legal framework in 2021, but that by spring 2024, only one had been formally established. According to him, the legislative framework is still not fully enforceable as it has many ambiguities. On the other hand, there is one energy community in the country that has received permission to carry out energy activities, but in practice, it still cannot share the energy produced by that energy community.

– We ask the legislator to simplify the registration process for energy communities, provide technical and financial support for such communities, as well as the sharing of energy produced by energy communities – said Čačić.

He says that experiences in other European countries show that this form of investment in renewable energy brings two to eight times more benefits for the local community than renewable energy projects by external investors. However, he emphasized that more developed European countries are still adapting to such an investment system.

Nevertheless, HEP – the Distribution System Operator, according to his information, is working on changes to its system to enable sharing, so it is assumed that sharing energy from such power plants could be enabled during this year.

The President of the Green Energy Cooperative Zoran Kordić emphasized that energy communities need their path to prosper, rather than competing with large players in the energy market.

His cooperative, he said, has been promoting energy cooperatives or communities for ten years and has conducted a series of activities and procurements of solar power plants. In the past year, it has established a new energy cooperative, or community ZEZ Sunce, which already has more than 120 members.

The advisor for the implementation of the European semester at the European Commission’s Representation in Croatia Judita Cuculić Župa pointed out the importance of decarbonizing buildings that are responsible for 30 percent of gas emissions and 40 percent of energy consumption. According to her, this is important for achieving decarbonization goals.