SERENE Partners met with the residents from Olst to plan next steps of project realisation in the Dutch demonstration site

On the 17th of March 2023, the SERENE Dutch partners organised a meeting with the residents of the Vereniging Aardehuis Oost Nederland district in Olst to discuss the next steps to be taken in the Dutch demonstration site, and – importantly – to receive feedback from inhabitants.

First of all, the suggested plan assumes that Loqio completes the installation of monitoring systems at the households and testing of the systems until June 2023. Secondly, it is planned that all partners participate in a number of experiments to gain experience in order to be able to create a well functioning community with a smart energy system. Finally, the third step is the actual realization of the community smart energy system, where the goals are 1) to change behavior (via shifting energy consumption to moments of surplus generation based on predictions and shown on interactive dashboard, 2) to benefit from the neighborhood battery system (to achieve power balance and increased self-consumption), and 3) to increase significantly self-consumption of solar energy from local PV, (and thereby to decrease CO₂ emission in the neighborhood).

An online poll organized by the Saxion team was also held during this meeting to learn more about the motivation of inhabitants to participate in the smart energy system and about the do’s and don’ts for such a system.

Last but not least, agreements were also made to support the socio-economic research of University of Twente through providing answers to an upcoming extensive questionnaire, which will be shared among as many residents as possible, in the municipality of Olst-Wijhe. Such a survey will be also conducted in the Municipality of Skanderborg (in the Danish demonstration case ) as well as in the Municipality of Przywidz (in the Polish case). In this way, researchers aim to receive valuable information about the different motives for implementing sustainability in different geographical and economical circumstances, and thus be able to generate guidelines that will assist and enhance other local energy communities in application of smart management systems.

Meetings between the project partners and the residents of the Dutch demonstration site of SERENE are very important for successful cooperation.

Thank you everyone for the valuable ideas and discussions!