From 11 to 14 September, AURORA team attended the Smart Energy Systems conference in Copenhagen, Denmark.
At the conference, Zhe Zhang, coordinator for Aarhus demonstration site, made a presentation to share the challenges setting up an energy community in a university in Denmark: complicated ownership of the buildings lead to long discussions with more parties involved, reluctance to try new legal framework and long decision-making process in public institutions, and the current tax system, to name a few.
Another AURORA team member, PhD Fellow Parisa Rahdan, also presented her recent research finding on benefits of rooftop photovoltaic systems at the conference. “Distributed rooftop photovoltaic systems are more expensive than utility-scale PV systems, but they can reduce total European system cost up to 3.7% by reducing the need to extend distribution capacity”, said Parisa.
Zhe and Parisa also participated in the technical tour to Avedøre Energifællesskab and learn about the first energy community in Denmark. “It is very inspiring to visit the first energy community in Denmark and know that we had similar challenges. Though we adopt a slightly different legal framework at our solar cooperative in Aarhus, we are excited to learn from Avedøre Energy Community.”
