The approach to establishing a virtual energy community at the University of Ljubljana was presented at the largest photovoltaic conference, at the EU PVSEC, in Vienna, Austria. Matevž Bokalič, together with Matej Guštin and Marko Topič presented a poster entitled Challenges of Energy Communities at Universities – A Virtual Approach.
The poster exposes legal barriers encountered by Aurora demo sites located within the universities, before focusing on a virtual approach of the Aurora Concept as developed by the University of Ljubljana. The virtual approach includes the whole Aurora rationale except the actual crowdfunding. It is built within the Student Energy Club (ŠEK) framework, which connects students, increases awareness of different events, and encourages evaluation of energy consumption and carbon emissions by using the Aurora Energy Tracker app. The demonstrator photovoltaic power plant is nevertheless being installed and will provide PV production data to the App users, thereby giving first-hand PV experience to community members.
The poster area was a nice place to discuss the problems of climate change with the conference delegates and how this can be tackled by individuals exploiting a bottom-up approach. Several new connections were made at the conference aiming to communicate the Aurora mission, inspire new App users and recruit new ambassadors.
