Stakeholders involvement for energy conscious communities: The Energy Labs experience in 10 European communities

In the framework of the INTERREG IVC RENERGY project an innovative methodology was devised to exploit stakeholder involvement on energy and environmental decisions at community level and to increase community acceptance. It is based on the "Living Lab" paradigm applied to policy making as a powerful instrument to encourage and coordinate stakeholder engagement. The paper describes the preliminary stakeholder analysis performed and the application of "Energy Lab" concept to eleven different EU communities (Kaunas - LT, Torre Vedras - PT, Potenza - IT, Slagelse - DK, Durham and Sheffield - UK, Tulln - AT, Szentes - Hu, Jaslo - PL and Avrig - RO) with the purpose of identifying gaps and needs at regional level, share the knowledge through the discussion of exemplar case studies, maximize the transfer of good practices for the regional implementation plans and derive effective policy recommendations. The results show that the Energy Labs can give a sound basis for a future dialogue and a long lasting co-operation among the different parties and can be therefore considered an investment in the future at community level. At interregional level the comparison of the experiences among different countries helps to highlight the different motivations and aspirations of the various communities as well as the main common barriers in the implementation of renewable energy and energy efficiency strategies.