This book explains the challenges and barriers of island energy systems in the European Union. It reviews the research projects carried out to date, and proposes a new feasible scheme that could be advantageous to many isolated energy systems. The book contains a thorough literature review, to ensure the originality of its ideas. It provides a clear insight of the opportunities and difficulties facing EU island energy systems.

Welcome to the Islands Clean Energy Transition Handbook. This Handbook is an action- oriented guide to help islands navigate the transition toward clean energy. It follows a central methodology (EXPLORE, SHAPE, ACT) to cover ideas and projects in all stages of the clean energy transition. It also provides examples of European islands and includes references to key publications. The EXPLORE part addresses islands that are just starting their clean energy transition. It guides the development of a Clean Energy Transition Agenda (CETA), i.e., a strategic roadmap to decarbonise the island. The SHAPE part aims to bring forward the potential solutions suggested in the CETA to shape them into a pipeline of bankable clean energy projects. The project idea needs to be first developed, followed by studies assessing the feasibility of the projects, and the development of the business case. The ACT part focuses on further developing the projects so that they are ready to be implemented on the ground, including finding the right funding and financing, developing the business plan, and setting up the required partnerships for implementation.

While islands are particularly vulnerable to climate change, they enjoy a naturally high potential of renewable energy sources to harness. Many islands have abundant renewable energy potential, which can be tapped to lead decarbonisation. However, access to reliable, clean and competitive sources of energy remains a main concern of island communities in the EU. Although it is often technically and financially possible to develop renewable energy projects on islands, legal and regulatory frameworks, whether EU, national, regional or local, are not always fitfor purpose. In order to better understand how legal and regulatory frameworks help or hinder the development of local decarbonised energy systems on EU islands of seven specific Member States, the Clean energy for EU islands secretariat examined the frameworks of Greece, Ireland, Italy, Spain, Sweden, Croatia and Estonia. The study identifies regulatory and policy barriers to the clean energy transition on the islands and formulates concrete recommendations to overcome them. For each of the Member States these findings were discussed with diverse national stakeholders in two online Focus Group Meetings and a physical National Stakeholder Meeting. This study is deliverable of the Task Force 2 - Think Tank on legislation and regulation for islands of the Clean energy for EU islands secretariat. It builds further on the Regulatory inventory of legal and regulatory national frameworks that support clean energy development for 15 Member States, available online on the website of the Clean energy for EU islands secretariat.

The Clean energy for EU islands Initiative was launched in May 2017, underlining the European Union's intent to accelerate the clean energy transition on Europe's more than 2,400 inhabited islands. The initiative aims to reduce the dependency of European islands on energy imports by making better use of their own renewable energy sources. As a support to the launch of the initiative, the Clean energy for EU islands secretariat was set up in 2018 to act as a network for island stakeholders and to provide dedicated capacity building and technical advisory services. Between 2018 and 2020, the Secretariat acted as a pilot project supporting the EU-wide community of islands in their efforts to transition to sustainable energy and reduce energy consumption. Following the signature of the Memorandum of Split in 2020, the second phase of the Secretariat was launched in the beginning of 2021 and will run for two years. The second phase will build on the results of the pilot years to create a pipeline of bankable clean energy projects on islands in the EU.

Climate change is currently the most severe global environmental problem creating large damages and chaos both in developed and in developing countries. Mitigation of climate change is required for controlling the temperature rise at affordable levels in the coming decades. Emissions of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere should be sharply reduced soon coupled with atmospheric carbon removal using various processes. Islands are unique energy communities with specific characteristics and features. Their ecosystems are fragile and vulnerable requiring protection. Many islands have isolated electric grids that make difficult the use of renewable energies in them particularly the intermittent renewable energy sources. Each island has unique green energy resources that can be used for heat and power generation. The clean energy transition in islands requires the combined use of many carbon-free energy technologies in heat, cooling and power generation as well as in transportation. The involvement of all stakeholders in the creation of a de-carbonization plan and their commitment in its realization is a prerequisite for a successful clean energy transformation. The book is tackling the possibility of clean energy transition in the island of Crete, Greece that is important taking into account the urgent necessity to mitigate climate change and the EU goal for carbon neutrality in the continent in the coming decades. The methodology followed can be replicated in other islands with different characteristics and features. It is obvious that islands with different availability of renewable energy resources can use different technologies for energy generation compared to Crete.

This volume addresses renewable energy communities, and in particular renewable energy cooperatives (REScoops), in the context of the revised EU Renewables Directive. It provides a comprehensive account of the history and development of the renewable energy community movement in over six different countries of continental Europe. It addresses their visions, strategy, organisation, agency, and more particularly the challenges they encounter. This is of particular importance to gain more understanding into how renewable energy communities fare in domestic energy markets where they are confronted with regime institutions, structures and incumbents’ agency that tend to favour maintaining of the status quo while blocking attempts to empower and institutionalise renewable energy communities as market entrants having a disruptive, radical green and localist agenda. This volume will be an invaluable reference for academics and practitioners with an interest in social innovation in sustainable transitions, the role of community energy in energy markets, their agency, as well as an outlook to the impact that the EU Renewables Directive may have to change national legislation and policy frameworks to create a level playing field that is essentially more fair and beneficial to renewable energy communities.

This book explores the intrinsically multiscale issue of renewable energy transition from a local, national and transnational perspective, and provides insights into current developments in the Upper Rhine Region that can serve as an international model. Organised around the exploration of stakeholder issues, the volume first describes a framework for public action and modelling and then articulates a triple complementary focus from the viewpoint of law, economics and sociology. This multidisciplinary approach is anchored in the social sciences, but also explores the ways in which technological issues are increasingly debated in the implementation of the ecological transition. With a focus on the Upper Rhine Region of France, Germany and Switzerland, the contributions throughout analyse how concrete regional projects emerge, and whether they are carried out by local authorities, private energy groups, network associations or committed citizens. From this, it appears that real-world energy transition modes can be best understood as permanent transactional processes involving institutional regulations, economic levers and barriers and social interactions. This book will be of interest to advanced students and scholars focusing on renewable energy transition, stakeholder issues, environment and sustainability studies, as well as those who are interested in the methodological aspects of the social sciences, especially within the fields of sociology, law, economy, geography, political science, urbanism and planning.