Collaboration in regional energy-efficiency development

Abstract

Regional energy efficiency has become an increasingly popular topic in the discussion concerning sustainability and energy issues. Although energy production, renewable fuels and emissions have attracted more attention in the mainstream media, saving energy has become equally important. Additionally, issues such as sustainability and regional energy self-sufficiency are becoming increasingly important as drivers of change, alongside the traditional energy price factor. Balancing the system has an important role in the overall efficiency, and optimization requires close collaboration of all partners producing, consuming or transmitting energy. Traditionally, various stakeholders within a region have managed and developed their energy use or production independently. Utilizing, for example, the excess energy of other stakeholders in the region has been rather sporadic. From the system (i.e. regional) perspective, independent efficiency development in the sub-parts (e.g. individual companies) has its limitations and acknowledging this has directed attention to the opportunities of regional energy cooperation. This requires a new kind of collaboration between the stakeholders, from the identification of efficiency improvement opportunities to potential joint investments. The purpose of this paper is to study these potential regional collaboration opportunities between the stakeholders and the boundary conditions related to their implementation. One finding is that bilateral collaboration and development is already taking place, but broader cooperation is still somewhat modest. Furthermore, the stakeholders are usually well aware of the benefits of broader collaboration and have already identified some potential forms of cooperation. However, the long-term nature of the development of energy systems presents challenges for collaboration. It requires long-term commitment from the stakeholders, as well as a coordinating organization that has the aspiration and means to facilitate the collaboration over a long-time perspective.