Innovation lab act4.energy (Austria)

Was ist CLUE und was sind Energiegemeinschaften

400+ PV-plants

20.000 citizens

5MWp+
installed PV-power

e-Mobility and storage solutions

Demo region Burgenland

One of the demo sites for the project CLUE will be in the Austrian province Burgenland within the innovation lab act4.energy. The innovation lab act4.energy is a living lab initiative that is initiated and managed by Energie Kompass GmbH and is supported by the Austrian Federal Ministry of Climate Action within the innovation program “City of Tomorrow”. The initiative is located in the districts Oberwart and Güssing in south-east Austria and encompasses 10 municipalities that all work together and cooperate in a public-private partnership.

The innovation lab act4.energy builds and operates experimental environments and creates framework conditions for innovations. It enables and supports research and innovation projects for development and testing of new products, solutions and services in the energy sector and has a focus on improving the use of renewable energies. The region Oberwart-Stegersbach (10 municipalities in total) operates as a living lab test-bed for demonstrating and evaluating new technologies and services for regional renewable energy systems. Based on open innovation processes a cooperation of science, politics, research, companies, local representatives and the civil society develops new solutions with a strong focus on practical application and functional business models.

Picture © act4.energy

Picture © act4.energy

The innovation lab region in short

The Oberwart-Stegersbach innovation laboratory region comprises 10 municipalities with 20,000 inhabitants

An exemplary geographic and demographic Structure enables good duplicability to other regions

Dynamically growing business location in the heart of Europe with tourism, commerce, trade, strong municipal infrastructure (trade fair location, schools, cultural institutions) and cheap transport connections

Renewable energy utilization already well developed (initiative “Sonnenkraftwerk Burgenland” with more than 400 PV plants, biomass and biogas plants and geothermal applications).

Available user access for Co-creation processes

Comprehensive partner network as well as a well established R&D infrastructure

Motivated and professional actors & partners

Within project CLUE

The innovation lab act4.energy has a strong expertise in open innovation and co-creation processes and as such will focus on the question of usability and end-user experience for the demonstrated project solutions.

In the demo region an energy community (renewable energy community) will be established with the goal of utilizing flexibilities from electric-mobility in combination with contact-less automatic charging and payments supported by blockchain technology for clearing. During the preparation and execution of the demo there will be strong emphasis on user engagement, and experiences in forming and administrating energy communities beyond the mere technical aspects will be gathered.