Community-Powered Renewable Energy

Estonia faces a significant challenge in reducing reliance on oil shale for electricity, which has a high environmental impact. In response, Energiaühistu aims to pioneer a community energy model to enable local renewable energy production through community and municipal partnerships, empowering communities to produce clean energy locally.

Estonia still heavily relies on oil shale for electricity, creating a high environmental toll. While there is a pressing need to expand renewable energy infrastructure, most individuals and municipalities face technical, financial, and logistical barriers to participation. Ordinary citizens lack feasible pathways to engage in renewable energy projects, and municipalities lack adequate resources and models to initiate such projects independently. Additionally, resistance (NIMBY syndrome) towards renewable energy sites can hamper local project approval, leaving many communities in need of an effective model for green transition and energy independence.

The project seeks to establish a community energy model, allowing residents and municipalities to co-invest in local renewable energy projects like solar or wind farms. By fostering partnerships with municipalities that can offer public spaces for these installations, Energiaühistu will facilitate community-based energy cooperatives. Community members can become stakeholders, achieving shared benefits, reducing reliance on fossil fuels, and creating a sustainable revenue model that reinvests in local energy resilience.

The aim is to create a replicable, legally sound community energy model in Estonia that encourages renewable energy production while fostering local cooperation. This model is expected to catalyze the establishment of community energy parks across Estonia’s municipalities, increasing the share of locally produced green energy, reducing environmental impact, and supporting community-wide economic benefits.

The energy cooperative initiated a project in which proposals were submitted to 24 local governments for the construction of community energy parks. All municipalities showed interest, wanting to discuss the possibility of proposing a full cooperation model that would cover all aspects from the use of the soil to the purchase of the generated electricity.

Apart from the local governments, TalTech was also involved in the development of the community energy model, with whom planning for a park on the roof of the university building was started. Also, with the help of the Tartu Region Energy Agency, a community energy round table was created, where different stakeholders participate, the purpose of which is to maintain the flow of information, share experiences and competences, and coordinate activities to introduce community energy.

With the city of Tallinn, a working group was formed at the strategy center, which develops a cooperation model for the city and the energy cooperative. The working group participated in the Government Office’s Innosprint program, where the focus of the project was specified and possible pilot project locations were determined.