Renewable Energy Communities (RECs) have been defined as modes of collective prosumership under the Renewable Energy Directive (RED II). We evaluate the benefits offered by RECs and the barriers and enablers impacting their uptake. Germany is taken as a case study for a novel multi-disciplinary assessment of a potential REC intended as a climate-neutral, mixed-use district. We found that energy cooperatives may not be suited to form RECs, but the future may see an uptake of innovative organizational structures such as the Consumer Stock Ownership Plan. It has been shown that a high degree of prosumership can provide technical and economic benefits with maximum greenhouse gas savings of 35% and a maximum self-consumption share of 61% compared to no prosumership. The REC has a negative Net Present Value (NPV) after 25 years of operation and lacks financial attractiveness. A positive NPV is only possible by using the cost savings from prosumership to recoup the investments faster. RECs are a promising mode of citizen participation in the energy transition; however, for their application in Germany, together with the currently missing regulatory allowance of sharing energy between small-scale parties over a public grid, dedicated subsidies, one-time grants or price support for operators are needed.

Distributed solar photovoltaic generation is less expensive than the retail price of electricity from the grid in most parts of Europe. Growing shares of variable generation place a focus on Renewable Energy Communities (REC) to increase the economic benefits of local energy systems. Civil society could play an influential and necessary role in the development of such communities, the expansion of renewable energy capacity and the provision of flexibility. However, current RECs models still confine tenants to their role as non-participating consumers. This article provides a concept to enable participative RECs within the German regulatory framework through collective self-consumption by including consumers for a fair allocation of renewable electricity using the blockchain technology.

This paper introduces a framework for agent based autonomous charging and discharging of Battery Electric Vehicle (BEV) at local energy communities. Agents are programmed to control the bidirectional charging according to green energy utilisation incentives, based on load and generation forecasts. The optimization is achieved within a group of independent prosumers following a fully distributed approach using multiple self-organising agents. No central instance is needed for communication, billing or decision making. To demonstrate the ecological benefits of the system, simulations for a car pool, with a Photovoltaic (PV) plant, in a residential neighborhood were performed. The simulations resulted in an increased community PV self-consumption value of 48% compared to 29% in case of uncontrolled charging processes.