COME RES has been endorsed by public officials from Italy, Germany and Spain:

Mayor Lucilla Parisi from the Municipality of Roseto Valfortore in the Italian Appulia region on their local energy community and their participation in COME RES:

"The Municipality of Roseto Valfortore is enthusiastic to participate as a “case study” in the European project COME RES. For this opportunity, the Administration sincerely thanks ENEA and Ecoazioni which, by providing the technical-scientific skills for the development and management of Energy Communities, will evaluate the driving factors, barriers, legal aspects and economic models on the concrete case of Roseto Valfortore. The aim is to individuate the more suitable choices for the energy community's development.

The energy community of Roseto Valfortore, participated by citizens, businesses and local authorities, was created with the aim of enhancing all the resources of the territory and, through targeted investments, to retain locally the benefits created by Renewable Energy Sources (RES).

This is the way towards a more equitable and sustainable future, where every citizen will be able to produce and share green energy with others, combining environmental benefits with economic and social ones. Energy communities will be protagonists of a new energy regime: no longer centralized and hierarchical but distributed and collaborative."

State Secretary Tobias Goldschmidt, Ministry of Energy, Agriculture, the Environment, Nature and Digitalization in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany

We are pleased that Schleswig-Holstein has been selected as a model region in the COME RES project. Schleswig-Holstein has a long tradition of citizen wind farms. In order to enable citizen energy projects including citizen wind farms also in the future, we have established a citizen energy fund in 2018. The money from the fund is intended to make it easier for citizen energy projects to take the first steps in the planning and start-up phase and to reduce financial risks. We are particularly pleased that Thuringia is also planning to establish such a fund and we are happy to offer our support. We highly appreciate that the COME RES project supports the dialogue between different regions in Europe.

From our point of view it is important that also in the long term citizen energy projects have a firm place in the expansion of renewable energies next to financially strong and nationally operating companies. The framework conditions must be such that no competitive situation arises, but that also citizen energy projects have the possibility to be realized locally in order to engage people and to let them participate in the projects’ success. But this also means that sufficient areas must be available so that both large investors and citizens can get their projects off the ground.

In terms of climate protection, it is still of great importance to make more areas available for wind energy overall - i.e. nationwide. This would also improve the opportunities for citizen energy projects. A nationwide provision of an average of 2% of land for wind energy use is conceivable. In addition, the federal government should examine which supporting elements can be made available (e.g. citizen energy fund SH). In addition, we need to transpose and implement the new EU directives at the level of the Federal Republic in order to strengthen and further develop citizen energy in Germany in the long term as well.

Nuria Matarredona, Director General, Ecological Innovation in Buildings, Generalitat Valenciana, Spain:

“The development of local energy communities is key to the definitive impulse of the urgent ecological transition. A commitment to self-consumption and renewable energy, in line with the European Green Deal, is essential to transform our built environment and make it more resilient to the emergencies we face today and the challenges that are yet to come.

Projects such as H2020 COME RES which pursue the transfer of knowledge and the establishment of a framework for sharing experiences are essential to continue advancing towards climate neutrality.

The Generalitat Valenciana is co-leading various initiatives with the private sector to raise public awareness, detect and eliminate administrative barriers, co-finance and generate tools and channels to facilitate the transition to a new model of residential energy consumption”.