On 28th September 2020, the CROWDTHERMAL Consortium held its second meeting of the year 2 of the project. The objective was to follow up on the Advisory Board Meeting held on the 16th September 2020.
The Advisory Board (AB) gathers experts from the geothermal, financial and social side. The Advisory Board agreed on the importance of trust at all project stages and expressed their interest in CROWDTHERMAL’s endeavours, considering public empowerment as a key factor.
The meeting was an opportunity for the CROWDTHERMAL consortium to translate the AB’s vision into tangible actions. Specifically, an emphasise was put on the following key items: Geothermal energy’s sustainable potential and local impact of participative finance for geothermal projects.
Regarding sustainability, the Advisory Board and the Consortium both agreed to stretch the importance of the green impact of geothermal technologies in the energy mix. The excellent work performed during WP1 addressing the bottlenecks of public engagement for community-based geothermal development demonstrated that geothermal energy has a positive impact on the environment not only regarding CO2 emissions but also regarding land use, water and noise. It was concluded that part of the communication of the project shall focus on the positive environmental aspects of each geothermal project to raise public awareness.
The Advisory Board also concluded that CORWDTHERMAL’s principle to empower society to participate in the development of geothermal projects using alternative financing schemes has the potential to have a positive impact on local jobs and economy. This ambitious target needs to be studied further by the consortium. Fortunately, CROWDTHERMAL is in an ideal position to tackle this research question thanks to the combination of its three case studies (Iceland, Spain and Hungary) as well as its expertise in social science and finance. CROWDTHERMAL will work closely with local communities in Europe to ensure that the conclusions of the project meet the aspirations and needs of EU citizens so that they can play an active role in EU carbon neutrality.
The Advisory Board’s input has been highly appreciated by the project partners and the consortium is motivated for the second year of the project which should produce even more positive results for the empowerment of EU citizens in clean and sustainable geothermal energy.
For more information read our recent press release available at the link here below!
