TIPS4PED or Turning cIties Planning (into) actionS for Positive Energy Districts, is a Horizon Europe research and innovation project, involving four cities from four countries, which will investigate scalable and easily reproducible technologies and digital optimisation strategies for the successful delivery of Positive Energy Districts (PEDs) in European cities.
The project will run between January 2024 and May 2027
with a budget of almost 6.5 million EUR
A positive energy district (PED) is an urban area that produces at least as much energy on an annual basis as it consumes. A PED is seen, as JPI Urban Europe defines it, “as an urban neighbourhood with annual net zero energy import and net zero CO₂ emissions working towards a surplus production of renewable energy, integrated into an urban and regional energy system”. This can be done via four main components:
A PED constitutes an integral part of comprehensive sustainable urbanisation strategies including societal, social, economic, cultural aspects and the involvement of citizens. To accelerate progress toward decarbonisation, TIPS4PED will support municipalities in the implementation of PEDs. By developing an Integrated Assessment Platform (IAP) to facilitate decision-making, as well as designing and testing the real-world effectiveness and viability of a digital twin-based platform, TIPS4PED will help pave the way for emissions reductions across Europe.
Cities are responsible for a substantial share of human climate and environmental impact and contribute to around 70% of the European Union’s (EU) CO2 emissions and primary energy consumption. At the same time, cities are recognised as key drivers for sustainability transformations. With the Green Deal, the European Union committed to cutting GHG emissions by 55% by 2030 and becoming the first continent to achieve climate neutrality by 2050. Positive Energy Districts (PEDs) are considered a key enabler for emission reductions in the building and mobility sectors. Indeed, PEDs could help to reduce the carbon emissions of urban districts by up to 85%, depending on the region under consideration. Due to their high decarbonisation potential, the EU is aiming to develop at least 100 PEDs by 2025.
Governments at all levels are facing significant obstacles with respect to the broad roll-out of decarbonisation strategies, such as a lack of: I. Adequate technical skills to identify the most appropriate technological solutions; II. Robust monitoring and evaluation frameworks; III. A systemic approach to identify and integrate available financing and funding schemes; IV. Effective multi-level governance, policy alignment, and integrated cross-sectoral planning approaches. Moreover, despite citizen awareness and engagement being key to tackling climate neutrality, citizens are poorly represented in the development and implementation of these plans and strategies.
Moreover, despite citizen awareness and engagement being key to tackling climate neutrality, citizens are poorly represented in the development and implementation of these plans and strategies.
Support municipalities in:
We seek to suggest scalable and easily reproducible technologies and digital optimisation as a key solution for achieving 2030 EU goals, while taking into consideration various market circumstances, and environmental, safety, and regulatory aspects.
We will do this by:
TIPS4PED Integrated Assessment Platform Tools:
To facilitate knowledge sharing and peer-to-peer learning, the TIPS4PED project consortium will coordinate several stakeholder dialogues between developers, utilities, and local governments.
Four national roundtables will be organised in Ireland, Italy, Hungary, and Greece, to facilitate an exchange amongst representatives from local, regional, and national government, and draft initial pathways for replication, involving more than 55 stakeholders (20 from academia, 20 from industry, and 15 government representatives).
The local stakeholder ecosystem will benefit from direct coaching from consortium partners, to enable platform deployment and PED-oriented integrated planning approaches. By providing city planners with access to high quality data and analytical tools, TIPS4PED can facilitate more effective and equitable urban planning.
The project will also utilise forums, such as Mission Platform, Smart City Marketplace/Scalable Cities, Living in EU, Intelligent City Challenge, IBA, EVS, POLIS Conference, Nordic Edge, or Tomorrow Building to foster multi-stakeholder and multi-level collaboration and form a more efficient development of Positive Energy Districts.
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