What is EnergyREV? 

EnergyREV is a research consortium of more than 90 researchers from 22 UK universities to deliver research that supports the uptake and impact of Smart Local Energy Systems (SLES). It was funded under Innovate UK’s Prospering from the Energy Revolution (PFER) programme, which set out to demonstrate the viability, impact and future prospects of smart local energy systems. From 2018-2023, the consortium produced more than 60 reports and countless more academic papers. 

In this project, Regen has pulled together key insights from across EnergyREV’s research into a report, Lessons from EnergyREV: The role of smart local energy systems in a net zero future. This provides evidence-based recommendations for UK and devolved governments, Ofgem and those working to deliver smart energy places. 

Why are smart local energy systems important? 

SLES bring together energy supply, storage, heat, transport and buildings in a local area. They connect them in a smart way using data and digital technologies and provide new ways for people, communities and other local stakeholders to get involved. They can deliver many important local and national outcomes, including: 

• Energy system benefits, such as grid optimisation, enhanced voltage and frequency control, grid stabilisation, improved energy security, and balancing, capacity and flexibility services. 
• Financial benefits through reduced need for grid reinforcement and from targeted place-specific action. 
• Economic benefits via local supply chains; employment, up- and reskilling opportunities; spin-out of innovation; and increased local revenue.  
• Household benefits through energy and bill savings, fuel poverty reduction, increased thermal comfort and reduced technology costs or payback periods.  
• Environmental and social benefits such as carbon reduction and improved air quality, improved health and wellbeing, community empowerment and social cohesion. 
• Equity and justice outcomes through public engagement and decision making, inclusive governance, local ownership and fairer distribution of costs and benefits. 

How can these benefits be unlocked? 

This work highlights seven key building blocks necessary for unlocking the value in SLES, and provides a series of recommendations for government policymakers, Ofgem, SLES developers, SLES programme funders, and educators and qualifying bodies. These recommendations outline steps that these different stakeholders can take to deliver the seven SLES building blocks and unlock a wide range of value for a variety of energy system stakeholders. 

What needs to happen next?

Insights drawn across the seven SLES building blocks revealed cross-cutting challenges. To address these, and ensure SLES are successful and flourish across the UK, key next steps include:

1. Assigning a policy ‘owner’ and creating a national vision and strategy for SLES.
2. Devolving power and resources to local authorities to deliver SLES and building capacity by investing in local authority net zero teams.
3. Building better governance and accountability structures across the public sector and encouraging these in the private and third sectors.
4. Aligning value for all stakeholders so everyone is motivated and working towards the same goal.
5. Reframing innovation and talking openly about ’failures’ so we can collectively learn and improve SLES and keep going on the challenging journey to net zero.

The final report, Lessons from EnergyREV: The role of smart local energy systems in a net zero future, will be launched at an online event on March 26, which will include responses and perspectives from key stakeholders. You can sign up here.

For more information on this area of work, please reach out to Regen’s Head of Demand and Flexibility, and EnergyREV Research Director, Rebecca Ford.

The use of energy data has huge potential to support and accelerate our transition to net zero. For example, the digitisation of energy infrastructure assets will enable better management and planning, which is essential for integrating a growing number of low carbon technologies. Making energy data open, at the same time as improving its quality, accessibility and interoperability, will allow innovators, academics, local authorities, policy makers and many others to make more informed decisions, as well as develop new products and services that can help us decarbonise.

The Energy Digitalisation Strategy is available to download here.

Regen helped visualise the whole strategy through the following graphic, which summarises the approaches and actions required to overcome barriers.

We also worked with BEIS, Ofgem and Innovate UK to explore how a consumer journey could be improved through further digitalisation of the energy sector. We chose a consumer heating scenario. The following interactive infographic shows how a consumer journey could interact with network operators, innovators and a number of different data systems and services. You can also explore the graphic here.

As we progress to net zero, the electricity networks will be required to connect significantly more low carbon technologies and to intelligently plan and manage their networks. Opening up electricity network data can enable innovators to create new products and services, it can drive up performance and deliver benefits for customers. Open data will play an important part in enabling smarter and more efficient ways of working.

Regen worked with users and stakeholders to raise awareness of the opportunities and to identify:

What do people want data for (the use case)? And what other ideas can we come up with?

How do they want to access it (the user design requirements)? And can we design the perfect service together?

We engaged through multiple channels during 2021 and 2022 to reach as many interested groups as possible.

Activity to date

You can find out more by taking a look at the following videos and publications (the most recent first).

In November 2022, UK Power Networks published a Local Authority Data Page on its Open Data Portal, compiling work that Regen led to prioritise datasets needed for Local Area Energy Plans. This piece of work was informed by direct stakeholder engagement with Essex County Council and Greater London Authority to identify the 30 most pressing planning challenges faced by local government, and the datasets needed to address them. The 153 datasets that were identified as part of this research can be seen on the Local Authority Data Page

Between December 2021 and January 2022, we looked more closely at how DNO data can support planning for net zero. The findings of this work are summarised in the following report:

The raw data from the online survey is openly available here under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Licence.

The launch of UK Power Networks’ data portal:

You can also watch the launch webinar for the Enabling open energy data programme below:

During the launch webinar, we asked stakeholders about what was most important to them and how they would like to engage going forward. The findings from this exercise are summarised in the report below:

Regen’s first contribution to the project was a high-end literature review of stakeholder engagement findings in open energy data to date to inform future engagement. The review of literature on open data engagement in the energy sector can be read here:

The data that sits behind the analysis of use cases is available here.