Xavier Simón, coordinator of EC4RURAL, and Ánxela Fernández, mayor of the municipality of O Rosal (Galicia, Spain), which is part of our project, participated in a working visit on March 14-15 to the territory of the Duero-Douro European Grouping of Territorial Cooperation (EGTC) to learn about a best practice in cross-border community energy: the Efiduero model.

In fact, as early as last February, we had already learned about the experience of this cross-border energy community during the presentation in Brussels (Belgium) of the Handbook on Cross-Border Energy Communities, prepared for the Directorate-General for Regional and Urban Policy (REGIO) by a consortium consisting of Spatial Foresight, Eurac, and EureConsult. Our colleagues from ELARD also attended this event.

Efiduero is a European Cooperative Society founded in 2017 to implement management and investment initiatives aimed at fostering territorial development through the use of renewable energy. It consists of 55 municipalities in the cross-border region between Zamora and Salamanca (Spain) and Trás-os-Montes and Beira Interior Norte (Portugal). In 2021, they established a Citizen Energy Community that became an energy supplier in the Iberian market.

So far, the Efiduero model has enabled the development of 150 photovoltaic installations on public building rooftops, with an additional 80 currently under construction, which will bring the total installed capacity to over 3.4 MW. In return, municipalities receive a significant portion of the electricity they consume. Participation in Efiduero’s capital requires a contribution of €25. The Efiduero cooperative sells energy to its members at cost price and has the ability to share surplus energy with them, regardless of the distance between the consumption point and the location where the surplus is generated. Typically, the limit is 2 kilometers.

In addition to visiting these municipalities, the delegation also explored various initiatives in Fermoselle, located in the heart of the Raia, and learned about its network of electric vehicle charging points, the largest in the Iberian Peninsula.

Ánxela Fernández Callís, mayor of O Rosal, stated: “For a rural Galician municipality, the main lesson from the visit to Zamora and Salamanca was seeing how the regulatory framework for local governments does not prevent them from becoming active participants in the energy transition.” Meanwhile, Xavier Simón repeatedly emphasized “the need to envision a future where small local energy installations are part of a larger entity, controlled by the same local actors, to strengthen their role in the electricity market. That is, to produce, self-consume, but also commercialize energy.”