The Municipality of Calopezzati, driven by the awareness that one of the greatest challenges of our time is the transition toward more sustainable modes of production and consumption, has launched the process to set up a Renewable Energy Community in its territory. The project stems from the deep conviction that the development of self-production energy policies, together with strong energy efficiency policies, represents one of the best welfare policies for families, capable not only of contributing to the reduction of bill costs but also of improving the social life of members.
The future Calopezzati Renewable Energy Community, being by its very genesis a legal entity with the aim of bringing environmental and social benefits to the community itself, will act as a stimulus for members to participate in community life, turning them into increasingly aware and active citizens, focusing on self-production from renewable sources.
Supporting the Municipality of Calopezzati in activating the path toward the creation of the renewable energy community in the territory is Romeo Group Fotovoltaica srl, which took on the role of Local Facilitator following managerial decree no. 484 of 02.01.2024.
The communication campaign is currently active, aimed at collecting the first possible members, that is, the entities potentially interested in participating, identifying for each potential member whether they are energy producers and/or consumers. Let’s remember that energy communities, in their various forms, are open entities, where participants can enter and leave freely, complying with the rules established and decided at the time of setup.
Once the first memberships and the role of each participant have been collected, along with possible surfaces suitable for the construction of the systems, the next step is the drafting of the Feasibility Study, that is, the preliminary analysis needed to verify the full economic and social sustainability of the project.
The Calopezzati energy community aims to become a model for neighbouring municipalities, paving a path toward environmental sustainability that the surrounding territories, from the slopes of the Sila Greca to the coasts of the Ionian Sea, will be able to follow in the near future. It is hoped that the initiative will become an example replicable across the local territory, giving citizens, businesses and administrations a new impulse toward competitiveness and energy transition. This is the wish that Romeo Group Fotovoltaica expresses, together with the municipal administration of Calopezzati, in the person of the Mayor, Eng. Giudiceandrea.
The slogan of the initiative is: “LET’S PUT OUR ENERGIES TOGETHER”, the message of which holds the concept of being and building a community, of sharing a common good such as energy, produced and generated from an ecological, free, inexhaustible and democratic source — therefore available to everyone: the sun.
Because Community is also the place where individual and collective identities are strengthened, a territory that develops, in people, a sharing of each other’s needs, equal rights and symmetrical duties, connected and coordinated in a solidarity bond aimed at promoting the construction of the common good.
The development of the REC, as a new energy model, represents a fundamental building block not only for achieving the decarbonisation goals of the energy sector, but also as an opportunity for rebirth and revival for the local territory, to reduce inequalities and open virtuous economic, civic and sustainable processes.
