Photovoltaic-Green Roof Energy Communities for the European Green Deal: a Probabilistic Cost-Benefit Analysis

In the face of environmental challenges of unprecedented scale and urgency, the European Commission enacted in 2019 a new comprehensive growth strategy aimed at reaching net zero greenhouse gas emissions in 2050. Named as the European Green Deal, this strategy includes energy, biodiversity, pollution, and climate targets, envisaging contributions from all EU actions and policies. However, to date, actions addressing biodiversity, climate adaptation, and health issues from within the energy sector are still missing or lagging behind. This research proposes a new form of Renewable Energy Community (REC), which combines photovoltaic panels with green roofs to address multiple Green Deal’s objectives. First, such form of REC was grounded in the European legislation. Next, its costs and benefits were determined for a case-study in Esch-sur-Alzette (Luxembourg) and a probabilistic cost-benefit analysis (CBA) was conducted. By applying Scenario Discovery, the CBA was simulated under different combinations of input parameters and the ranges of input values resulting in desirable NPVs were determined. As a result, the conditions under which the photovoltaic-green roof energy community becomes economically viable were determined, providing guidance to national policymakers designing RECs’ incentive schemes at present.