Citizen Participation in the Energy Transition: Insights from Delft Climate Week Event

On November 14, the Urban Energy Institute (UEI) and the Municipality of Delft hosted an event during Delft Climate Week focused on citizen participation in the energy transition. 

The event began with a presentation by Suzan Mannens, Project Manager for Energy Transition at the Municipality of Delft. Mannens outlined the city's ambitious energy transition goals, including insulating 10,000 homes and disconnecting 9,500 homes from gas by 2030. She emphasized the importance of collaboration with citizens and other partners to achieve these goals. Strategies for engagement include providing information, offering subsidies for home insulation, organizing collective purchasing initiatives and supporting citizen and community-led actions. A central question to her presentation was: How can we encourage more people to actively participate in the energy transition? 

Following Mannens' presentation, four researchers from TU Delft’s Urban Energy Institute - Stefanie Horian, Ladislav Krutisch, Ragy Elgendy, and Diletta Ricci - shared insights from their research on home renovation projects, including: 

  • Diverse engagement preferences: Public interest in participating in energy transition efforts varies widely. Based on one study, 92% of residents wish to be informed but 36% of tenants would like to be engaged only once.  Tailoring participation strategies to varying levels of interest remains a challenge. 

  • Renovation success factors: Successful home renovations depend on several factors, including strong regulatory support, financial incentives, temporary accommodation during renovations, and active engagement through co-creation processes. 

  • Renovating with VvEs: Renovations involving homeowners' associations are much more complex than those in single-family homes. Intermediaries, such as "one-stop shops" (public, private, or public-private), can help overcome these hurdles, although scalable & viable business models are still needed. 

  • Support tools for VvEs: Cities can set up tools to assist homeowners’ associations in their renovation efforts, with successful examples from several cities including Mechelen,  Antwerp and Paris.  

  • Energy justice & vulnerable neighborhoods: In vulnerable areas, energy-efficient renovations must address local challenges and ensure affordable energy access, while also considering broader socio-economic needs. 

The event concluded with a panel discussion featuring Art den Boer from the Municipality of Delft, a "kwartiermaker" supporting VvE’s in the municipality’s energy transition; Ingrid Lips, board member of Bewonersvereniging Heel Tanthof; and Wim Schut, chairman of a local Delft VvE. The panelists shared their experiences with energy-efficient home renovations and discussed the practical challenges of implementing the energy transition on the ground. 

Some of the key takeaways from the lively discussion with the panelists and the audience include: 

  • There is strong enthusiasm among Delft citizens to participate in the energy transition. However, ensuring broad participation requires significant effort from the municipality, homeowner associations, and citizen organizations. 

  • A better exchange of experiences and best practices is needed among homeowners' associations (VvE’s). 

  • Government policies and regulations must be stable and long-lasting to effectively support the energy transition.  

 

The event aimed to strengthen the collaboration between the Municipality of Delft and TU Delft in advancing the energy transition by bringing together practitioners, researchers, residents and other stakeholders for meaningful dialogue, with the aim to continue beyond Delft Climate Week. 

View the slides from the presentations here.

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