On October 2nd, META BUILD and its synergy project WeForming held a closed co-creation workshop during META BUILD’s online General Assembly, aimed at exploring how their collaboration can generate greater impact in supporting the EU Green Deal’s goals.
Although each project takes a distinct approach, both are committed to driving smart energy management in buildings. With this in mind, the workshop had two main objectives:
- Identify synergies – to find common ground where the projects complement one another;
- Establish strategic alignment – to develop a collaborative strategy and exchange best practices.
The session opened with introductions by project coordinators Konstantinos Kotsalos from European Dynamics (WeForming) and Alexios Lekidis from ICCS (META BUILD), ensuring that both consortiums were familiar with each other’s work. From there, the workshop focused on sharing knowledge in two key areas: WeForming led the discussion on “Stakeholder Engagement,” while META BUILD showcased their “Holistic Approach”. “
"Stakeholder Engagement” by WeForming
Ioanna Bala from HOLISTIC started her presentation by emphasising the importance of end users to the successful adoption of smart grid technologies: if users do not understand or engage with the technology, smart grids cannot reach their full potential. To ensure the final project meets user needs, WeForming is prioritising co-creation activities by involving the end users who will use the services being developed from the very beginning.
Ioanna outlined WeForming’s methodology to stakeholder engagement, which includes profiling end users of its demos and assessing their knowledge, needs, and concerns about smart grids. This process involves distributing online surveys through various channels, such as demo leaders’ networks, the project website, and social media. The insights gathered will then be analysed to inform the planning of tailored workshops for end users (building managers, technical staff, property owners, etc.), where they can learn about the technology and collaboratively design solutions.
In addition to workshops with end users, WeForming plans to conduct interviews with demo leaders to better understand user expectations at each demo site and workshops with sister projects to refine strategies based on their case studies.
Stakeholder engagement is indeed a topic where WeForming and META BUILD can support each other to come up with effective methods to involve end users throughout the implementation of both projects.
“Holistic Approach” by META BUILD
The second round of discussions showcased a range of holistic approaches to optimising building energy efficiency and decarbonisation, with experts drawing on various projects and META BUILD.
Vaggelis Marinakis from NTUA provided an overview of buildings as key data sources for energy applications. He shared insights from related projects like DigiBUILD and Dedalus, highlighting how building data can enhance energy efficiency interventions, electric vehicle (EV) charging, and heat pump integration, all aimed at achieving energy autonomy while adopting an holistic approach.
Elissaios Sarmas from EPU NTUA followed with a presentation on decarbonising buildings through smart renovations, leveraging AI and machine learning models from previous EU projects like MATRYCS and BD4NRG. He emphasised the need for “Decarbonisation as a Service” (DaaS) tools and shared examples from various projects. Nikos Dimitropoulos followed up with a presentation regarding technologies and applications in the residential sector, covering information about hardware and software capabilities in the edge and cloud domain, analytics services and tools for energy services. This work is being developed under META BUILD along other EU funded projects and suggested that once the technology reach the desired TRL level, it would be easily expanded to further test its envisioned capabilities.
Himanshu Nagpal from EURAC presented their work on real-time advanced control systems for heating and cooling efficiency, which are central to their pilots within META BUILD. He discussed the integration of predictive control models and weather forecasting for load management in buildings.
Noelia Vicente Gómez from TECNALIA presented their work on Digital Twin technologies in building operations, focusing on their responsibility for Pilot 6 in META BUILD. She highlighted the challenge of balancing energy cost savings with occupant satisfaction and showcased smart space management innovations for hybrid work environments within a Digital Twin framework. Laura Quant Colón, also from TECNALIA, concluded Noelia’s presentation by stressing the importance of building smartisation and the integration of intelligent space management in digital twin technologies for hybrid work environments to achieve this goal.
Discussion
After these presentations, a highly productive discussion followed, highlighting the complexities and opportunities involved in scaling decarbonisation technologies while effectively engaging stakeholders. Stratis Kanarachos from European Dynamics and Elissaios Sarmas from EPU NTUA discussed the potential for “Decarbonisation as a Service” (DaaS) tools, with Stratis emphasising the importance of optimising and scaling approaches for neighbourhoods and energy communities, as well as addressing data dependence and integration processes. Adriana Coca from ENDEF raised the issue of legislative differences across countries, to which Nikos responded that they are prepared to adapt their solutions to various legal contexts while prioritising privacy and security through their work in Data Spaces. Anton Soppelsa from EURAC also contributed by discussing the integration of systems into a Python-based simulation environment for enhanced data management and optimal energy steering, alongside plans to improve IoT Box hardware.
Conclusion
This workshop revealed several pathways for collaboration between META BUILD and Weforming, demonstrating how the projects can leverage each other’s strengths to overcome common challenges. By combining insights and perspectives from both projects’ experiences, the session laid the foundation for future cooperation in pursuit of maximising impact and advancing the energy transition in Europe.
About WeForming
WeForming is at the forefront of transforming energy management in buildings, focusing on seamless integration with the energy ecosystem. Through groundbreaking solutions, this EU project addresses digital operation, management, and maintenance, along with efficient and interactive energy processing for Intelligent Grid-Forming Buildings (iGFBs). The WeForming project (full name: Buildings as Efficient Interoperable Formers of Clean Energy Ecosystems) is an innovation action funded by the European Union through the Horizon Europe Programme under the Grant Agreement No. 101123556 that started in October 2023 and will last for 36 months.
- Website: weforming.eu
- LinkedIn: linkedin.com/company/weforming
- Twitter/X: twitter.com/weforming