How young people can contribute to energy communities

Heleen Schockaert, project manager at REScoop.eu and youth ambassador, sat down with Yusuf Latief at European Sustainable Energy Week (EUSEW) to talk about the role of youth in energy communities.

Schockaert believes that the imagination of youth and their ability to change movements such as energy communities is important to make energy communities more accessible to different types of social groups.

"I think there's still so much that we can learn from different perspectives and different angles and that's more than welcome."

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However, Schockaert admits that there are challenges faced by energy communities such as the little awareness around the fact that you can belong to an energy community, policy challenges and because they are such small players the energy market is not really designed for them.

“So there's all these different challenges and I think that it's super important to keep on fighting for recognition of energy communities, the benefits that they can bring but also educational awareness raising with citizens..."

For youth who are interested in the energy sector, Schockaert believes that they should just try it and find an energy community to join in their neighbourhood.

“I think what would be important is that people just join an energy community. For example, I recently joined the board of Eco Power which is the biggest cooperative here in Flanders [Belgium]..."

Now that she joined the board as a young person, Schockaert believes that it will be interesting to see the type of change she will be able to implement to be able to attract a diverse group of people to join.

Watch the full EUSEW interview to learn more about Heleen Schockaert's view on the future energy landscape.