Background

The South East Energy Agency (formerly Carlow Kilkenny Energy Agency/3cea) was established by Carlow and Kilkenny Local Authorities in partnership with the Leader Development Companies in Carlow and Kilkenny to provide sustainable energy information and services to the people of Carlow and Kilkenny, to local businesses and community groups, and to the Local Authorities. Since being founded in 2002, the Carlow Kilkenny Energy Agency has expanded to include Wexford and recently Waterford, now representing the entire Southeast region as South East Energy Agency.
The Agency can be contacted for impartial information, advice and support by anyone considering energy management or renewable energy projects in Carlow, Kilkenny, Wexford, and Waterford.

South East Energy Agency launched its Regional Strategy to 2030 – a strategy that helps map the path we are going to have to follow together. The partnership underpins the capacity to deliver the Climate Action Plan at the regional level through public and private actors supported by the South East Energy Agency as the Trusted Intermediary. Discover the Regional Strategy.

Activities

There is a huge renewable energy resource waiting to be tapped into in Co. Carlow, Co. Kilkenny, Co. Wexford, and Co. Waterford. Full exploitation of the Accessible renewable energy resources in the Counties would mean that we could meet 50% of our primary energy requirements from local renewable energy resources.
The development of renewable energy sources is a priority at local, regional, national, and at a European level. It is an objective of the existing County Development Plans of both counties to encourage and facilitate the development of renewable energy developments where it is consistent with the proper planning and development of the area.
The South East Energy Agency carried out a survey in 2005 of the potential and practical availability of renewable energy resources in Co. Carlow, Co. Kilkenny and Co. Wexford. All these resources have the potential to be used to reduce our dependence on imported fossil fuels.
The Agency can offer support and advice to anyone wishing to utilise the renewable energy resources in the Counties whether using wood, solar or geothermal energy to heat homes and other premises, for the development of wind and biogas projects, or for the use of biofuels for transport.

Mission

The mission of the South East Energy Agency is to contribute effectively to sustainable development in Co. Carlow, Co. Kilkenny, Co. Wexford, and Co. Waterford by providing sustainable energy information, support and services to the people of the southeast region, to local businesses and community groups, and to the Local Authorities.

Objectives

• Energy awareness and dissemination campaigns
  Providing information on renewable energy and energy-efficient products, local developers, suppliers, and installers.
• Energy management and procurement
  Negotiation of energy supply contracts and management of electricity accounts and optimisation of Council operations for energy efficiency.
• Energy efficiency and renewable energy projects
  Project management and facilitation for the Local Authorities, local community groups, and businesses.
• Sustainable energy training
  Organising training courses and workshops for local Authority staff and the public.
• Energy Policy Development
  The Agency works with the southeast County Councils to develop specific energy efficiency and renewable energy policies in County and Local development plans and public building initiatives.

Active EU Projects

Housing 4.0 Energy

Housing 4.0 Energy (H4.0E) looks to develop and champion a new way of constructing Zero-Energy Homes to help deal with issues such as the embodied CO2eq emissions in modern house construction, the lack of social houses available, and the low energy efficiency of older homes. This project seeks to deliver 58 model housing units in pilot sites across 4 countries. The project also hopes to deliver a digital platform to allow for the replication of the H4.0E process by independent parties. The objectives of H4.0E are:

• To facilitate the uptake of low carbon technologies, products, processes, and services in sectors with high energy saving potential, to reduce GHG emissions in NWE
• Housing 4.0 Energy practices will
  • reduce production costs of new housing units by 25%
  • reduce CO2/m² by 60% emissions for embodied CO2
  • Build 56 units which means a saving of 0.86 kt CO2

Housing 4.0 Energy Project Summary – South East Energy Agency

STEPS

STEPS intends to accelerate development and innovation in medium-scale renewable energy storage for companies in North West Europe by helping them overcome two large obstacles. The first obstacle is limited access to test beds. Emerging energy storage products often take years to reach pre-commercial TRL and need test beds to help develop their offering. The second obstacle is a fragmented regulation as each country has its own energy market regulations which influence a products’ technical specifications and the profitability of the business model.

STEPS Storage Of Energy & Power Systems In NWE – South East Energy Agency

RegEnergy

RegEnergy aims to break up existing structures for increasing the use of renewable energy in North West Europe regions. Creating renewable energy demand–supply partnerships between urbanised and surrounding rural territories will lead to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. 9 project partners from 7 NWE countries, representing metropolitan regions, cities, rural communities, regional agencies, scientific institutions, and renewable energy producers will develop strategies and models to illustrate how such partnerships can be built. In three strategic areas the missing regional links between demand and supply from renewables will be addressed. To accelerate innovation in medium-scale energy storage, STEPS is planning to bring 25 new storage products & solutions to a pre-commercial level.

RegEnergy – South East Energy Agency

ENERGee Watch

The European Network ENERGee-Watch, has the aim of standardising data at a European Level, enabling comparisons across European territories to be made and for European-wide methodologies to be established. ENERGee-Watch has three main missions:

1. To share experiences between regional/local public authorities in the field of energy and GHG inventory.
2. To share experiences amongst GHG monitoring organisations.
3. Involve and work with European organisations to: Define methodologies suited to local needs. Define common guidelines to be able to compare the performance of territories. Improve national and international observation methodologies based on feedback from regional approaches. Evaluate the European energy policies (CoM).

The European Network of Regional GhG Emissions and Energy Watch – South East Energy Agency

Data4Action

Data4Action is a co-funded Intelligent Energy Europe Funded project, which aims to mobilise energy data providers and public authorities in eleven European countries to design and demonstrate strong outcome driven partnerships based on setting up win-win data exchange collaboration models that support the successful implementation and monitoring of Sustainable Energy Action Plans.

The objectives of Data4Action are to:

1. Explore ways to improve public authorities access to energy data for better implementation and   monitoring of SEAPs,
2.  Mobilize public authorities and energy data providers and facilitate their cooperation in establishing or developing regional energy observatories,
3.  Foster collaboration models in energy data exchange between public authorities and energy data providers for sustainable energy planning at regional and local levels,
4. Demonstrate data exchange collaboration models ‘in action’ in the partner regions.

Data4Action – South East Energy Agency

EU City Facility

The EUCF is a support for municipalities, local authorities, their groupings and local public entities aggregating municipalities/local authorities in Europe with tailor-made, fast and simplified financial support (in the form of EUR 60,000 lump sums). The EUCF also offers related services to enable them to develop relevant investment concepts related to the implementation of actions identified in their climate and energy action plans.

It is important to note that the EUCF is not to be invested in the product for the project but in the development of the investment concept. The ultimate objective is to build a substantial pipeline of sustainable energy investment projects across municipalities in Europe.

EUCF – South East Energy Agency

CAN SME

The Climate Active Neighbourhoods project (CAN) focuses on underprivileged neighbourhoods that require renovation in municipalities and regions of varying sizes throughout northwest Europe.To build relevant capacity in these participating local authorities, neighbourhood approaches and synergies based on new governance models will be introduced. CAN SME (formerly CAN Cap) builds on the efforts of CAN to begin working with SMEs.

Through CAN SME, South East Energy Agency is offering discounted energy audits to SMEs in the southeast region of Ireland. This gives these small businesses the opportunity to understand and reduce their energy consumption, with little financial investment from themselves (a common barrier for SMEs).

CAN SME – South East Energy Agency

Energy Poverty Advisory Hub

The Energy Poverty Advisory Hub (EPAH) is the leading EU initiative aiming to eradicate energy poverty and accelerate the just energy transition of European local governments.

EPAH’s mission is to be the central platform of energy poverty expertise in Europe for local authorities and all stakeholders interested in taking action to combat energy poverty in Europe by providing direct support, online trainings, and research results and by building a collaborative network of stakeholders interested in taking action to combat energy poverty in Europe.

Building on the EU Energy Poverty Observatory legacy, the EPAH adapts an action-based approach by creating a space for collaboration and exchange for local and regional authorities planning a variety of measures to tackle energy poverty in the pursuit of a just and fair transition.

EPAH – South East Energy Agency