Research

Co-designing with energy communities in Colombia a digital management platform to promote sustainable local energy markets

Working with energy communities in Colombia, this project will co-design and develop an interactive energy community management platform that supports local collective energy markets to manage their own energy production, consumption and exchange. 

In Colombia, regulations enable peer-to-peer energy transactions, but there is not the digital infrastructure to support this. By using and adapting an existing peer-to-peer energy transaction system in Colombia as the starting point, we will host a series of community-based co-design workshops to brainstorm and iteratively co-design the interfaces of the platform. 

These workshops will explore communities’ lived experiences, needs, expectations, aspirations, socio-technological barriers, challenges, design ideas and opportunities, actively engaging with local energy communities.

This new energy community platform will promote the uptake of community-based digital energy tools, support collective agency and facilitate participation in newly citizen-led energy markets. This community-first approach seeks to foster resilience, equity, energy justice, social innovation, and sustainability of collective energy markets within local communities in Colombia.

The project team will also evaluate the acceptability, usability, user experience and impact of this platform. 

Find out more on the project’s website.

Team

Nervo Verdezoto Dias – Senior Lecturer, Cardiff University

Victor Adolfo Romero Cano – Lecturer, School of Computer Science and Informatics, Cardiff University

Jaime Quintero Restrepo – Professor, Faculty of Engineering and Basic Sciences, Universidad Autónoma de Occidente, Colombia

Orlando Puente Moreno – Associate Professor, Faculty of Social Communication, Humanities and Arts, Universidad Autónoma de Occidente, Colombia

Lilian Andrea Carrillo Rodríguez –  Associate Professor, Faculty of Administration, Universidad Autónoma de Occidente, Colombia

Alejandro A. Cadavid Pinilla – Mayor, El Darien Municipal Government, Colombia

Luis A. Romero Cano – Secretary of Infrastructure, El Darien Municipal Government, Colombia

Juan Carlos Delgado Ortiz – Colombian Committee of the CIER – COCIER, Colombia

Carlos Alberto Carabali Gómez – Legal Representative, Bocas del Palo Energy Community, Colombia

Dany Ortiz – President, Bocas del Palo Energy Community, Colombia