Towards practical typology of energy communities: main differentiating elements and examples of promising implementations

For developing energy communities, this paper provides a typology based on regulatory, contractual and commercial aspects. The main classification elements used in the paper are: use of the public grid, geographical proximity, property boundary crossing, individual/collective contracts and customer type (industrial/residential or commercial). These elements are used to distinguish six energy community types, which have different business model opportunities. With European examples, the typology helps to analyse the future pathways of energy communities by making their differences concrete and distinguishable.