At the COP30 summit in Belém, last November 19, the second phase of the international Digital Demand-Driven Electricity Networks (3DEN) initiative was announced, promoted by the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP, the UN environmental agency) in collaboration with the International Energy Agency and supported by the Italian Ministry of the Environment and Energy Security. Phase II will finance 14 pilot projects in eight countries – Brazil, South Africa, Morocco, Tunisia, Kenya, Nigeria, Ethiopia and Tanzania – for an investment of 23 million euros, with the aim of accelerating the digitalisation of energy and agri-food systems, increasing their flexibility and resilience and expanding access to clean and affordable energy.
In this context, Italy takes on a leading role in Brazil thanks to the VERDE (Vital Energy for Resilient Digital Ecosystem) project, selected among the winning initiatives of 3DEN Phase II. The project will be implemented in the Municipality of Taquara, in the State of Rio Grande do Sul, and is conceived and led by the Unical Smart City Instruments (SCI) spin-off, in partnership with the University of Calabria (Department of Mechanical, Energy and Management Engineering), the University of Cagliari (Department of Mechanical, Chemical and Materials Engineering), the UNICAL R&DCal spin-off, the Universidade FACCAT, the Municipality of Taquara, the technology company Pináculo and the electricity distributor RGE.
VERDE is conceived as an urban-scale digital energy ecosystem, founded on the construction of an energy community involving families, educational institutions, health services and third sector entities. The project integrates production from renewable sources, digital tools for observing and managing consumption and a training and participation program aimed at the local population, with particular attention to the most vulnerable contexts. The perspective is that of a city that governs energy in a shared way, reduces dependence on centralized structures, strengthens its ability to respond to climate and economic crises, communicating with peri-urban and rural areas.
This approach is placed within the theoretical framework of “smart territories”, developed by Alfredo Sguglio, CEO of Smart City Instruments, and presented for the first time in 2022 at the international event “Ciudad Global”, promoted by the Center for the Fourth Industrial Revolution (C4IR) of Medellín and the World Economic Forum. In this perspective, the territory is understood as a complex socio-ecological system, in which digital infrastructures, social capital, multilevel governance and public policies converge in a unitary strategy of sustainable and inclusive development. In this design, energy takes on the role of a critical vector of innovation, cohesion and redistribution of opportunities between communities and places.
Sguglio speaks from Buenos Aires, where he has just signed a collaboration agreement between the Unical Smart City Instruments spin-off and the Metropolitan Foundation, an organization that has been working on public policies and the sustainable transformation of the Argentine metropolitan area for over twenty years:
«The GREEN project takes place in a phase marked by the climate crisis, in which the issue does not concern “humanity” in the abstract, but the organization of relationships between energy, economy and nature, which has long treated lands, bodies and territories as expendable resources. With this project we are exporting to Brazil, as well as to the Dominican Republic, Colombia, Panama, Argentina, Uruguay and Morocco, a model that intertwines public research, digital innovation and partnerships with local realities, making renewable energy a lever of social empowerment. The energy transition, consequently, does not coincide with a simple change in technologies, but with a profound reorganization of the relationships between communities, ecosystems and infrastructures, which is reflected both in daily behaviour, i.e. in the ways of consuming, living and producing, and in the forms of governance and cooperation that territories are able to generate.»
This approach arises from a path already tested in the field, which led the SCI team to create the first Rural Living Lab in the Dominican Republic and Central America, financed by the Dominican Ministry of University and Research, and to design the “Plan Maestro Medellín Distrito Inteligente” for the Municipality of Medellín, in Colombia. These experiences have consolidated a working method based on international cooperation, territorial experimentation and knowledge transfer between different contexts.
In this framework, the VERDE project also represents a significant expression of the “third mission” of the University of Calabria, of which spin-offs such as Smart City Instruments constitute one of the most concrete tools for transferring knowledge, skills and innovation towards the territories and their communities.