The sharing economy is now affecting the energy markets

“Transactive grids” is an iconic American project related to the subject. The project intends to build a residential micro-grid, a self-producers community located at Brooklyn, sharing their own electricity. The size of this community is not proportional to the number of articles that revealed its existence: they are 5 independent producers to participate in the project that combines control of distributed generation and business links between neighbours, without any intermediary.

This project goes beyond the movement of “uberization” of the market, I have already spoken about: it reflects a will of ownership of the self-production by the producers themselves.

This project, as symbolic as it is, should not overshadow that the same desire animates the self-producers of all countries in Europe; this desire is often expressed and communities begin to organize themselves despite regulatory constraints.

The sharing economy is gaining ground in many areas: there is no reason why the world of energy escapes it.

Such projects require the development of new technologies (such as blockchain technologies) but they also open the way for deep changes in the positioning of utilities. The sharing economy will only affect part of the business of utilities; its development will be slow, held back by the defensive strategy of utilities and the need for regulatory changes.

It seems fundamental to the future that the main energy players now imagine the opportunities they can take advantage of instead of trying once again to oppose it.

Supporting the move could allow to discover new bubbles of value, so essential for utilities.

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