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Energy communities, energy cooperatives, energy clusters

Abbreviated form of legal source(s)

  • Ordonnance n° 2021-236 du 3 mars 2021
  • Code de l’Énergie

Summary

The purpose of the ordinance is to set out the legal framework for energy communities, to define the citizen energy community, and to clarify the scope of these new entities aimed at promoting citizen energy. These communities will be the organising legal person (PMO) for collective self-consumption operations carried out by their members.

Addressees

According to the Ordonnance, an energy community is an autonomous and open legal entity, whose members or shareholders are natural persons, small and medium-sized enterprises, local authorities or their groupings in the vicinity of the renewable energy projects to which it has subscribed and which it has developed.

Requirements and conditions

The purpose of an energy community is to provide environmental, economic or social benefits to its shareholders or members or to the local areas in which it operates. Under the terms of the Ordinance, the renewable energy community may:
• Produce, consume, store and sell renewable energy, including through renewable energy purchase agreements;
• Share within it the renewable energy produced by the production units it owns, subject to maintaining the rights and obligations of its members as end customers and, as regards electricity, the provisions of Articles L. 315-1 to L. 315-8;
• Access all relevant energy markets, either directly or through aggregation, in a non-discriminatory manner.
Under the Ordinance of 3 March 2021, members of energy communities will be able to self-consume the energy produced by their production facility. However, a provision of the order specifies that when the energy exchanges within an energy community concern electricity, the operation will have to be carried out within the framework of collective self-consumption defined in articles L. 315-1 to L.315-8 of the Code de l’énergie.

Geographical limitations

Since the publication of the PACTE law, and following the publication of the Energy and Climate Law, the Energy Code (Code de l’énergie) provides for a collective self-consumption operation located within a given geographical area (2 km).

Type of energy sharing

  • Energy communities, energy cooperatives, energy clusters   : Relevant