The third partner meeting of the EU GEMS project took place at the Irish pilot site at Medtronic Mervue in Galway, hosted together with the University of Galway.Medtronic, headquartered in Dublin, Ireland, is one of the world’s largest medical technology and healthcare services companies and employs over 3,000 people at its production site in Galway.
At the partner meeting in mid-April, representatives of the consortium took the opportunity to discuss the current status of the pilot projects, explore strategic issues relating to scaling up, and exchange valuable insights from industry and practice.
Focus on pilot projects and expert knowledge
The first day began with an introduction and a comprehensive update on the ongoing pilot projects as well as future planning. A highlight of the programme was the expert presentation by Niall O’Brolchain, a researcher at the eGovunit at the Insight Centre for Data Analytics at the University of Galway. Niall O Brolchain placed GEMS within a broader European policy context and highlighted how different national and regional frameworks influence the possibilities for local energy systems. He emphasised that GEMS could create added value beyond the pilot projects by translating the insights gained into practical guidelines, best-practice models and policy-relevant outcomes for SMEs and public authorities.
In a subsequent discussion with experts Marijke Deegens and Marc Leeuw, who are also members of the project’s Advisory Committee, the project partners were able to ask specific questions and reflect on their experiences. Marijke Deegens works for the province of Gerderland in the Netherlands and is a policy advisor for the economy at Gelderland Innovation Energy & SMEs. Marc Leeuw is the initiator of Smart Energy Hubs and focuses on system innovations in the energy transition in the east of the Netherlands. * The discussion highlighted how the GEMS Advisory Committee can provide further support. Its’ role is to support the project in scaling from six pilot projects to broader regional implementation. In practice, this involves helping to shape policy recommendations, linking insights from the pilot projects with regional ecosystems, assisting in the development of funding and implementation pathways, and contributing to standardised guidelines on the legal, economic, social and technical aspects of EMS implementation.
In the afternoon, the focus was on the innovation maturity levels and business cases of the respective pilot projects. A separate discussion session of the Advisory Committee took place in parallel. The day concluded with a workshop on “PEST and the Multi-Level Perspective”. During this, the partner regions each explored how the multi-level perspective can be used to analyse their pilot’s progress in the areas of politics, economy, society and technology in a structured manner, in order to derive insights for political transformation strategies.
The professional exchange continued in an informal atmosphere at the consortium dinner at the historic McSwiggan’s.
Workshops and practical development on the second day
The second day was heavily workshop-oriented. In several working groups per region, the participants addressed key future topics of the project, including:
• “How to 1-stop shop” – best practices
• Regional replication and scaling
• Indicators, benchmarks and success factors
The results of the workshops formed an important basis for the further operational and strategic direction of GEMS. In addition, the progress on the building of the GEMS tool was discussed, before a final overview of project communication highlighted what had already been published and what measures are planned for the near future.
Strong impulse for the next project phase
The partner meeting in Galway not only strengthened cooperation within the consortium but also provided important impetus for the next phase of the GEMS project. The intensive exchange between research, regions and industry once again underlined the project’s added value for sustainable innovation and regional development. During the meeting, it was repeatedly emphasised that the remaining work is no longer solely about technical aspects. Procurement, data integration, business model logic, legal clarity, stakeholder trust, communication and the translation into policy measures are all crucial for the successful implementation of the pilot projects and subsequent transfer.
This was also reflected in the concluding discussion, which was chaired by Thomas van Rensburg from the University of Galway and focused on the drafting of a joint GEMS paper designed to combine findings from the pilot projects with workshops, national perspectives and policy-oriented recommendations.