RE-COGNITION

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The RE-COGNITION Solution

RE-COGNITION – Renewable, cogeneration and storage technologies integration for energy autonomous buildings

Renewable Energy Integration Framework

The proposed solution will leverage energy production from multiple Renewable Energy Technologies (RETs) and enable their optimal pairing with storage technologies to meet the buildings electricity, heating, cooling, and hot water demand, efficiently and exactly when it is needed.

Challenge

The building sector is accountable for 40% of the energy consumed and 36% of carbon emissions in the EU. Approximately one-third of the buildings currently in use are more than 50 years old, having little or no renewable energy sources (RES) installed.

At the same time, EU has set ambitious energy targets for staying at the forefront of the clean energy domain, aiming at the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions by 40% by 2030 and reaching a 20% share of renewables by 2020 increasing to at least 27% share by 2030.

In this context, a technological, as well as a policy-driven push, is required for decarbonising the existing highly inefficient European building stock to re-establish cost-effectiveness and facilitate new investments for integration of Renewable Energy Technologies into buildings.

RE-COGNITION aims to pave the way for large-scale deployment of building-level Renewable Energy Sources and increase their share in the energy mix of EU in a safe and secure way for the grid.

The main ambition of the RE-COGNITION is to develop a future and technology-proof integrated solution aiming to maximise the utilisation of the energy that is locally produced by building-level renewable energy technologies and to reduce implicitly and explicitly induced costs, towards Zero Energy Building’s realisation.

To this end, the project aims to deploy a Renewable Energy Integration Framework able to seamlessly incorporate existing, as well as newly developed Renewable Energy Sources and storage components, along with peripheral electrical and thermal loads (HVAC, chillers, ICT devices, EV chargers, conventional load equipment, etc.).

 

Project objectives

Envision and develop an ICT-based building-wide Automated Cognitive Engine that will monitor, predict, optimise and control the energy flow in-between the various supply and demand sub-systems aiming at maximising building self-consumption and RES utilisation
Ensure optimal integration planning of RES and subsystems, based on a multi-criteria decision support tool facilitating installers’ and building owners’ decision-making process.
Deliver breakthrough innovations in core RES technologies for the buildings’ sector in Europe, maximising the systems’ performance for a lower cost.
Small-Scale Testing and Validation of the final solution in close to real-life forward-looking scenarios.
Create and evaluate customer-centric business models that will effectively exploit the potential of the proposed solution in several energy markets in Europe.

Pilots

Corby Enterprise Centre
UK – Corby, Northamptonshire

Technical University of Cluj-Napoca

Romania – Cluj-Napoca

The City of Lizzanello

Italy – Lizzanello

Hellenic Petroleum

Greece – Athens

The Energy Center

Italy – Torino

CERTH/ITI Smart House

Greece – Thessaloniki

This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research & innovation programme under grant agreement n° 815301.