oPEN Lab’s 1st YEAR OF IMPLEMENTATION

One year into the EU’s Green Deal project oPEN Lab, under the leadership of VITO and closely supported by Sympraxis, three open innovation Living Labs have been set up in the cities of Genk (BE), Pamplona (ES) and Tartu (EE) and are fully on the road to create and deliver Positive Energy Neighbourhoods (PENs). Already, the three Living Labs have collectively reached hundreds of stakeholders (citizens, researchers, business and financial actors, etc.) with whom they defined their targets for social, technical, business and other innovation, and are ready to enter into the tendering procedure for jointly renovating more than 45,000 m² into PEN. An open call for innovators is currently under preparation and planned to be launched in early 2023. Despite, or maybe against, the energy crisis, oPEN Lab paves the way towards an unprecedented opportunity to rethink Europe’s energy infrastructure and uptake sustainable, flexible, efficient, and integrated clean energy solutions.