Renewable Energy Community WebGIS as a Capitalisation Tool for the Mediterranean Region

Abstract

The Mediterranean area is a fertile territory for numerous European projects related to renewable energy. In order to avoid the loss of the project results after their conclusion and to allow diffusion and application of these results within relevant territorial plans and national/European policies, the Interreg MED programme created, in the current programming period, eight thematic communities, managed by “Horizontal” projects, whose role is to communicate and capitalise on the results of the communities' funded projects. In their capitalisation phase, the Horizontal projects should allow the replicability of the community projects results in territories of the MED area, not involved within the projects. The Interreg MED Renewable Energy Community (MED RES Community) created a WebGIS platform, which highlights the results of the six “Modular” projects belonging to the community: LOCAL4GREEN - “LOCAL Policies for GREEN Energy”, StoRES - “Promotion of higher penetration of distributed PV through storage for all”, COMPOSE - “Rural Communities engaged with positive energy”, PRISMI - “Promoting RES integration for smart Mediterranean islands”, PEGASUS - “Promoting Effective Generation and Sustainable Uses of electricity” and ForBioEnergy - “Forest Bioenergy in the Protected Mediterranean Areas”. A WebGIS platform is an online Geographic Information System (GIS), combining the advantages of both the Internet and GIS. The MED RES Community WebGIS platform is available at the following address: https://rescommunitywebgis.envipark.com, and is structured in 2 sections opened to the public: 1) The WebGIS section, dedicated to the cartographic elements, includes thematic maps and data related to renewable energy in general and to the MED RES Community and its projects; 2) The Document Manager section, a selection of relevant documentation, where thematic reports and technical data related also to the map elements are accessible. It provides a visual map of Europe on which users can see how different types of energy are produced and used across Europe with a simple click. The data-rich map allows not only to add and remove layers of data or thematic maps, but also to collect, process, analyse, interpret, visualize and communicate information. The MED RES Community WebGIS is focused on the Interreg MED cooperation area, composed of 57 regions divided among 10 EU Member states and 3 countries from the instrument for Pre-Accession Assistance, located on the north shore of the Mediterranean sea. These territories have to face up with common specific energy challenges for the energy transition. This paper has the objective to present the structure, contents, features and potentialities of the MED RES Community WebGIS platform and explain in what terms it is considered a capitalisation tool for the Mediterranean Region.