Incumbent Perspective to the Sustainability Transitions: District Heating Companies and the Rise of Energy Communities

Abstract

Energy communities and solutions are gaining more attention as a part of the sustainability transition. District heating (DH) companies are not traditionally part of those communities or solutions, although the literature suggests that DH companies should seek to develop prosumer-centric business models.. In this study, four different scenarios are created, each scenario with different involvement of DH company and DH. Four case studies are selected to shed more light on the scenarios and three main topics studied in this paper: Actor network, regulation and policy, and technology and material aspects. This study discusses the role of DH and DH company in energy communities and energy solutions, and how their involvement affects their revenue.