Building Energy Commons: Three Mini-PV Installation Cases in Apartment Complexes in Seoul

Seihun Yang, Weiming Chen and Hana Kim
Additional contact information
Seihun Yang: Department of Social Economy, Hansei University, Gunpo 15852, Korea
Weiming Chen: Center for Applied Demography and Survey Research, University of Delaware, Newark, DE 19716, USA
Hana Kim: School of Humanities & Social Science, KAIST, Daejeon 34141, Korea

Energies, 2021, vol. 14, issue 1, 1-14

Abstract: Solar photovoltaics (PV) deployment is not easy in dense urban areas because there is little space for the installation. Furthermore, tenants have few incentives to install PV panels because they frequently relocate, and most PV facilities are nonremovable. To address these factors, this study reports on an innovative model that collectively installed 260 W of mini-PV on the balconies of almost all the households in two high-rise apartment complexes in Seoul, South Korea. This project was unique in that it established energy commons in a community using private space. This study found that economic and social factors significantly influenced community-internal or micro factors, which in turn affected the success of the community energy project. Economic factors such as the expected economic benefit and residents paying no direct installation costs shaped the initial conditions for the commencement of the project. Leadership played a key role by speeding up the process, relieving residents’ concerns and distrust. This study introduced an innovative community energy model that can be referenced by megacities and communities. It provides opportunities for enhancing awareness of energy transition via on-site energy production using renewable energy and allows even communities that have insufficient common space to build energy commons.

Keywords: community energy; dense urban area; mini-PV; collective installation; energy commons; internal factor (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (7)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/14/1/249/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/14/1/249/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jeners:v:14:y:2021:i:1:p:249-:d:475063

Access Statistics for this article

Energies is currently edited by Ms. Agatha Cao

More articles in Energies from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().