An inspiration for INVADE are the world-wide agreements on minimisation of human caused effects to climate change and energy efficiency targets set at the European Union with ambitious goals for reduction of greenhouse gas emission and for increase of renewable energy share. To enable a higher share of renewable energy sources to the smart grid and gain a traction in the market place a few critical barriers must be overcome. There is a deficiency of 1) flexibility and battery management systems 2) exploration of ICT solutions based on active end user participation 3) efficient integration of energy storage and transport sector (EVs), 4) novel business models supporting an increasing number of different actors in the grid. INVADE addresses these challenges by proposing to deliver a Cloud based flexibility management system integrated with EVs and batteries empowering energy storage at mobile, distributed and centralised levels to increase renewables share in the smart distribution grid. The project integrates different components: flexibility management system, energy storage technologies, electric vehicles and novel business models. It underpins these components with advanced ICT cloud based technologies to deliver the INVADE platform. The project will integrate the platform with existing infrastructure and systems at pilot sites in Bulgaria, Germany, Spain, Norway and the Netherlands and validate it through mobile, distributed and centralised use cases in the distribution grid in large scale demonstrations. Novel business models and extensive exploitation activities will be able to tread the fine line between maximizing profits for a full chain of stakeholders and optimizing social welfare while contributing to the standardization and regulation policies for the European energy market. A meaningful integration of the transport sector is represented by Norway and the Netherlands pilots – with the highest penetration of EVs worldwide.

The Triangulum project will demonstrate how a systems innovation approach based around the European Commission’s SCC Strategic Implementation Plan can drive dynamic smart city development. We will test the SIP across three lighthouse cities: Manchester, Eindhoven and Stavanger, which represent the main typologies of European cities. They will be complemented by our follower cities Prague, Leipzig and Sabadell. This powerful combination reflects an urban population of between 100k and 1,2m inhabitants across six different countries, allowing us to demonstrate successful replication across a wide range of typical urban areas in Europe. Each city has already made significant progress towards the transition of becoming a smart city; developing their own individual approach reflecting specific local circumstances. These inherent strengths will now serve to accelerate the smart city development across proposed demonstration sites within Triangulum. The suite of projects developed will be based around zero/low energy districts, integrated infrastructures and sustainable urban mobility designed to deliver a range of cross-cutting outcomes across different sectors and stakeholders. This will provide the basis to ‘road test’ the SIP and provide recommendations to the Commission on how it could be improved to facilitate wider replication. The Triangulum goals target a series of direct impacts around; reduced energy consumption of buildings, increased use of renewable energies, increased utilisation of electric vehicles, deployment of intelligent energy management technologies and the deployment of an adaptive and dynamic ICT data hub. The design and implementation of innovative Business Models and the activation of citizens as co-creators are core cross-cutting elements to base the technologies in real-world city environments and facilitate replication.