# Energy Transition on Sifnos: An Approach to Economic and Social Transition and Development
## 1 Introduction
### Energy Transition on Sifnos--The Sifnos Energy Community  
The idea and the necessity for energy transition on Sifnos was transferred to the islanders directly through their contacts with energy cooperatives from other countries, given the following facts on Sifnos:  
* The strong dependence of the island on imported energy sources. * The high electricity production cost [10]. * The fact that the final electricity procurement price for the final consumers is equal everywhere in Greece, regardless of the differences in the levelized energy production cost between the mainland and the insular grids. This means that the mainland consumers subsidize the low electricity procurement price in the insular, autonomous grids in Greece by paying a higher price than the levelized production cost in the interconnected mainland grid. * The forthcoming liberalization of the electricity wholesale market, which will probably overturn the previously described status regarding the equal electricity price in Greece [43; 44]. * The high investment interest from private investors for the development of electricity production plants from RES on the Greek islands, revealing, on the one hand, the high available wind and solar potential and threatening, on the other hand, to modify the insular environments in decentralized industrial zones through the development of disproportional large projects in these small and sensitive natural ecosystems [45]. * The European Commission directives and what happens in Europe with the foundation and the activation of hundreds of Energy Cooperatives. Given the aforementioned facts, some few tens of Sifnos residents founded, in 2013, the Sifnos Island Cooperative (SIC) [46], aiming to drive a rational, fair and effective energy transition for their island, with the optimum possible benefits for their community. At that time, the SIC was the first cooperative scheme among insular Greece communities. Today, the SIC has transformed into the Sifnos Energy Community (SEC). More than 150 Sifnos families, out of the 800 in total, together with the Municipality of Sifnos and a number of members outside Sifnos, participate in the SEC, making it the largest in Greece with regard to its size per capita. To date, the SEC has been active in the following initiatives and projects:  
* Capacity building of the local insular community based on the concept of energy transition and the objectives of the SEC. * The design, the siting, the sizing and the submission for licensing of a hybrid power plant, consisting of a wind park and a PHS system, with the target to undertake 100% of the current and the future electricity consumption in the island, accounting also for the transition to e-mobility and additional expected electricity loads [47; 48]. The project was designed and licensed despite the fact that the electricity selling price from the HPP to the grid still remains unknown, due to revisions of the relevant legislation. * In November 2018, the SIC joined the European Commission network of the \"Clean Energy for EU Islands\" initiative and was declared as one of the six pilot islands of the European Union. As a pilot island, the SIC undertook and fulfilled the obligation of the design and the writing of the Clean Energy Transition Agenda (CETA) [6]. The distinction of Sifnos as one of the six pilot islands by the European Commission constitutes a reward for the efforts of the SIC since 2013. At the same time, it reveals the innovation and the challenges of the overall venture, while it designates the route towards energy transition on Sifnos as a pilot for the whole of Europe. Indeed, the SEC's initiative, particularly through the design and the development of the hybrid power plant, has the following innovative features at the global level:  
* It is the first project at the global level involving a hybrid power plant based on the combined operation of a wind park and PHS system operating with seawater.