The city of Eeklo in Belgium works closely with local citizen-energy cooperatives to ensure access to affordable, local, renewable energy for its citizens. Since 2000 several wind turbines were developed on public grounds of the city by the citizen-energy cooperatives Ecopower and Volterra. This way over 500 households (5% of total households) in Eeklo became member of the cooperatives in the last 20 years. The average profile of these households are highly educated middle class families. As a city we want that our local energy is available for every citizen, especially households in energy poverty as they could benefit even more of lower energy prices from the cooperative Ecopower (that has a suppliers permit in Flanders). But becoming member of the cooperative means becoming shareholder by investing €250 euro in the cooperative, a financial barrier which makes membership out of reach for a lot of families in energy poverty. The city of Eeklo and Ecopower are setting up social energy shares to overcome this financial barrier. The social shares are shares of the cooperative that are pre-financed by the city and that can by used by lower income households. The households pay the value of the share (€250) spread over 6 years via their monthly advance invoice (€3.5 montly). They are full members of the cooperative from the start. We work closely with social services to identify households with difficulties to pay their energy bill and help them transfer to the cooperative supplier if they are interested. This way we try to make affordable, local, renewable energy accessible for every inhabitant of the city, regardless of their household budget.

Regional and local public authorities have a strong role to play in fighting energy poverty. That is why the overall objective of POWER UP! is for cities to go beyond their planning role and sustain the creation of local energy market players with a social agenda. This will be realised by the following 3 specific objectives: - Implement pilot schemes for households in energy poverty, so that they benefit from renewable energy production and energy efficiency measures, without having to bear the financial risks; - Develop and reinforce local energy market players with a social agenda, based on a long-term perspective to acquire local knowledge and strengthen the local economy; - Disseminate the experience of the consortium members to facilitate the replication in European countries. Four pilot schemes will be developed in five locations across Europe: Eeklo (Belgium), in the Campania area (Italy), in Rožnov pod Radhoštěm (Czech Republic), and Valencia (Spain). These schemes will be co-created with energy-poor households and local stakeholders (cities, social organisations, energy utilities, citizen energy communities etc.), leading to at least 2,5 Million EUR investment in sustainable energy before the project ends and involving 58 333 energy poor consumers. Supported by a European city network, a leading UK university, a Belgium cooperative and finance experts, the consortium will build the capacity of more than 185 people in local organisations. This will allow these players to either provide cheap energy to fuel poor households, or reinvesting benefits to carry out energy poverty mitigation measures.