EDP NEW, as Smart2B project coordinator, is responsible for many different tasks, spanning from project management to more technical and business-oriented activities. A demanding role, but also an opportunity to develop new approaches to face the risks related to the project.

EDP NEW is Smart2B project coordinator, and it is responsible for ensuring a proper implementation and quality performance of the project and contributing for the achievement of the expected outcomes.

Additionally, EDP NEW is also Work Package 6 leader, coordinating the demonstration and evaluation of the Smart2B concept in the five diverse pilot sites.

Regarding the Smart2B technical pillars, EDP NEW will assist Smart Energy Lab, SEL, its third-party in the context of the project, in the integration of building appliances and legacy equipment through IoT gateways, namely through the developments in the communication layer of the already commercial available solution EDP re:dy system.

In addition, EDP NEW is responsible for the implementation and Integration of the smart readiness advising and gamification component, that includes the development of smart readiness advice and gamification strategies in user interfaces (Smart2B App). This component was integrated in the developed dashboards and aims at increasing users’ engagement with the interactive application, by guiding their attention to different aspects of energy consumption behavior (based on simulations of new revenue streams by forming citizen energy communities). The approach developed is based on EDP’s past experiences with the residential clients engagement platform: users will be guided through several challenges aimed at:

• reinforcing the energy literacy of the users
• reducing the buildings energy consumption while increase their engagement with Smart2B app

Eventually, the most active user will be the winner of the “greener building” competition.

Finally, EDP NEW is also contributing to some transversal tasks, including the definition of the use cases’ requirements, the refinement of the business model & case and the assessment of the cost and benefits of the Smart2B concept, which include the investigation of the economic feasibility of the business case.

Solving the interoperability issue through a user-centered approach

In Smart2B, since the beginning of the project, the lack of interoperability of all components (devices, platform, services, and the user-interaction app) was pointed as the main risk for success. However, based on the experience gained by EDP NEW and the other project partners in the last few years, it is believed that the solution to solve such complex problem should be the centrality of people.

From the project development point of view, people are central in the management of all human relationships and dependencies between the partners, to ensure that all the “dots” are connected.

From the solution point of view, because Smart2B is about designing and developing a smart building ecosystem to be used by people to solve their energy management problems.

It is then clear how Smart2B employs a user-centric approach as an overall management strategy, ensuring the involvement of all related parties in the whole process, from the proposal stage until the product development, to ensure the success of the project, which will be measured by the marketability of the products developed and their acceptance by Smart2B potential clients.