Endesa sent letters to its 12,000 customers in the Malaga neighbourhood selected for the rollout of Smartcity, explaining the general scope and aim of the project and attaching a brief questionnaire which, when filled out, qualified the customer for the contest.

SmartCity is a pioneering Spanish project for developing a new energy management model for cities which aims to achieve 20% energy savings, reduce CO2 emissions by 6,000 tonnes per year and increase the use of renewable energy sources.

Malaga has been chosen to test the most promising technologies for developing a city with sustainable energy use and security of electricity supply.

Ángel Jiménez Saavedra, a Malaga resident from the Playa de La Misericordia neighbourhood, collected his prize today of one year of free electricity from Endesa, after having filled out the questionnaire about energy habits that was sent to 12,000 Malaga residents living in the area where Endesa is developing its Smartcity project. The manager of the company’s Central Andalusia division, Alfredo Rodríguez, was in charge of the awards ceremony.

In April, Endesa sent letters to its 12,000 customers in the Malaga neighbourhood selected for the Smartcity initiative, announcing its launch, and explaining the general scope and aim of the project.

Attached was also a brief voluntary questionnaire for its customers to fill out. By sending in the completed “Smartcity, your opinion counts” questionnaire, customers were eligible to participate in the contest, whose top prize was one year of free electricity. The questionnaire included eight questions designed to gather information and opinions about energy-related habits and new technologies.

A sustainable management model for cities of the future

The Smartcity Málaga project was conceived to promote the search for solutions to the energy and environmental problems arising from the increased population concentration in large cities. The project, spearheaded by Endesa, in collaboration with 15 other companies, government bodies and several research centres, has a budget of Euro 31 million for three years, aims to demonstrate the viability of concentrating in a single city centre a wide array of advanced and sustainable technologies in order make possible the creation of a new energy model for big cities. The overall objective of the project is to achieve 20% energy savings, and to reduce CO2 emissions by over 6,000 tonnes per year.

The project, currently in its initial phase, has already reached an important milestone with the installation of the first smart meters in Spain, in the city’s Playa de la Misericordia area. The project will benefit 300 industrial customers, 900 service providers and 11,000 households over four years.

Malaga was chosen because it meets all the requirements to ensure the initiative’s success: high growth potential, huge technological capacity, universities and businesses, strong government support and an excellent electrical infrastructure.

SmartCity will involve optimal grid integration of renewable-energy sources by bringing power generation facilities closer to end-users through the installation of photovoltaic panels on public buildings, the use of micro power generation in a number of hotels and the installation of micro wind power systems in the area. In addition, batteries will be used to store the energy generated, so that some of the energy can later be used for climate control of buildings, public lighting and electric transport. Furthermore, recharging stations will be installed and a small fleet of vehicles will be dispatched to encourage the use of electric cars.

Above all, however, the aim is to make end-users into active participants in this effort. All the customers involved in the project will be provided with new smart meters which have been developed for remote management to encourage more sustainable electricity consumption. The installation of advanced telecommunications and remote control systems will permit real-time and automated adjustments to the distribution network for a new form of energy management and better service.

SmartCity Malaga is one of the six most important projects of its kind in the world, together with Stockholm (Sweden), Malta, Masdar (Dubai), Boulder and Columbus (USA), and falls under the framework of the Plan 20-20-20 Plan of the European Union.