A local community defines their own path to sustainability through renewable energy
Summary
The 3700 inhabitants on the 114 sq.km Danish island Samsoe (Samsø) has through wind, solar, and biomass projects converted the energy systems on the island to be CO2 neutral. The fossil fuels still used in the transport sector and in some of the individual housing heating systems, is off-set by sale of wind-based excess energy production.
| Sector | Energy |
| Sub-sector/ Technology | Biogas; Biomass; Energy conservation; Heat generation; Heatpumps; Solar; Wind |
| Climate Action | Mitigation |
| Elements | Municipality and citizen devised plan to make the island fully based on renewable energy. Mix of private, collective, and municipal investments and implementation. Elements include windmills, solar, heat pumps, and district heating based on biomass. Transport sector transformation to bio-ethanol etc. but not yet fully implemented. Wind energy excess production and sale compensates for fossil fuels use in transport sector. |
| Applicability | Islands and/or local communities. Requires cooperation among citizens, public services, and private sector |
| Barriers | Transport sector still difficult to effectively make fossil-fuel free |
Full Story
Since 1998 the inhabitants of the island of Samsoe in Denmark devised and implemented a plan to make the island fully based on renewable energy and CO2 neutral. Except for 30% of the heating of houses 
outside the district central heating system and the transport sector, energy production on the island is since 2012 based on wind and solar energy. The 114 sq.km island with 3700 inhabitants and 2000 households, has three ferries connecting it to the rest of Denmark (15km off the coast of Jutland).
In cooperation between the local municipality, citizen cooperatives, and the private sector, several windmills were constructed on land. Later, an off-shore windmill park was established south of the island. The excess electricity production is sold to the mainland of Denmark, and this excess renewable energy production off-sets the fossil fuels still used in the transport sector and for some of the housing heating systems outside of the district heating system. As such the island as a whole is CO2 neutral, energy-wise.
District heating is using biomass (primarily locally produced straw) and many houses have heat pumps installed using renewably produced electricity from the grid.
The transport sector is still partly fossil fuel based. One of the three ferries is using gas, and economically feasible solutions to convert the transport sector to renewable solutions are constantly pursued.
For more information:
Samsoe’s own website explaining the process – Energiakademiet / Energy Academy
Photo: Top Panoramio, Bottom Energiakademiet Samsoe
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Probably using more fossil fuel than it saves. This is Denmark where insolation is poor and solar is inefficient – some think ERoEI < 1.0.