A group of people - neighbours, the town hall, the school, businesses, NGOs - who together produce the energy they use. That's it. The rest is legal and technical detail you can leave to an operator. On this page we explain what it means, how it works and what you get in practice.
The technical term is REC (Renewable Energy Community) or CEC (Citizen Energy Community). Both rest on three elements - without them, it is not a community.
The energy is produced from the sun, the wind or other clean sources. Not coal, not gas. This is not an option - it is the legal definition (RED III, transposed in Romania through Government Emergency Ordinance (OUG) 59/2025).
All members are on the same distribution grid - the same town, village or neighbouring area. Energy produced locally stays local.
Members are not shareholders chasing profit, they are beneficiaries of the energy. The surplus (the money from sales) is reinvested or shared out according to the allocation key set in the statutes.
Four steps in which energy turns from sunlight into a reduction on your bill. You change nothing at home: the grid is the same, the meter is the same.
The solar panels on the roof of the town hall, the school or a shared building produce kWh in the sunlight.
A smart meter records every kWh produced and every kWh consumed by members, in real time.
The energy travels through the public grid - the same one that brings you electricity now. The grid operator (DSO) knows it as your community's energy.
Your share of the production is automatically deducted from your consumption. Your bill gets smaller - by between 20% and 60%.
The community must have a legal entity, which is then entered in the national register of energy communities kept by ANRE (Romania's energy regulator). There are several options; all have advantages and constraints. STUP Standard recommends the cooperative, but we accept any viable form. The first two communities registered in Romania, in September 2026, chose exactly these two paths: an association in Galați and a cooperative in Sibiu.
| Legal form | Minimum members | Legal basis | For whom |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cooperative | 5 | Law 1/2005 | Communities with benefits shared equally - recommended by STUP |
| Association | 3 | Government Ordinance (OG) 26/2000 | NGOs, homeowners' associations, neighbourhood communities |
| Homeowners' assoc. | varies | Law 196/2018 | Blocks of flats, panels on a shared roof |
Once the form is chosen: statutes + articles of incorporation → legal registration → entry in the national register of energy communities, following the procedure in ANRE Order 50/2026. The register has been running since June 2026, and the first registrations were made in September 2026. Procedural timeline: 4-6 months from scratch. After registration, members have 180 days to switch to smart meters. Full details on the Legislation page.
Reductions of 20% to 60% on each member's bill. For an average household's consumption, that means 200-600 lei a month taken off the cost of electricity.
The reduction on your bill comes from the community's own production, not from subsidies. The surplus sold through a supplier brings money back into the community and is reinvested locally: expansion, batteries, new projects.
An average community (200 kWp) avoids ~150 tonnes of CO₂ a year. The equivalent of taking 65 cars off the road. And zero fossil fuel burned on your doorstep.
You don't have to own land to be in the community. And you don't have to install anything at home. The community is about who can join as a member and who benefits - not about who pays for the installation.
The next step is simple: you write to us through the form, we get back to you within 24h (by phone if you left a number, otherwise by email), and we have a 30-minute conversation about your situation. Then we send you a concrete brief with the steps and the costs.
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