On Saturday, February 14, the first public launch event of the European project H2SCORE was held in Quarona.
Hosted in the heart of Valsesia and open to the local community, the meeting was not merely an institutional occasion, but a concrete opportunity to discuss the future of energy in the area. In a region already engaged in developing its Renewable Energy Community, the discussion focused on shared responsibility among institutions, businesses, and citizens, and on how a territory can take an active role in the energy transition.
The official launch of H2SCORE, funded by Horizon Europe and dedicated to integrating hydrogen into Renewable Energy Communities, in the presence of the Italian Minister for the Environment and Energy Security, Gilberto Pichetto Fratin, marked a significant step. Not because of the formal nature of the event, but because of the message it conveyed: technological innovation, public governance, and strong territorial roots must move forward together.
H2SCORE aims to demonstrate that hydrogen can become an enabling factor for Renewable Energy Communities, strengthening their flexibility, resilience, and ability to valorise locally produced renewable energy. However, the scope of the project goes beyond its technical dimension.
The real challenge lies in understanding how a Renewable Energy Community can evolve from being a simple energy-sharing mechanism into an integrated platform capable of interacting with different energy vectors, stabilising local systems, and reducing dependence on external sources.
In this context, Quarona and the Valsesia REC are not merely a demonstration site. They represent a real-life laboratory, embedded in a mountainous territory composed of businesses, public buildings, citizens, and local administrations. Here, the energy transition is not an abstract concept, but a tangible process measured against the daily needs of a community and its long-term development prospects.
An Alliance Across Institutional Levels and Competencies
The Minister’s presence reinforced this dimension. It was not just a formal institutional opening, but a clear political signal: the integration of Renewable Energy Communities with emerging technologies such as hydrogen is part of a broader strategy addressing energy security, industrial competitiveness, and decarbonisation.
When the national level recognises the value of a territorial experiment, a fundamental alignment is created. Policies find concrete application, and territories gain centrality within national energy strategies. This is where the transition ceases to be merely a regulatory direction and becomes a shared trajectory.
During the event, the plurality of actors involved clearly emerged: the scientific coordination of Politecnico di Torino, the technological contribution of industrial partners, the role of local administrations and the Mountain Union, and Engreen’s operational engagement in the territory. All of this reflects a model that goes beyond vertical approaches.
The energy transition cannot be managed in silos.
It requires technical expertise, political vision, industrial competence, and social consensus. No single actor can address its complexity alone. H2SCORE therefore becomes not only an innovation project, but also an exercise in governance.
From Demonstration to Territorial Impact
In this scenario, technological innovation is a tool, not an end in itself.
Hydrogen is not presented as a miraculous solution, but as a component of a broader system aimed at making Renewable Energy Communities more robust and autonomous.
The expected impact is concrete: greater stability of local systems, improved management of renewable surpluses, reduced energy vulnerability, and new opportunities for local businesses. Yet there is also a less visible — and perhaps even more strategic — impact: the ability to attract skills, investments, and institutional attention, generating an ecosystem conducive to innovation.
The open discussion session involving speakers, institutions, and citizens was not a formal ritual, but a methodological step. The energy transition is credible only if it is understandable and shared. Creating a space for dialogue, gathering expectations and potential concerns, means establishing a transparent pathway from the outset.
This approach is also crucial in terms of replicability.
H2SCORE will last four years, but its ambition goes further. If the integration of hydrogen within a Renewable Energy Community proves effective in a real context such as Valsesia, the model could be adopted in other Italian and European territories.
The true value of the initiative lies not only in the technology, but in the convergence it has activated. National and local administrations, universities, businesses, operational actors, and communities have shared the same space for discussion and the same strategic direction.
H2SCORE does not simply represent the launch of a hydrogen demonstration project. It represents a different way of approaching the energy transition: integrated, participatory, and rooted in territories.
If this synergy consolidates over the coming years, Quarona will not be remembered merely as the site of a European project, but as one of the starting points of a new generation of Renewable Energy Communities — more advanced, more resilient, and fully aware of their role within the future energy system.
