A transferable coordination-based method for analysing renewable energy systems derived from the EU FLEXI project. The framework models infrastructures as synchronised material, value and information flows.
Research context
The methodological framework presented here is developed within the EU co-funded FLEXI project. FLEXI investigates coordination mechanisms in renewable-based energy systems with a specific focus on flexibility activation and operational stability.
The approach does not introduce a new technological concept. Instead, it applies an established coordination-oriented systems understanding to contemporary energy infrastructures characterised by variability and distributed resources.
The underlying perspective originates from infrastructure management research in which technical systems are analysed as coupled logistics and information structures. Energy systems therefore represent a specific application domain of a general resource coordination problem.
Energy systems as logistics structures
The framework models energy systems as three interdependent operational layers:
- Resource layer – availability of primary energy
- Demand layer – temporally and spatially distributed consumption
- Coverage layer – conversion, storage and transport processes
Stable system behaviour depends not on optimisation within one layer but on synchronisation across all three layers.
Coordination through three fundamental flows
Synchronisation occurs through three coupled flows:
Material flow
Physical energy carriers and infrastructure capacity
Value flow
Economic signals and market mechanisms
Information flow
Forecasting, control and operational decision processes
With increasing renewable penetration, material availability becomes variable while operational requirements remain continuous. Under these conditions, the information flow becomes the dominant coordination mechanism.
Flexibility as a system property
Within this framework, flexibility is not defined as a market product or a specific technical feature.
Flexibility emerges when information processes anticipate and align material and value flows across the three system layers. A system therefore becomes flexible only if decision processes operate faster than physical constraints propagate through the infrastructure.
Application procedure
The framework can be applied through the following analytical steps:
- Identify operational actors in each system layer
- Map dependencies between resource, demand and coverage
- Detect delays between information and material response
- Define coordination points where decisions must occur
- Stabilise recurring operational routines
The objective is not optimisation of single components but reduction of coordination latency.
Relation to living lab environments
Living lab infrastructures provide operational environments in which coordination behaviour can be examined under real conditions. They allow verification of whether synchronisation between flows is practically achievable rather than theoretically assumed.
From this perspective, demonstration projects represent application environments of a general coordination model rather than isolated technological experiments.
Conclusion
Flexible energy systems should primarily be analysed as coordination problems rather than technological ones. Stability depends on maintaining synchronisation between information, material and value flows.
The presented framework therefore offers a transferable analytical method applicable across technologies, energy carriers and regional contexts.
Foundational references
Foundational system model
Methodischer Problemlösungsansatz für ein zukunftsorientiertes Wasserwirtschaftskonzept. Wasserwirtschaft, 1994.
Methodological operationalisation
EU FLEXI project – coordination mechanisms in renewable energy systems.
Empirical implementation and validation
Establishment of Austria’s First Regional Green Hydrogen Economy: WIVA P&G HyWest. Energies Journal.
About the methodological background
The work of the Green Energy Center is based on a coordination-oriented infrastructure model originally developed for integrated resource management and first published in a peer-reviewed form in 1994.
Subsequent projects apply this systems approach to renewable energy integration and hydrogen infrastructure.
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Energy system transformation increasingly depends on the ability to coordinate distributed resources, infrastructures and users rather than on individual technological performance. This article introduces a coordination-oriented analytical framework derived from Living Lab operation environments. The approach treats energy systems as logistics systems in which material, value and information flows must remain synchronised to enable reliable operation.
The framework is independent of specific projects and can be applied to regional energy systems, hydrogen infrastructures and cross-sector coupling environments.
Rather than introducing a new theory, the following framework operationalises an existing coordination-based systems understanding within the domain of energy infrastructures.
With the European research project FLEXI, a central challenge of the energy system transformation comes into focus: the development of flexibility mechanisms that enable supply and demand to be coordinated in increasingly complex, renewable-based energy systems. FLEXI addresses this challenge by focusing on flexibility markets, services, governance structures and decision-making mechanisms, explicitly recognising the growing importance of data-driven and information-based coordination. From the perspective of the GEC Codex Partnership, FLEXI is particularly relevant where these concepts do not remain abstract, but are confronted with real system experience from Living Lab environments.
Core Scientific Context
The work presented here is based on a coordination-oriented resource system model originally developed for integrated infrastructure management and first published in a peer-reviewed form in 1994.
The model describes technical infrastructures as logistics systems in which stability depends on synchronisation between material processes and decision processes.
The following contribution applies this systems perspective to contemporary energy infrastructures
Methodological Background
The systemic perspective applied in FLEXI does not originate from energy markets alone. It derives from earlier work on infrastructure coordination and circular system stabilisation, where technical systems were analysed as coupled logistics and information structures.
In this context, energy systems are understood as a specific case of operational resource management in which stability depends on synchronisation between material processes and decision processes.
The FLEXI project therefore serves as an application domain in which this coordination-oriented systems approach can be examined under conditions of renewable energy variability.
Energy Systems as Logistics Structures
The framework models energy systems as three interdependent operational layers:
- Resource system layer, availability of primary energy
- Demand system layer, temporally and spatially distributed consumption
- Coverage system layer, conversion, storage and transport processes
Stable system behaviour depends not on individual optimisation within one layer, but on synchronisation across all three layers.
Coordination Through Three Fundamental Flows
System synchronisation occurs through three coupled flows:
- Material flow, physical energy carriers and infrastructure capacity
- Value flow, economic signals and market mechanisms
- Information flow, forecasting, control and decision processes
With increasing renewable penetration, information flow becomes the dominant coordination mechanism because material availability becomes variable while operational requirements remain continuous.
Flexibility as a System Property
Within this framework, flexibility is not defined as a market product or a technical feature.
Flexibility emerges when information flow can anticipate and align material and value flows across the three system layers. A system therefore becomes flexible only if decision processes operate faster than physical constraints propagate through the infrastructure.
Application Procedure
The framework can be applied through the following steps:
- Identify operational actors in each layer
- Map dependencies between resource, demand and coverage
- Detect delays between information and material response
- Define coordination points where decisions must occur
- Stabilise recurring operational routines
The objective is not optimisation of single components but reduction of coordination latency.
Relation to Living Lab Environments
Living Lab infrastructures provide environments in which the described coordination behaviour can be observed under real operating conditions. They allow validation of whether synchronisation between flows is operationally achievable rather than theoretically assumed.
Research Context and Programme Framework
The methodological framework presented in this article is developed within the context of the EU co-funded FLEXI project. FLEXI investigates coordination mechanisms in renewable-based energy systems with a specific focus on flexibility activation and system stability.
The project does not introduce a new theoretical paradigm but applies an existing coordination-based systems understanding to contemporary energy infrastructures under conditions of increasing variability.
Conclusion
Flexible energy systems should be analysed primarily as coordination problems rather than technological ones. The presented framework therefore focuses on maintaining synchronisation between information, material and value flows as the primary condition for stable operation.
This perspective enables transferability across technologies, energy carriers and regional contexts.
From this perspective, FLEXI does not represent a standalone research topic but an application environment in which a general coordination model of technical infrastructures becomes observable in a modern, renewable-based energy system..
Living Labs at GEC: from models to reality
The Green Energy Center Europe (GEC) does not understand itself as a collection of individual projects, but as a systemic learning and implementation environment. The central methodological framework for this approach is the Living Lab, which deliberately connects research, real infrastructure and real-world applications. Within this framework, several functional entities play a key role:
- EWest – Power in Demand processes
- HyWest – Power to Hydrogen processes
- Quantum computing–based optimisation approaches
These entities are not parallel stand-alone projects. Rather, they fulfil complementary system functions within a coherent architecture for the transformation of the energy system. The GEC Codex Partnership acts as the operational and economic backbone of this structure, connecting research activities, digital and physical infrastructure, data, hardware and software resources, and real-world market actors, and translating them into implementable projects.
The logistics system as a unifying principle
Work within the GEC Living Labs follows a logistics-based system understanding, which can be described through three closely interlinked subsystems:
- Resource (Supply)
– real energy availability, such as renewable generation and electricity surpluses - Demand
– real demand profiles from industry, mobility, logistics and infrastructure - Coverage of Demand
– conversion, storage, transport and temporal decoupling
These subsystems are not isolated. They are connected through three fundamental flows:
- Material flows (electricity, hydrogen, physical resources)
- Value flows (costs, benefits, market mechanisms)
- Information flows (data, control signals, optimisation, forecasting)
With increasing system complexity, the information flow becomes a decisive coordinating element.
EWest and HyWest: real supply and demand logics
EWest (Power in Demand) represents real demand structures. It makes visible when, where and under which constraints flexibility on the consumption side is actually available, beyond idealised modelling assumptions.
HyWest (Power to Hydrogen) addresses the supply and conversion side. Through the real production, storage and logistics of green hydrogen, temporal and spatial flexibilities are created that cannot be captured within the electricity system alone.
Together, these entities provide real data, real constraints and real learning experiences, which are indispensable for any serious discussion of flexibility markets and system coordination.
FLEXI and the information flow: AI as a systemic resource
FLEXI focuses on a dimension where classical energy system approaches increasingly reach their limits: the coordination of highly complex decision spaces.
Here, the information flow becomes central, for example through:
- AI-based forecasting and decision support
- optimisation of flexibility activation
- market design and governance considerations
- digital services for flexibility providers and users
From the GEC perspective, the key added value of FLEXI lies in the fact that these approaches can be developed in direct connection with real Living Lab infrastructures, rather than in isolation.
Bridging to quantum computing and the REINFORCE project
The challenges addressed in FLEXI are closely related to quantum computing–based optimisation approaches, as explored, for example, in the REINFORCE project. While classical AI methods already provide important contributions to pattern recognition and decision support, quantum computing opens new perspectives for:
- high-dimensional optimisation problems
- non-linear system couplings
- multi-objective conflicts (costs, CO₂, availability, grid constraints)
At GEC, these approaches are considered not in abstraction, but in the context of real, available hardware and software resources and real-world implementation projects.
Added value for FLEXI: reality as a testbed
From this perspective, a clear added value for FLEXI emerges:
- Living Labs provide real supply, demand and demand-coverage logics
- market concepts can be tested against actual system states
- governance and service approaches become empirically assessable
- flexibility is understood as a systemic property, not merely as a market product
In this sense, FLEXI becomes not only a research project, but part of a learning system in which theory, modelling and implementation continuously inform one another.
Outlook
The systemic integration of EWest, HyWest, AI-based information flows and, prospectively, quantum computing illustrates how the transformation of the energy system can be understood and shaped as a coherent process.
From the perspective of the GEC Codex Partnership, FLEXI is therefore not an isolated initiative, but an important resonance space for embedding Living Lab experience while simultaneously incorporating new methodological impulses.
This systemic perspective also provides a foundation for further consolidation within a broader manuscript, in which digital, algorithmic and physical entities of the energy system are analysed in an integrated manner.
Positioning within the GEC context
Further information on projects and Living Lab entities of the Green Energy Center Europe can be found at:
👉 https://green-energy-center.com/projects/
References
About the methodological background
The work of the Green Energy Center is based on a coordination-oriented infrastructure model originally developed for integrated resource management and first published in a peer-reviewed form in 1994.
The model interprets technical infrastructures as logistics systems whose stability depends on synchronisation between material processes and decision processes.
Subsequent projects and publications apply this systems approach to contemporary domains such as renewable energy integration, hydrogen infrastructure and regional energy planning.
Demonstration projects therefore serve as application environments rather than isolated research topics.
Methodischer Problemlösungsansatz für ein zukunftsorientiertes Wasserwirtschaftskonzept, Wasserwirtschaft 1994: https://green-energy-center.com/methodischer-problemlosungsansatz-fur-ein-zukunftsorientiertes-wasserwirtschaftskonzept/
Establishment of Austria’s First Regional Green Hydrogen Economy: WIVA P&G HyWest, Energies Journal 2023 : https://green-energy-center.com/establishment-of-austrias-first-regional-green-hydrogen-economy-wiva-pg-hywest-publication-in-energies-journal/
Strategy Tirol 2050 Energy Autonomous: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLvm1wAxuTkzwtTQbIAHZ5z-2z6C8uL8gy&si=o4Z_FrOgaCKVAQHO
