8 teams, 35 participants and two days to offer their solutions to the challenges in the energy sector. This is what the first remote intelligence hackathon, organised by Ignitis grupė and the Ministry of Energy, looked like. Its winners created an energy-saving loyalty program and a special scenario for the use of energy storage technology.

This year, for the seventh time, the participants of the hackathon addressed various issues of today's energy sector: from the development of the network of electric car charging stations to the mobilization of electricity demand and consumer loyalty programs. Each hackathon team was assigned with mentors from Ignitis grupė, ESO, Ignitis, the Ministry of Energy and Start-up Lithuania, who kept in touch with the participants and shared the necessary knowledge. "This year, the smart energy hackathon has attracted talents from various fields not only from Lithuania, but also from seven other European countries. In addition, the event became a great opportunity for Lithuanians studying or working in other countries to prove their strength – hackathon teams also included compatriots living in Belgium, Germany and Denmark. We received very carefully fulfilled and noteworthy decisions, so the commission that evaluated the work of the teams had to work very hard,” says Paulius Kozlovas, the head of the Innovation Centre of Ignitis grupė.

Enestor and Flexitis became the winners of the hackathon. The first, consisting mainly of doctoral students in energy sciences, proposed a smart solution for the accumulation and distribution of surplus energy by producing consumers using infrastructure for electric cars. Meanwhile, Flexitis has proposed the creation of an electricity consumer loyalty program, which would reward its participants with points for reducing or increasing electricity consumption at the right time.

The winners of the smart energy hackathon were awarded a prize fund of EUR 2,000. "The energy of the future is unimaginable without creative, flexible and innovative solutions. This year, in order to promote smart energy initiatives, we awarded a nominal award from the Ministry of Energy to one of the teams involved in the hackathon. We hope that the ideas proposed by the participants will be further developed and will contribute to the growth and intelligence of the Lithuanian energy sector. Business participation in achieving energy progress is one of the most important goals of the Lithuanian energy sector, which we actively pursue,” says Lina Sabaitienė, Deputy Minister of Energy.

This year's smart energy hackathon became the first joint project of the Ignitis grupė and the Ministry of Energy after the cooperation agreement signed by both of them on 16 September this year. The main objective of this agreement is to create a favourable energy innovation ecosystem in the areas of human resources, science, technology, new products and services, communication and a culture of innovation.