*3.2. Key Success Factors for the Implementation of CRE Projects*

The key actors identified nine factors that could have influenced CRE implementation. The nine factors can be then categorized into two groups: internal and external. Upon considering the CRE development step, each internal factor is allocated to each step that requires it inside the community, as shown in Figure 4. On the other hand, the external factors mainly are supports from outside the community, which are also assigned to the required step, as shown in Figure 4. Details of the internal and external factors are introduced in the following sections.

**Figure 4.** Summary of internal and external conditions and their interaction through a path toward a successful implementation of CRE in Thailand.

#### 3.2.1. Internal Factors

A clear "intention and vision" in a community (for both a leader and team members) creates cooperation and unity, accounting for 84% of the groups. For instance, a cooperative group representative mentioned that "our group has very clear intention and vision on CRE development for improving the local environment and reducing fuel cost of our rubber processing. Therefore, the team members work hard to achieve successful implementation of the project".

"Human resources" is essential in the implementation, accounting for 83% of the groups. A cooperative group representative, for instance, said that "despite the cooperative having many members and staff, we lack the personnel with expertise in renewable energy technologies. We have to ask the help of experts from outside, which leads to some delay in the implementation".

"Management skills" helps drive the project smoothly, accounting for 94% of the groups. A community enterprise representative elaborated that "the project must be expertly managed on time, on budget, with knowledge and integration that organizations need". He added that "without this skill, our project would not be successful in terms of the objective, budget, and time".

"Community participation" exerts a significant influence on project implementation because the participation gains social acceptance, accounting for 50% of the groups. For instance, a biogas network project involved 100 households. The gas produced is supplied through a piping system to the houses of community members. In such a project, community participation plays an essential role because the number of participating households critically affects gas utilization and income.

#### 3.2.2. External Factors

"RE potential" and "mature technology" are significant factors for project development, accounting for 100% and 92% of the groups, respectively. Each group mentioned that "without RE resources and technology, the community would not implement CRE. Furthermore, the lack of RE assessment and technology evaluation causes the project to fail".

"Financial support" is a significant factor in a project's implementation, accounting for 84% of the groups. A grant from the MOEN is the primary source of financial support. The MOEN fund accounts for 30% to 70% of the total budget. Subsequently, the community bears the rest. We found that 85% of the projects raised funds by collecting money from their group members or using the organization's budget. Three cooperative groups and one community enterprise, which represent only 15% of the projects, borrowed money from banks. Many of them indicated that it was challenging to get a loan for a project with a reasonable interest rate from a commercial bank. Furthermore, a representative of a nonprofit foundation group elaborated that a "foundation organization has no choice but to use the foundation's capital because it is quite difficult for the foundation to borrow money from the bank". Some of them mentioned that "it would be easier for us to implement the project if the government could contact some banks to approve the community loans". Therefore, a financial institution's support is vital for CRE implementation to overcome the initial investment cost burden.

"Appropriate consultation" is necessary to design CRE, accounting for 83% of the groups. All the groups mentioned that "the projects would not succeed without the support from the expert or academic institution". In these CRE projects, the MOEN provided the community people with technical support from academic advisors. This factor plays an essential role in the initial stage of CRE project development. Community members cannot design concrete CRE systems by themselves due to limited knowledge and skills.

"Support from national and local government" is needed to authorize a project, accounting for 61% of the groups. Most of the respondents mentioned that "when we create the legal entity in the early development stage, we require support from the relevant government".

#### **4. Discussion**

The results show that the formation of a CRE's group and the existence of external support contribute to the successful implementation of CRE in Thailand. The characteristics of Thai communities make it easier to formulate groups due to their collectivist mentality and commitment to the traditional roles of each member. However, the formation of a formal organization is necessary as it provides the structure and rules that enable the community to manage the project as a business. Support from the academe helps less experienced CREs by providing technical and financial knowledge. On the other hand, the government provides financial support to implement the projects since most communities have low income.

#### *4.1. Characteristics of the Community*

Thai farmers with a collectivist culture have a tendency to build long-term relationships and trust, which leads to a shared intention and vision. Their commitment to traditional roles leads to everyone having their own rightful place in society, which fosters community participation in maintaining society. Hofstede reported that Thai cultures exhibit a high power distance and tend to be low on individualism [35,36]. Furthermore, these two cultural dimensions (power distance and individualism) relate to the culture of agricultural communities in Thailand because of the kinship principles, which serve as the basic foundation for working together (e.g., rice planting and harvesting are organized around kinship and close friends). Although some traditional agricultural societies are gradually shifting to the agroindustry, collectivist farming vastly remains in Thailand. Thus, Thai agricultural communities can still be considered collectivistic and traditional. Hence, these characteristics lead to (1) effortless formation of groups, (2) willingness to

accept help from others, and (3) intention to take leadership roles. However, a strong group leader is needed to drive the project's success.

In the UK, internal and vision (4%) and community participation (5%) were also identified as success factors, but the percentage was relatively low, suggesting a low impact [17]. In contrast to Thailand's collectivism and commitment to traditional roles, the UK's society is more individualistic and competitive [35,36], which explains the low importance placed on a group's effort. Community spirit and sense of locality and responsibility were also identified as success factors for the community-level project in the Samso Renewable Energy Island, Denmark [13]. Moreover, the longevity of the local people's group was identified as a successful social factor in Scotland [21]. This shows that community participation and intention and vision are important despite the difference in culture.

#### *4.2. Characteristics of the Group Structure*

Since Thai culture is fundamentally rooted in a kinship society [37], it tends to have unclear business practices, which necessitate a formal structure. On the other hand, individualism in the UK also requires a formal structure to initiate a business. We found that a legitimate organizational structure leads to a successful implementation of CRE, as mentioned in Section 3.1.1. The activity of forming a legal structure sometimes strengthens a group as it provides the opportunity to (1) gather the necessary people with skills needed by a project, (2) establish the rules of an organization, and (3) clarify the duty of members. The legal organization establishes good governance to manage its activities, such as account auditing, annual tax payment, and collective decision making. The results showed that 69% of the total CRE projects (18 projects) had a formal structure before implementing CRE, as shown in Figure 2b. A study in the UK also reported that 65% of the total respondents (354 projects) had a formal structure [17]. In the Thai case, the MOEN required a community to form a legal entity in a project's final application. As a result of forming a formal organization, CRE gained human resources and management skills, which are necessary to manage a project.

#### *4.3. Knowledge Support*

CREs in Thailand need technical and financial consultation since this kind of project only started in 2013 with support from the MOEN. Communities still do not have the necessary knowledge to implement a project. The MOEN has just implemented a trial of a CRE subsidy program from 2013 to 2016, which suggests that the program is still young. As the MOEN aims at helping agricultural communities to develop CRE, it recognizes that these communities do not have the necessary knowledge about renewable energy. With this in mind, the MOEN has dispatched academic consultants to help communities to develop a CRE project. Initially, the MOEN only contacted Chiang Mai University, and the university used its network to establish a consultation network to support communities in other regions in Thailand.

Despite the efforts of the consultation network, only five universities supported communities across the country due to the limited number of academic organizations in Thailand. It will be tough to support communities once the number of CREs increases in the future. Therefore, there is a need to increase network support. In the UK and Denmark cases, people involved in a project can support each other due to the strong network among CREs and other organizations, such as local authorities, business entities, academic institutions, and nonprofit organizations [13,17]. The study in the UK reported that the average networking of CRE was 2.7 partners per operative project in partnership with other organizations [17], while in the Thai case, it was only 1.15 partners per operative project, as mentioned in Section 3.1.1. In the case of the Samso Renewable Energy Island, Denmark, a strong network with entrepreneurial individuals was identified to effectively support the island's search for new opportunities for CRE development [13]. Therefore, to promote CRE in Thailand, we suggest that the Thai government or academia help CRE

groups create network support among CRE groups. For example, organizing more AAR activities can create a network among CRE projects.

#### *4.4. Financial Support*

The participants in the projects are from agricultural sectors that have low income, and most of them need financial support. Actually, 26 CRE projects were implemented with financial support from the government. The project size ranged from USD 3000 to USD 160,000 and USD 40,000 on average per project [9]. With 30%–70% subsidy, each project got around USD 28,000. With a farmer's household net income of about USD 2128 per year in 2017 [38], it is insufficient for members to implement a project only with their incomes. This shows the importance of financial support for the success of a project.

Despite the success of these projects, financial support is limited to that of the MOEN, since only 15% of the participants were successful in borrowing money from financial institutions, as explained in Section 3.2.2. These factors show the limited financial institutes that provide loan for CRE implementation in the country. The Thai government is not entirely decentralized, and as a result, there is minimal local financial autonomy to support CRE. There is a limited grant from the MOEN available for CRE implementation. Moreover, a few soft loans are available for a community to implement a project.

In the UK case, however, since the local government is decentralized, it can directly help CRE projects. Moreover, the UK government created a novel funding mechanism called "Big Society Capital" in 2012 to provide the social sector with affordable financing and build a market for a social investment of social purpose enterprises that expect a social or financial return on investment [17,39]. At the same time, it has a sufficient number of financial institutions that support local activities, with the number of banks totaling about 300 [40]. Thus, the chance to obtain financial support from a bank in the UK is high, which could have led to a significant number of CRE projects in the UK. In contrast, there are only 30 banks in Thailand [41]. Among these small financial institutions, only a few of them provide loans to communities because projects require a low-interest rate. Therefore, the government should establish long-term financial support for CRE. For example, a long-term revolving fund should be created for CRE implementation in Thailand. It is feasible because Thailand already has a revolving fund for the private sector to invest in renewable energy and energy efficiency projects [42].

#### **5. Conclusions**

The characteristics and success factors for the implementation of the selected 26 CRE projects in Thailand are analyzed. Results reveal that (i) CRE implementation is rooted in geographically bound communities; (ii) a pre-existing group and its legal structure in communities play an essential role in carrying out CRE; (iii) the primary motivation for CRE employment is sustainable development, which focuses on the economic, environmental, and social dimensions; (iv) the internal success factors are intention and vision, human resources, management skills, and community participation, while the external success factors are RE potential, mature technology, financial support, appropriate consultation, and support from the national and local government. It is strongly suggested that external factors, such as financial policy and network support, should be promoted to further facilitate CRE implementation.

Our finding addresses the lack of a comprehensive view on implementing CRE projects in Thailand. Further research is necessary to understand the significant factors influencing CRE implementation in developing countries.

**Author Contributions:** Conceptualization, N.L. and K.N.I.; methodology, N.L., T.O., H.O., and K.N.I.; software, N.L., T.O., and H.O.; validation, N.L., T.O., H.O., and K.N.I.; formal analysis, N.L.; investigation, N.L. and K.N.I.; resources, K.N.I.; data curation, N.L.; writing—original draft preparation, N.L.; writing—review and editing, N.L., T.O., H.O., and K.N.I.; visualization, N.L.; supervision, K.N.I.; project administration, N.L.; funding acquisition, K.N.I. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

**Funding:** This research received no external funding.

**Institutional Review Board Statement:** Our study is not applicable.

**Informed Consent Statement:** Our study is not applicable.

**Data Availability Statement:** This study did not report any data.

**Acknowledgments:** The authors are grateful to the communities' leaders and members for sincerely and kindly providing the information required in this study, and especially to the Ministry of Energy and Energy Technology for Environment Research Center, Chiang Mai University, for the great collaboration to get more data for the analysis. Special thanks to Samuel Matthew G. Dumlao for the fruitful discussion, support, and help with English proofreading.

**Conflicts of Interest:** The authors declare no conflict of interest.

#### **References**


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