The SMARTeeSTORY project has reached an important milestone with the completion of its commissioning phase across three historic demonstrator buildings in Riga (Latvia), Granada (Spain) and Delft (Netherlands). This achievement follows months of installation work, during which local partners deployed sensors, controllers, smart devices, communication gateways and automation servers designed to enhance the energy performance of heritage buildings without intrusive renovation.

Commissioning is the stage where newly installed digital systems, such as sensors, smart devices, controllers and communication layers, are validated to ensure they operate reliably and coherently. For heritage buildings, this step is especially critical: deep renovation is often not possible, and smart, low‑intrusion measures are needed to enhance efficiency while respecting cultural value.

Across the three pilots, commissioning involved aligning a diverse set of building systems. While each site has its own combination of technologies, the work consistently centred on three areas:

• Environmental responsiveness, including weather‑driven control and, where applicable, automated shading and daylight-linked lighting.
• Thermal comfort, ensuring HVAC behaviour remains stable and predictable despite fluctuating occupancy patterns.
• Digital integration, validating data flows, communication protocols and the local automation servers that coordinate monitoring, alarms and control functions.

These steps set the stage for the project’s next phase: connecting each building to the SMARTeeSTORY Building Energy Management System (BEMS). With installations validated and systems now fully operational, the demonstrators will move into continuous data collection and optimisation. This will allow the project to test smart control strategies, evaluate performance under real conditions and refine approaches that balance energy efficiency with heritage preservation.

SMARTeeSTORY demonstrates that heritage protection and energy efficiency can progress together. By applying interoperable, user‑centred and non‑invasive digital solutions, the project provides concrete examples of how Europe’s historic buildings can move closer to climate‑neutral operation.