Social innovations such as energy cooperatives, energy aggregators, and crowdfunding projects are important for strengthening energy democracy and promoting active citizen participation in the energy transition. However, the multitude of criteria and constraints in the design of social innovations complicates the decision-making process. It is therefore important to understand the criteria that need to be considered when designing a social innovation in the energy sector, as they influence the possible design solutions and the designer's decision. Thus, the objective of this paper is to define the key criteria for the design process of a social innovation in the energy sector. To achieve this goal, this work is based on a bibliographic survey and a field study. The state of the art is mainly concerned with the social innovation design process in the energy sector and its success criteria, while the field study is based on interviews with members and leaders of four use cases. The findings are the key criteria for designing social innovations in the energy sector identified in this research work. They are presented with an arborescence and an I-P-O framework, a multifaceted picture that presents the inputs, outputs, and the key criteria of a social innovation design process.< Leer menos