Category: News room

Developed within the framework of the meetMED working area on “Reinforcing public awareness and capacity building of local stakeholders on EE and RES”, the first meetMED training on the use of Sustainable Energy Design Toolkit for Public Authorities has wrapped up yesterday in Algiers, Algeria.

Hosted by the Algerian National Agency for the Promotion and Rationalisation of Energy Use (APRUE), the meetMED training course has been co-organized by CRES (Greece) in cooperation with ANME (Tunisia) and RCREEE, based on the sustainable energy design training package jointly designed by ANME (Tunisia), ADENE (Portugal), CRES (Greece) and ENEA (Italy), and building on sustainable energy toolkits already designed in other projects, such as CES–MED, SUDEP, INSMART, the Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy initiative and Clima South.

Its main aim was to provide representatives of national and local public authorities with guidelines on the use of sustainable energy design toolkit as well as of financing solutions for sustainable energy projects in a context of improved multi-level governance and better adaptation of EU legislation to local realities in the Southern and Eastern Mediterranean countries.

More than 20 participants from 9 Mediterranean countries signed up for the training and came up with useful suggestions to improve the role of national energy agencies and authorities in supporting RE and EE planning and implementation, including at the local level. In particular, during the five-days training, it was underlined the essential role public authorities play in setting the goals and monitoring their implementation as well as in leading by example in the design of EE and RE projects. Special relevance was given also to regional cooperation, as key element to share common monitoring tools – such as EE and RE indicators, effective methodologies for energy audits and qualifications for energy managers, as well as experiences on EE in public buildings and finance schemes to implement energy efficiency actions. At this regard, regional cooperation at local level was encouraged in the framework of the Covenant of Mayors. With respect to communication and transparency, greater involvement of stakeholders at different levels was urged as well as improved communication on energy planning activities and the creation of energy communities to increase social acceptance of RE and EE projects. Finally, concerning more financial aspects, it was identified the need to carry out life-cycle cost analysis for EE supplies in public procurement and to simplify the access to information on green and climate finance.

The meetMED Sustainable Energy Design Toolkit for Public Authorities is available on meetMED website here!

The next meetMED trainings will take place in December 2019 in Cairo, Egypt and in January 2020 in Tunis, Tunisia. The first will focus on Energy Audits in Industrial SMEs, whilst the latter will focus on EE and RE in Buildings. More information will be circulated in the next months.

On 19 June 2019, the meetMED team took part in the event co-organised by MEDENER and EUROMED Cities Network in the framework of the European Sustainable Energy Week 2019 in Brussels. Moderated by Mr Matteo Barra, meetMED Project Manager, the event explored the “Role of Local Authorities and National Agencies for Efficient Buildings in the Mediterranean region” and focused particularly on the possible ways to scale-up and foster innovative tools for energy efficient buildings. The debate among the panellists has been trigged after the lack of political commitment was identified by the public in the room as the main missing element to foster energy transition in the building sector. The panellists reacted to the provocative outcome of the poll by presenting diverse initiatives to tackle the problem at different governance levels. By opening the debate, representatives from the European Commission, the Union for the Mediterranean and MEDENER presented the initiatives taken in the Mediterranean region at the supranational level. Firstly, Mr Eero Ailio, Adviser on Energy Transition and Local Governance at the DG Energy of the European Commission, emphasised the key role local authorities play – particularly when grouped in networks, like the Covenant of Mayors – to ensure that EU and national policies have an effective impact on the ground. The Senior Deputy Secretary General for Energy and Climate Action of the Union for the Mediterranean, Mr Jorge Borrego, stressed the importance of energy transition as an effective way to act against climate change. He continued by acknowledging the role the meetMED Project is playing on the matter especially through the work carried out by its task forces of experts on EE in Buildings and EE in appliances. Particular attention has been given also to the process of the refurbishment of existing buildings, often overshadowed as, most of the times, the owners of the buildings requiring renovation are not their actual users. The Secretary General of MEDENER, Ms Roberta Boniotti, gave an overview of the work carried out by Association in the field, including the activities carried out by 8 out if its 13 members in the framework of the meetMED project with the aim of putting energy efficiency and renewable energy at the heart of public policy making in the countries of both the Northern and Southern shores of the Mediterranean. Ms Boniotti highlighted the importance of raising public authorities’ awareness with respect to the feasibility of investments in the EE and RE sectors. Likewise, the Secretary General of EUROMED Cities Network, Mr Bernard Massabo, shed the light on the relevance of creating synergies in the whole Mediterranean area, which may trigger the replication of good practices. Particularly, he mentioned the activities EUROMED Cities is implementing in the framework of the INTERREG programme.

The panel discussion addressed the topic of innovative tools for energy efficient buildings from a more local perspective, thus providing very practical examples. Mr Evangelos Evangelides, Mayor of Aradippou (Cyprus), stressed the importance of informing the citizens about the incentives and policies in force at the municipal level to make buildings more energy efficient. Particularly, he described the initiative of the reward cards implemented by his Municipality – where citizens accumulate points for any EE measures implemented, equivalent to a tax reduction of the same amount – and the pilot action plan for the zero production of household waste, in force by September 2019. Ms Claire Roumet, Executive officer of Energy Cities, contributed to the debate by emphasizing the key role played by innovative technological tools, like ECOLOCAL – a mobile App tracking energy consumption in the different buildings – and by projects targeting reduction of energy consumption in schools, where pupils have the right and the responsibility to choose how to invest savings coming from reduced energy consumption in their schools. Mr Pier Luigi Porta, Researcher at ENEA, presented the TEESCHOOLS project, which provides new solutions to Local Authorities both in technical and financial terms to implement Nearly Zero Energy Building (NZEB) renovation activities in Mediterranean schools, thus raising awareness also among the youngest generations. These initiatives have shown that children pay more attention to the issues relating to energy transition and climate change compared to their parents, who, thanks to them, learn to act more responsibly on these matters. Mr Philippe Masset, Deputy Director of the Europe and International Division at ADEME, and Mr Radouan Yessouf, Head of Energy Efficiency in the BuildingDivision at AMEE, provided, then, concrete examples of measures implemented by national energy agencies from two Mediterranean countries. Mr Masset illustrated the actions implemented by ADEME in the framework of the broader French multilevel governance system, which intertwines national initiatives on energy efficiency with the regional ones. For instance, ADEME, in cooperation with the Regional Council of Ile de France, created a private-public company to help financing energy consumption reduction measures and overcome the barriers to investments in the sector. Furthermore, a Regional Council made up of 17 French regions, established a dedicated platform for energy efficiency renovation in buildings, which is meant to train all the stakeholders involved in the sector and to make investments more effective on people’s lives. Likewise, Mr Yessouf presented the main measures implemented in Morocco, where the building sector is one of the most energy-intensive sectors. All EE policy measures need for strong financial incentives from the public institutions, especially in the first years of their implementation. Among other incentives, Morocco decided to exempt imports of EE materials from VAT and other custom tariffs as well as to help Moroccan private companies through the Programme MorSEFF, supported by the European Union. In addition, Morocco managed to support its national energy transition thanks to an initiative aimed at modernising energy systems in mosques and other public buildings and at creating new jobs: The Green Mosques and Buildings Project, which was initiated in 2014 by the Ministry of Energy and the Ministry of Religious Affairs in cooperation with SIE, the Moroccan state energy investment company, and AMEE.

On Wednesday 24 and Thursday 25 April 2019 at APRUE Headquarters in Algiers, meetMED experts met with local stakeholders in order to map and discuss Algerian climate for investments in EE and RES sectors .

Mrs. Nadia DJELOUAH, Mr Kamal DALI, and Mrs. Nadia CHIOUKH from APRUE organised the meetings in collaboration with ENEA experts, Mr. Roberto DEL CIELLO and Mrs Lorenza DARODA. APRUE and ENEA are jointly carrying out meetMED activities aimed at mapping climate for investments and market structure in selected countries, in order to mitigate investment risks for predefined RES and EE technologies.

The mission aimed to collect all documents, information, studies and laws related to the safeguard of foreign direct investments (FDIs) in the EE and RES sectors in Algeria. In this framework, meetMED experts had the opportunity to meet with representatives of many Algerian institutions, such as the Ministry of Energy,  the Ministry of Industry and Mines, the Ministry of Environment, the National Agency for the Development of Investment, the National Agency of Climate Change. Furthermore, in the presence of the General Director of APRUE, Mr Mohamed Salah BOUZERIBA,  they discussed and exchanged views with representatives of the largest national public companies in the energy sector – namely, SONATRACH, SONELGAZ and SKTM –  as well as of other Algerian private companies working on Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy – such as SONARIC, ENPEC, OXXO, ELEC El Djazair- and of the Non Governmental Organization, CARE. Finally, meetMED activities and their current progress have been presented to the stakeholders participating in the meetings.

The information collected during the mission and through the questionnaires prepared by ENEA will help draft the meetMED Country Report on Algeria.

 

 

Last week, Dr Dario Chello, president of MEDENER, was invited in Beirut by ALMEE (the Lebanese Association for Energy Saving and Environment) to discuss the meetMED approach to energy transition on the occasion of the Plenary Session of the 4^th International Conference on Renewable Energies for Developing countries (REDEC 2018). In particular, he stressed that:

 

• Nowadays, multilateralism lacks a solid support;
• Despite this, the two main challenges in the Euro-Mediterranean Region – climate change and migration – cannot be faced easily at the national level;
• The undesirable effects of climate change are getting everyday more and more visible and there is no much time left to act;
• The completion of a free market for energy requires a significant amount of time. The EU internal market was launched in 1993 after 10 years spent setting it up. After 35 years, this market is now working properly enough but unfortunately, we cannot wait 35 years more for the completion of a broader Euro-Mediterranean market. Time to act is running out;

• Conversely, meetMED is trying to speed up energy transition in the region as much as possible, thanks to a multilateral and pragmatic approach aiming at fostering immediate actions independently from the legislative and regulatory framework of each single State.

For further information about the Conference, please visit REDEC 2018 website.