Sustainable Energy Planning for cities - Eastern Europe and South Caucasus

Viewthis video to see how the municipal of Beltsy, Moldova, has achieved more sustainable use of energy.

As part of a 2012–2014 EU project coordinated by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), three cities — Beltsy (Republic of Moldova), Icherisheher (Azerbaijan) and Vinnytsia (Ukraine) — signed the Covenant of Mayors, thus agreeing to reduce their dependency on fossil fuels and curb the impact of climate change on their territory.

The project, which helps the cities with their sustainable energy planning, mainly targets buildings, equipment/facilities and transport. It can also include action related to electricity production and heating/cooling generation. Sustainable energy planning improves a city’s quality of life, its public services, its energy security, its local economy, and creates new jobs.

View this video to see the main achievements of the project in the municipal of Beltsy, Moldova.The video has been prepared by the municipality of Beltsy. 

Through information campaigns and special events, the project aimed to increase public awareness about energy use and energy efficiency. In order to gain knowledge and learn about best practices, representatives of the three cities took part in regional and global meetings and workshops. For instance three capacity-building workshops that took place in each of the partner cities, for representatives of national governments and local authorities of Eastern Europe, the Caucasus and Central Asia, they were aimed at increasing local authorities’ capacity in issues such as climate change, energy efficiency, and at planning;at offering guidance on how to develop a Sustainable Energy Action Plan, with presentations from the Frankfurt School – UNEP Collaborating Centre for Climate and Sustainable Energy Finance, GIZ (the German International Cooperation Agency), the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), and the Covenant of Mayors COMO-East office.

Finally, the project helped to implement parts of the three cities’ Sustainable Energy Action Plans. Each city selected one activity from its action plan and implemented it. Beltsy chose to insulate the external walls of a kindergarten; Icherisheher chose to change its inefficient street lights; and Vinnytsia chose to replace the obsolete wooden window frames of a school.

The project funded by the European Union is organised by the Covenant of Mayors Azerbaijan and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) is the project coordinator,