EuroPACE Project: Focus on the city of Olot, Spain
|
|
|
Learn more about the City of Olot and the 1st EuroPACE pilot
|
|
|
|
Olot is the capital city of the comarca Garrotxa, in the Province of Girona, Catalonia, Spain. The city has roughly 34,000 inhabitants and it is known for its natural landscape, including four volcanoes scattered around the city center. The municipality is part of the Garrotxa Volcanic Zone Natural Park. Olot is also well-known for its industrial activity and a strong focus on sustainability and environmental protection.
The administration is keen to revitialise the city’s economy and to that effect, the City runs several initiatives to promote sustainability ranging from energy to tourism. The mayor launched a sustainability action plan in 2016 and his administration are fully committed to EuroPACE and the benefits it will bring to the community.
|
|
|
The City of Olot joined the EuroPACE project because of the Triple Bottom Line benefits the program would bring to the city by:
- revitalizing local economy,
- reducing CO2 emissions,
- and improving home comfort, health and productivity of Olot citizens.
|
|
|
|
The EuroPACE program is directly aligned with the 2016 Action Plan for the Sustainable Energy and 2016-2019 Olot Government Strategic Plan.
|
|
|
“In order to assure the well-being of the next generations, we have to promote a sustainable city model that makes a decisive step towards the energy transition and in this sense the PACE program, which has been successfully deployed in USA, can help us to reach these goals”
Josep Maria Corominas
Mayor of the City of Olot, Spain
|
|
|
|
Meet the team designing and implementing the first EuroPACE pilot in Europe
|
|
|
|
Above, from left to right: Jordi Marguí, Jordi Salvador, Carme Yeste, Judit Reixach, Josep Maria Corominas, Jordi Ayats, Anna Diago, Ariadna Villegas, Jordi Güell
|
|
|
|
"Our multidisciplinary team involves a range of professionals from public and private sectors with an extensive experience in management, marketing, economic development, tax legislation, public administration and energy efficiency & renewable energy.
Our goal is to design and deploy a successful pilot to benefit the citizens of Olot and become a model to generate best practices and manuals to scale the program to other cities and regions of Europe."
Jordi Ayats,
EuroPACE program manager
|
|
Designing the Pilot and Building Political Support
|
|
|
Learn more about the work the City of Olot has been doing
|
|
|
|
The first step of the EuroPACE program design was to evaluate the existing legal framework and identify what legal changes may be needed to successfully run a pilot. The city of Olot together with GNE Finance focused on the creation of a task force composed of public law experts and auditors from several regions and cities of Spain to discuss the implementation of on-tax financing mechanism. The task force evaluated existing legislation and produced a draft of suggested law amendments to ensure the programme's viability and scalability.
|
|
|
|
In parallel, the Olot team started working on the market analysis to identify the early adopters and building types that would benefit the most from the EuroPACE programme. This research involves assessing building types, necessary improvements, current renovation rates and existing programmes that may complement the EuroPACE pilot.
|
|
|
|
The following steps will involve the data analysis followed by field research and surveys with Olot citizens. The citizens of Olot will be kept informed about the program progress through a press conference held in September. On the legal side, the work will continue to promote the law amendment to be approved by the Spanish Parliament to put in place national framework for on-tax financing.
|
|
|
Join us and Climate Alliance for the 1st EuroPACE Webinar on October 18, 2018
|
|
|
EuroPACE is collaborating with Climate Alliance on a webinar about EuroPACE application in EU 28, with a special focus on 4 countries.
|
|
|
|
Home and commercial building renovation is not just a private business, but a public priority. With EuroPACE, cities can take an active role to enable private capital to help accelerate building renovation.
Register here before 17 October 2018.
The webinar scheduled for 18th of October@ 11:00-13:00 CET will be of particular interest to public authorities, energy agencies, renovation supply chain companies, and social enterprises engaging with households on energy issues.
|
|
Join us at the EU Regions Week
|
|
|
Attend the EuroPACE workshop to hear directly from the City of Olot and the Basque Government Energy Agency
|
|
|
|
Join us for a workshop on "EuroPACE: Unlocking Energy Efficiency Renovation at local level" at the EU Regions Week 2018. The workshop will take place on October 10th at 16:30 - 18:00 and it will be followed by a networking reception on the premises.
|
|
|
|
Keeping PACE with the latest developments...
|
|
|
This is a short compilation of relevant publications, articles and recent developments.
|
|
|
- Health and Environment Alliance reminded us in their Healthy buildings, healthier people briefing that we spend 90% of our time indoors and unhealthy buildings can harm our lungs and respiratory health. EuroPACE is committed to promoting not only energy efficient but healthy and comfortable spaces for all Europeans.
- Velux further highlights the impacts of unhealthy buildings on people in their viral 160 second video called Indoor Generation.
- Congratulation to our friends at EeMAP for recruiting 37 European banks to join a pilot scheme to implement energy efficient mortgages. Read more.
- As the Amended Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD) enters into force, you may be wondering how it will effect your city or your business. EuroACE put together an EPBD Guidance Note that outlines all the changes.
|
|
Thank you for being part of the EuroPACE Community
|
|
|
We look forward to working with you to make EuroPACE a success.
|
|
|
|
Sincerely,
The EuroPACE Partners
|
|
|
|
|
|
