The Red Argentina de Municipios frente al Cambio Climatico (RAMCC) organised the International Workshop for Energy Efficiency at Local Level, together with UN Environment, the Copenhagen Centre on Energy Efficiency (UNEP DTU Partnership), the Friedrich Ebert Foundation (FES), the District Energy in Cities Initiative, United for Efficiency (U4E) and the Agency for Environmental Protection of the Government of the City of Buenos Aires (APrA).
On September 4th 2018, the Centro Cultural Recoleta of Buenos Aires gathered 16 stakeholders, including authorities from Denmark, Panama, Spain, Chile, Brazil and Argentina. During this meeting, three different panels discussed diverse issues related to policies for energy efficiency. The first discussion focused on energy management for residential and public buildings, district heating and good practices in the application of measures for energy efficiency. There were crosscutting themes, which emerged throughout the workshop, such as public policy, private sector and finance mechanisms linked to energy efficiency. Additionally, the former Minister of Environment of Peru and current Global Lead, Climate and Energy at WWF International, Manuel Pulgar-Vidal, exposed the new international channels to foster climate actions for sub-national governments and members of the third sector, in order to achieve the goal of the Paris Agreement.
The opening of the workshop was presented by Ricardo Bertolino, the Executive Secretary of RAMCC, Alejandra Pérez Nella, the Cabinet Chief at Apra, and Gabriela Prata Dias, the Acting Head of the Copenhagen Centre on Energy Efficiency.
The main results of the workshop are the following:
- Energy efficiency is intangible, yet it creates tangible results.
- Energy efficiency should be a transversal policy, across institutions and levels of government.
- Energy efficiency has a great potential to reduce costs, due to savings in the energy consumption.
- International development agencies and institutions are focusing their programs towards energy efficiency.
- Governments have a core role in the promotion of energy efficiency, both for the public and the private sector, through activities of capacity building and developing financial and technical tools for improving energy efficiency.
