S. Tournaki

Potential of Energy Performance Contracting for Tertiary Sector Energy Efficiency and Sustainable Energy Projects in Southern European Countries

Flexible market mechanisms, such as Energy Performance Contracting (EPC), can help to overcome financial barriers towards the EU targets. Despite the huge energy efficiency potential, the EPC market is still underdeveloped in several Southern European countries; flagship projects in the tertiary sector are rare. National demand for EPC in six countries (Croatia, France, Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain) was analysed, by interviewing over 180 stakeholders, showing that large buildings are of great interest for EPC providers. There are still several bottlenecks to overcome for the wide adoption of EPC projects: insufficient knowledge and skills, difficult access to financing, lack of specialized bank products, high guarantees and interest rates, scarce examples and lack of standardization practices/certification. Possible EPC applications in tertiary sector buildings in Greece are presented. Scenarios involving passive and active solutions, as well as renewable energy systems, are studied through a standardized approach.

Impact Assessment of Sustainable Mobility in Touristic Cities of Europe: The CIVITAS DESTINATIONS Approach on Energy, Environment and Economy

European policies actively force towards a shift to low-emission mobility and have set the reduction of energy consumption in transport as a priority pillar in national/regional and European environmental policies. CIVITAS DESTINATIONS, funded by the European Commission within the framework of the Horizon 2020 programme, implements a set of reinforcing innovative mobility solutions to improve accessibility and cost-effectiveness of urban transport services and to reduce congestion, emissions and energy consumption in six EU island tourist destinations: Rethymno (Greece), Limassol (Cyprus), Valletta (Malta), Funchal (Portugal), Las Palmas (Spain) and Elba (Italy). Building on previous CIVITAS experience, 14 environmental indicators are proposed to provide a spherical overview of the energy and environment impacts. This work outlines a refined environmental assessment framework applied at the municipality of Rethymno. Common strategic goals, predefined performance indicators and common measurement/monitoring methods amongst all six destinations allow a consistent and comparable analysis at the project level.

Social, Economic and Environmental Impacts of the Wood Biomass Use in Cyprus Households

In many island communities of Europe, wood biomass is considered one of the most important sources of energy for heating and cooking, especially for the mountainous and rural ones. The aim of this paper is to determine comprehensively the wood biomass quantities consumed in the mountain areas of Cyprus; additionally the origin of biomass, the implications of the uncontrolled use and overexploitation of wood biomass as well as the evaluation of the social and economic impacts. The planned actions involve the identification of the quantities and the origin of wood biomass consumed in the mountainous communities of Cyprus (more than 40) with the analysis of data collected through a structured questionnaire and a dedicated field research. Also, measurements of the variation of air quality (CO2, CO, NOX, PM2.5, PM10, TPM) was carried out, between winter and summer months for both indoor and outdoor air quality in mountain households. Comparable measurements were performed in houses that use energy efficient fireplaces in order to record any changes/improvement in air quality. This study is financed by the Cyprus Research Promotion Foundation.