News report
EUKI
EUKI
Climate Action Connecting Europe – EUKI Publishes its Second Brochure
by Oliver Hölcke, GIZ/EUKI
The European Union’s strategic vision – to achieve a climate-neutral Europe by 2050 – shaped EUKI’s project work in 2019 and 2020. EUKI’s new brochure published on 29 July reveals just how strong this influence is.
Since 2017, EUKI has been funding projects that advance the energy transformation across national borders and look for solutions to the global climate crisis. The organisation has so far launched 128 projects across Europe with funding amounting to EUR 32.6 million. Most of the projects help in achieving the EU’s climate goals by reducing energy consumption and thus bringing down greenhouse-gas emissions.
This new brochure presents clear information about EUKI’s many and varied approaches to climate change mitigation – EUKI focuses on countries in Central, Eastern and Southern Europe and on the Baltic states.
This is precisely where EUKI’s Smart Climate Cities project operates. It is a strategy for using digital technologies in the cities and municipalities of the future to support the necessary social and ecological transformation so they can become climate-neutral by 2050.
Several EUKI projects are working to improve the information reaching the general public in Central and Eastern European countries on climate change mitigation topics. In Bulgaria, for example, school students have learned how to be more economical with energy. Not only has this improved energy efficiency in schools, but the subject is also going to be placed on the curriculum of other schools in Bulgaria. Other areas where EUKI is active have also developed successful approaches that are spreading throughout Europe.
EUKI has also constantly connected climate change activists at the public, municipal, civil society, economic and education policy level with one another and strengthened joint learning.
Dr Silke Karcher, Head of Division at BMU, says: ‘I see the great strides we have made in the climate protection sector, not just in discussions with local initiatives but also in cooperation measures with colleagues from other EU member states. Gone are the days when Europeans believed climate protection efforts were split into an Eastern and Western European camp. Climate protection has clearly become a joint project for all EU states. Of course, difficult discussions lie ahead but there is now a united front.’
This barrier-free PDF can be downloaded in German or English.