The Andalusian Energy Agency, the only Spanish representative in the 15th edition of the REGIOSTARS 2022 Awards convened by the European Union, has won the third prize after being selected among 300 projects for its Program to Promote Sustainable Construction in Andalusia (PICSA ). A project "that helped revitalize the construction sector in this region of Spain by introducing energy savings and a greater presence of renewable energy in existing buildings, which also improved the competitiveness of local construction companies and reduced the energy poverty of low-income families”, the European Union has pointed out on its website.
The Teatro García de Resende, in Évora (Portugal) hosted the Gala where the European Commission announced the best EU projects promoted by cohesion policy and the winners of the REGIOSTARS 2022 Awards after a public vote. The European Commissioner for Cohesion and Reforms, Elisa Ferreira, was responsible for presenting the prizes to the winners.
An award that recognizes the work of the Andalusian Energy Agency for making the construction sector, a very important pillar of the Andalusian economy, a model of sustainability, capable of generating quality employment and, at the same time, respectful of the environment and with social cohesion in Andalusia.
Joaquín Villar, Head of the Department of Internationalization, Innovation and Singular Projects, in charge of collecting the Award on behalf of the Andalusian Energy Agency, points out that since the entity won the RegioStars in 2015, intense work has been done to simplify administrative procedures, for improving the training of professionals in the sector, and for making aid for sustainable construction and rehabilitation more accessible to all.
“Collaboration with other European regions to promote sustainable construction in Europe has been crucial for us. In this sense, we established an interregional alliance to share more efficient good practices with them in terms of improving policies, better qualified employment, innovation and changing the culture of the population and now we are more than 40 European regions working together, connecting regional innovative ecosystems , with the aim of creating a more competitive European value chain around sustainable construction”, said Villar.
Prior to the Gala, the European Commissioner for Cohesion and Reforms, Elisa Ferreira, met with the 15 finalist projects to present them with an award recognizing them as "star" projects to guide other European regions. María José Colinet, Director of Financing and Promotion of Energy Actions, in charge of collecting this award, explained to the attendees that "the recognition given to Andalusia in 2015 for its work in the field of sustainable construction was a huge boost to continue contributing and revitalizing a sector that is a motor of development in terms of economic growth and job creation and to improve the results that had been achieved up to that moment”.
Access to the video here where POWERTY was presented.
More photos of the event here
More informationin Spanish here .
