The “Introducing the SEAP and SECAP: Planning for sustainable energy for cities and municipalities” training, held on September 20, was attended by the mayors of three affiliated cities in Lebanon – Beirut, Baakline and Kab Elias. Heads of local authorities engaged in the implementation of sustainable energy action plans and met with energy practitioners.
Mr. Cyril Dewalayne, Programme Manager for Infrastructure, Water and Energy at the Delegation of the European Union to Lebanon, reiterated in his opening speech the importance of developing sustainable energy planning tools in Lebanon, through which local municipalities can access grants to meet their energy needs and decarbonisation targets.
A second two-day Training of Trainers workshop followed on September 21-22. The target audience of the “Technical steps for the preparation of SECAPs” training were key managers and technical staff affiliated to national authorities and municipalities, who could mainstream new climate adaptation considerations into relevant policies, strategies and plans.
Mr. Naguib Amin, CES-MED Team leader, explained that the purpose of the training sessions were two-fold; as most of the project affiliated municipalities are already members of the Covenant.
‘’We encouraged those who have already developed SEAPs to adapt them with the SECAP template. Our Team at CES-MED has also thoroughly explained the content and the preparation modalities of SECAPs for those municipalities which consider adhering to the CoM and prepare a SECAP from scratch’’, said Mr. Amin.
The SECAP planning tool is aligned with the new status of the Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy (ex. Covenant of Mayors), adopted by the European Commission in end of July. The CoM is now committed to climate mitigation, adaptation, and secure, sustainable and affordable energy. To reflect this change of status, the SECAP template was developed by the EU’s Joint Research Centre (JRC) to harmonise data compilation, but also as a reporting framework for climate and energy planning and monitoring at the local level.
‘’Human Dynamics and our TA Team have already successfully delivered 18 SEAPs. We will also support the preparation of five new SECAP templates for Egypt and Jordan. This will add to HD’s technical capacities and references on preparation of such incremental planning tools for future projects in the South-Mediterranean region, added Ms. Nadya Boneva, Project Director for Human Dynamics