Covenant of Mayors Capacity Building Model for Ukraine and Georgia: Model Solution for Eastern Partnership and Central Asian Countries” – CoMO Model Project

Union “Energy Efficiency Center Georgia” with partnership of the Association “Energy Efficient Cities of Ukraine” (EECU) was implemented the project “Covenant of Mayors Capacity Building Model for Ukraine and Georgia: Model Solution for Eastern Partnership and Central Asian Countries” launched within the Program of the European Commission “Covenant of Mayors going East.

Project partners along with EECU and EECG in this project included the Development Agency “Sinergija Ltd” (Slovenia), Executive Committee of Kamyanets-Podilskyi City Council and self-governing Rustavi City Hall. Associated partners included NL Agency of the Dutch Ministry of Economic Affairs and “Envidatec”, a German company which specializes in introducing energy management systems in compliance with international and European standards. The project was performed in the cities of Kamyanets-Podilskyi and Rustavi as well as in 2 Ukrainian and 1 Georgian city. The project duration was 36 months. It was co-financed by European Commission.

The purpose of the project was to support local authorities in Ukraine and Georgia (and in the long-term in other Eastern Partnership and Central Asian (EaP/CA) countries) in improving their energy security, reducing greenhouse gases emissions, diminishing dependence on fossil fuels, and improving their citizens‟ quality of life. The following specific objectives were assigned:

1. To facilitate the effective participation of municipalities in Ukraine and Georgia (and in the long-term in other EaP/CA countries) in the Covenant of Mayors by the provision of supportive materials and institutionalized technical expertise;

2. To increase the capacity of project cities in Ukraine and Georgia to address their Covenant commitments through the development and implementation of local sustainable energy policy and Sustainable Energy Action Plans (SEAPs).

Target groups included selected officials (mayors and deputies), staff and the general public of 5 project cities, staff of the newly established Covenant Supporter in Georgia and the non-profit Covenant Energy Agency in Ukraine, and selected Ukrainian and Georgian energy professionals.

The project was provided the following:

• Development of guidelines that will assist municipalities in preparing politically and organizationally for effective participation in the Covenant of Mayors;

• Selection of methodologies/software tools relevant to guidelines and their adaptation to Ukrainian and Georgian conditions;

• Competitive selection of Ukrainian and Georgian pilot cities for the project;

• Organization and performance of a practical and interactive training course for Ukrainian and Georgian Covenant consultants and project cities energy managers based on the guidelines and adapted tools;

• Establishing, strengthening and promoting the Covenant Supporter in Georgia and Covenant Energy Agency in Ukraine;

• Supporting project cities in establishing an energy management system for their public buildings (including CO2 inventory and a 3-year SEAP prototype);

• Developing and implementing awareness raising campaigns and participation programs focused on gaining public support of local energy policies and SEAPs;

• Implementing small scale energy efficiency/ renewable energy measures for public buildings in project cities;

• Working collaboratively with the project cities to fulfill Covenant obligations;

• Shifting the SEAP of one project city into a practical investment plan.

First Training Session

On 17-19 April, 2013 a first of the four training session within the project was held. The training was attended by the representatives from project pilot cities and Covenant of mayor’s consultants from Georgia and Ukraine.

Second Training Session

On 5-7 June, 2013 in Vyshkiv, Dolyna district, in the Hotel “Yalynka”, a second training session of the project took place. The event was attended by representatives of pilot cities and Covenant consultants from Ukraine and Georgia.

Joint Forum of three projects

On 5-6 September 2013 in Tbilisi, a joint forum of “Covenant of Mayors East” project, “Ukraine and Georgia in the Covenant of Mayors” project and European Commission’s CIUDAD programme took place. The aim of the event was an exchange of best practices and experiences on Covenant of Mayors implementation in the Eastern Partnership, Southern Caucasus and Central Asia countries.

Third Training Session

On 16-18 October in Kamyanets-Podilskiy at the Gala-Hotel took place the third of the four training sessions of the project. The training was attended by city mayor of Kamyanets-Podilskiy, Mykhaylo Simashkevych; from project side project manager Agnieszka Schirru-Nowicka and Vitaliy Volkov, deputy project manager took part in the event. On the first day energy managers from project cities and consultants jointly worked on theoretical aspects of SEAP development and got acquainted with the experience of Georgian partners, who successfully submitted their SEAP’s to the European Commission. During practical examples, the participants evaluated and adjusted their SEAPs according to the sectors which are to be included in their plans.

On the second day trainers together with participants had a range of exercises on forming investment attractive offers and funding projects on enhancing energy efficiency, analyzed funding opportunities and overviewed the transformation of long term plans to operational SEAPs. Covenant consultants and representatives of pilot cities reached an agreement on future cooperation about developing SEAPs for the cities.

JEVIS TRAINING IN GEORGIA

Within CoM Grant project financed by EU Commission on 19-20 March, 2014 was conducted one-day training series in Gori Municipality and Self-governing Rustavi City. The main aim of training series was introducing of JEVis software to energy mangers and representatives of municipal buildings and located on Gori municipality and self-governing Rustavi city. The each trainings attended about 20-25 persons.

The JEVis software gives an opportunity to store metadata in a data bank allowing a comprehensive transparency about consumption, production data and costs as well as offers quick, intuitive overview all data with a huge number of graphic analysis tools. The trainings were conducted by representative of German company “Envidatec” (Mr. Nils Heinrich) who in detail provide information through power-point presentation on software. The training agenda was consisting with following items:

• Overview on the Graphical User Interfaces

• Visualizations with JEGraph

• Practice Use Cases in JEGraph

• Configurations with JEConfig

• Practice Use Cases in JEConfig

The Software presented during the trainings will assist Gori and Rustavi municipalities to control the energy consumption in municipal buildings.

Fourth Training Session

From 15 to 17 October 2014, the fourth and last training session for energy managers within the project took place in Lviv. During three days, the participants successfully expanded their skills in planning municipal investment policy. The training was attended by around 20 participants from Georgia and Ukraine, including energy managers from the project’s partner cities, Covenant consultants and representatives of the Association “Energy Efficient Cities of Ukraine” (EECU), among others.

CoM-Grant Steering Committee Meeting and Internal Project Meeting on 17.06.2015 in Vinnytsa

On 17 June 2015, the last Steering Committee Meeting and an internal Project Meeting of all partners and participants of the ”Covenant of Mayors Capacity Building Model for Ukraine and Georgia: Model Solution for Eastern Partnership and Central Asian Countries” project met in Vinnytsia to discuss the main achievements, lessons learnt and results of the project.

Updated: October 7, 2019