On 6 November, the EU4Energy program kicked off its new campaign aimed at introducing renewable energies and their importance for mitigating climate change to schoolchildren.
The main character of the campaign is Ozzy the Hamster, a comic book clean energy champion. In this latest awareness raising campaign, Ozzy becomes an EU Young Energy Ambassador to show how renewable energy is vital to our planet’s future.
The campaign is being implemented by the Council of the European Energy Regulators (CEER) in collaboration with EU Neighbors East and the Georgian National Energy and Water Supply Regulatory Commission (GNERC). Initially, it will be implemented as a pilot project in Georgia, before gradually expanding to cover all the countries of the Eastern Partnership.
During the campaign, Young European Ambassadors and experts from GNERC will visit Georgian schools and organize workshops on renewable energies
During the campaign, Young European Ambassadors (YEAs, a non-political youth network within EU Neighbors East) and experts from GNERC will visit Georgian schools and organize workshops on renewable energies with engaging educational materials designed specifically for young minds in a simplified yet informative manner.
The campaign has been developed in the framework of the EU4Energy Program Phase II – Promoting the Clean Energy Transition in the Eastern Partnership Countries, which contributes to the development of sound legislative and regulatory frameworks for energy and to support the region’s transition to clean energy and the liberalization of its energy markets. The program runs until December 2024 and will address new challenges and opportunities such as the gradual digitalization of all energy-relevant market segments, while promoting cost reflectivity. Thus, citizens of the Eastern Partnership countries will benefit from sustainable energy investments and increased regional market integration and intra-regional trade.
Young European Ambassadors from Georgia visited a school in the Georgian town of Bolnisi on 15 November to run a workshop on renewable energy.
30 school pupils aged 13-14 years old had the opportunity to discuss and learn about renewables with the help of DIY wind turbine kits.
During the workshop, one of the school pupils noted: “I realized that it’s quite easy to use renewable energies and every individual can contribute to saving the planet.”
The aim is to empower consumers for the energy transition by promoting and contributing to a carbon-neutral society and economy
The workshops are available to schools across the Eastern Partnership. Instructions for a DIY wind turbine are also available online for those who wish to build one at home.
Another school visit took place on 17 November in Gori, Georgia.
About the CEER Strategy
The basis of the CEER 2022-2025 Strategy Empowering Consumers for the Energy Transition is that European energy regulators, with a view to promoting the energy transition and contributing to a carbon-neutral society and economy, are committed to “empowering consumers for the energy transition”,by:
• Enabling energy system integration: integrating renewables and incentivizing innovation;
• Placing consumers at the center of energy markets with consumer-centric dynamic regulation, empowering consumers to actively contribute to and benefit from a flexible energy system; and
• Ensuring open, well-functioning and resilient markets nationally and in Europe: delivering flexibility and new business models.
These three regulatory dimensions lead to six core areas for CEER to address its work:
• Energy system integration
• Sustainable and efficient infrastructure
• Consumer-centric design
• Decentralized and local energy
• Well-functioning markets
• Flexibility
Energy regulators are committed to empowering consumers to participate in the energy transition to thereby promote it and to enable energy system integration as a major building block to achieve the overarching targets of decarbonization, climate neutrality, sustainability and efficiency as spelled out in the Green Deal and other initiatives of the European Commission.
The centerpiece of the new CEER Strategy is the consumer centric dynamic regulation.
It has incorporated the ASPIRE principles of the 2030 BEUC/CEER Vision into its strategy, placing the consumer at the center of all regulatory activities. CEER will focus all regulatory tools to enable energy system integration through pursuing an innovative and flexible whole system approach involving all actors, whose roles will more and more converge in the changing environment.
