In the event, that took place in the building of the permanent Spanish Delegation before the EU, the speakers where: Ana Cristina Costea on behalf of the Directorate General for Energy (European Commission), Jose Maria Ramos Florido, on behalf of the cohesion policy unit inside the Directorate General for Environment and Santiago Urquijo Zamora, Desk officer of the LIFE unit of the DG Environment.

In their interventions, it the present and the future of the energy and climate change objectives and policies were analysed; the Structural Funds and Cohesion Funds contribution to fight against climate change and to contribute to a low carbon economy, and the contribution of the LIFE Program to finance ecoinnovation, energy efficiency and climatic change projects.

In this context of energy efficiency and climatic change, LIFE GREEN TIC project with its objectives and first actions in progress (in the buildings managed by San Valero group (University of San Jorge and Training Centre of the San Valero Foundation)in Aragón and the building managed by the Natural Heritage Foundation of Castilla y León,  PRAE building in Valladolid together within the city of Logroño) were presented.

47 people participated in the event , 20 of them being representatives  of Regional Spanish Governments but also representatives from Germany regions(2), Denmark(2), France(2), Italy(2), Czech Republic(1) and Croatia(1).

Several representatives of the Spanish Delegation were also present, sharing an interest on the development of the GREEN TIC project in the framework of the environmental management system EMAS set up in the own delegation building whose main aim is the reduction of energy consumption.

The participants could get to know the dimension of the energy and raw materials consumption problems caused by the communication and information technologies which represent near 10% of the electricity consumption and 4% of theCO2 emissions in the European Union.

It was explained  to all participants that to contribute to minimise the ecological footprint of the ICT use  (75% of the total), the LIFE GREEN TIC project is developing several demonstrative pilot actions expected to  reduce 100 tons of CO2 , more specifically through the virtualization of data centres and desks in the PRAE building, by means of a virtual campus implementation in the University of San Jorge and San Valero Foundation and by means of the virtualization of the documents management system and other Smart city measures in the city of Logroño.

The GREEN TIC project will develop a methodology for the preparation of GREEN TIC strategies and action plans for the organisations, both public and private; it will draft a best practices guide for ICT managers and users; and it will develop a green procurement manual to make easier the acquisition of ICT devices by public authorities, companies and general consumers which are more respectful with the environment.

Finally, it was explained that the project aims to foster social participation to propose ideas or share best practices in the use of the ICT, through social networks, experiences that can also be shared by the local and regional administrations.

Participants were encouraged to share these ideas and experiences in the blog of the project http://mihuellatic.lifegreentic.eu