Environmental research

The issues of energy efficiency and climate change mitigation are integrated into Armenia s national policy in a number of legal and strategic documents, namely: Law of RA on Energy (2001); Law of RA on Energy Saving and Renewable Energy (2004); National Program for Energy Saving and Renewable Energy (2007); National Energy Efficiency Action Plan (2010), etc., as well as in the First and Second National Communication of Armenian under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. However, the implementation of the majority of adopted targets and strategic priorities on the national level has lagged due to persistent lack of funding and institutional capacity. The experience of the EU countries in increasing energy efficiency and reducing greenhouse gas emissions has been to transpose the relevant national policies to the local community level, where there has been more political will and dedication to implementing the EU 20-20-20 objectives and the associated greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reduction targets under the UNFCCC and Kyoto Protocol. This decision was also supported by the fact that about 80% of energy consumption and GHG emissions are associated with urban activity. Recognizing a critical role of local governments (communities) in mitigating the effects of climate change, the EC has launched the Covenant of Mayors (CoM) to endorse and support the efforts deployed by local authorities in the implementation of sustainable energy policies aimed to facilitate fulfillment of above-mentioned EU objectives. Nowadays, CoM is the mainstream European movement involving about 5500 local and regional authorities, voluntarily committing to decrease their GHG emissions on 20% by 2020 via increasing energy efficiency and use of renewable energy sources on their territories. The ultimate goal of CoM is the reduction of GHG emissions on a community level via implementation of energy efficiency measures in public and residential buildings, street lighting, urban transportation and other sectors. Alongside, the Covenant is aimed to help the signatory municipalities to achieve other objectives like: Increase quality of energy supply; Ensure sustainability of power supply for local population and other consumers; Improve environmental; Reduce energy consumption costs; Facilitate attraction of investments and job generation. According to the procedures of the Covenant, in order to achieve its CO2 reduction objective, a signatory city commits to perform the following activities: Development of a Baseline Emission Inventory (BEI) - a quantification of the amount of CO2 emitted due to energy consumption in the territory of a Covenant signatory within a given period of time starting from a baseline year. BEI allows identifying the principal sources of CO2 emissions and their respective reduction potentials. Development and submission of a Sustainable Energy Action Plan (SEAP) that must be officially approved by the local authority. SEAP is the key document in which the Covenant signatory outlines how it intends to reach its CO2 reduction target by 2020. SEAP defines energy efficiency and energy saving activities (e.g. a project pipeline) and other measures that lead to achieving GHG emission reduction targets on the community level and sets implementation time frames and assigned responsibilities. Implementation of SEAP, monitoring of SEAP implementation and regular submission of SEAP implementation reports each two years after submission of SEAP. Implementation reports aim to check the compliance of the interim results with the foreseen objectives in terms of measures implemented and CO2 emission reductions. Developing the BEI and SEAP, as well as implementing SEAP will require allocating community finances, building up the municipalities institutional capacity, and strongly relying on the local community for participatory realization of foreseen measures, as well as seeking support from donors and IFIs. The EU successful practice of addressing energy efficiency an climate change mitigation issues through direct involvement of communities even more desirable for replication in Armenia, which, as a non-Annex B party to the Kyoto Protocol, does not have legally binding obligations and fixed timelines for implementing climate change mitigation programs on national scale. Recognizing the potential benefits of introducing modern energy efficiency solutions on the community level and committing to global climate change mitigation objectives, several municipalities in Armenia have already expressed willingness and even taken some actions in this direction. Spitak Municipality, for example, has worked with the Energy Saving Foundation (ESF) to develop a municipal energy efficiency plan and identify the potential for reducing energy use in various sectors of the municipal economy. Similarly, acknowledging climate change mitigation effects to be achieved through reduction of greenhouse gas emissions, the Municipality of Tsaghkadzor joined the Covenant in 2009, followed by the Municipalities of Aparan and Hrazdan in 2013. The key outcome of this project is two-fold: 1. To develop a portfolio of cost-effective energy efficiency and energy saving interventions in the municipal economy (covering such sectors as public and residential buildings, street lighting, urban transportation, etc.) that will allow achieving GHG emission reduction in the community. This activity is to be co-financed from the community budget of the Mun

Armenia