Towards Solar Urban Planning
in Europe: The project "POLIS"

Cities are nowadays the main focus of development as they concentrate most of the population (about 80% in Europe), goods and activities and, thereby, the energy use (75% of demand). They also concentrate the production of polluting emissions (75%).
The change of the energy paradigm that the strategy to fight climate change requires to adopt, in which the renewable energies should have an important influence, constitutes both a challenge and a great opportunity for the cities to take advantage of their local resources (solar, wind, geothermal, etc..) in an efficient way.
In this regard, interesting initiatives have emerged in recent years in different European cities to identify the usable solar potential through passive strategies and active technologies (solar photovoltaic and solar thermal), as well as its subsequent transformation through legislative measures. In order to present those experiences, extending its use to other cities and to introduce in the practice of urban planning objectives for solar use, the project POLIS is born at the end of 2009.

Open publication

POLIS, an acronym for Identification and Mobilization of Solar Potentials via Local strategies, is a project co-financed by the Intelligent Energy Program-Europe (reference EIE/08/603/SI2.529237) through which six European cities have committed to develop strategies for urban planning taken into consideration solar criteria, as well as promoting local policies that allow to use the existing solar potential, in the belief that only a local strategic approach will significantly increase the integration of decentralized renewable technologies and the small scale technologies in the cities. The project, coordinated by the consultant company Ecofys, has the participation of municipalities in 5 European countries (cities of Munich, Vitoria-Gasteiz, Paris, Lyon, Lisboa and Malmö) as well as partner technical experts from various disciplines.

AUTHORS
Estefanía Caamaño Martín, Daniel Masa Bote, Jordana Herrera
Instituto de Energía Solar e T.S.I. Telecomunicación, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid.
Contact
Ester Higueras García, Ignacio Useros Barrigón, Fiorella Tortora
Grupo Arquitectura Bioclimática en un Entorno Sostenible", Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, ABIO research group.
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Sigrid Linder
Ecofys, Consultant Energy in the Built Environment, Germany, Consultant Energy in the Built Environment.
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Emmanuelle Faysse and Angela Saade
HESPUL, énergies renouvelables & efficacité énergétique, France.
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