The fight against energy poverty heads the five calls that the environmental association Cero makes this Sunday, National Energy Day, considering that the sector’s policy “has to safeguard environmental sustainability” without “failing in the face of the climate emergency”.
“The Portuguese energy policy must safeguard environmental sustainability and cannot fail in the face of the climate emergency,” reads a statement released by Zero.
Of the five calls made today, National Energy Day, the first is the need to “approve the Long-Term National Strategy to Combat Energy Poverty.”
“Zero continues to defend that energy poverty is a very relevant problem in the national context, which covers 20% of the population that cannot bear the burdens to guarantee thermal comfort at home”, affirms the environmental association led by Francisco Ferreira .
Recalling that “the public consultation of the National Long-Term Strategy to Fight Energy Poverty 2021-2050 ended on May 17, 2021, 377 days ago”, the association considers that “an important strategy like this can only serve in our country if approved.
In the text released today, the association also defends that the Renewable Energy Directive must be “transposed urgently”, which according to the association “is 11 months behind schedule”.
The standard refers to “the promotion of the use of energy from renewable sources, sets the binding objective of the EU [União Europeia] achieve at least 32% renewable energy by 2030”, as well as specific targets for the heating, cooling and transport sectors by 2030.
“Considering the national commitment to the development of renewable energies, it is not understood why this transposition is still lacking,” defends the association chaired by Francisco Ferreira.
Zero’s third call refers to the adoption of “measures to promote energy efficiency that have been lacking for 19 months”.
The association recalls that the European Commission “refers that Portugal did not adopt measures to promote energy efficiency”, with the 2018 directive aimed at ensuring the European objective “of reaching 32.5% in terms of energy efficiency by 2030”.
Zero advocates reducing the need for useful energy, improving the efficiency of technical systems, and implementing systems that use renewable energy sources.
Environmentalists also see the need to “move forward in simplifying and reducing bureaucracy in collective self-consumption and support for renewable energy communities,” with Zero calling the administrative processes “slow and confusing.”
The association also wants to put an end to “idle investments in natural gas”, considering that, for example, after the plan to move the EU away from Russian fossil fuels was presented, it “was overshadowed by more investments in gas infrastructure ”.
“Diversification of energy source locations simply replaces Russian fossil fuels with other fossil fuels, leading to continued dependencies,” according to Zero.
Source: Observadora
