Large-scale energy renovations of school buildings have a high perceived investment risk, while the many actors involved deem the endeavour an even more complex procedure. The importance of energy renovation of buildings has been addressed by National (NEEAP, NECP) and EU (EPBD, Green Deal) policies. PEDIA was conceived for removing legal, administrative, technical, and market barriers, eliminating the existing fragmentation through the achievement of the following objectives: 1.Upgrade of 25 schools to the Nearly Zero Energy Building (NZEB) level and improvement of the thermal comfort levels for the users 2.Activation of an Innovative Financing Solution for schools’ energy efficiency upgrading 3.Establishment of a long-term energy renovation strategy for school buildings 4.Increase of energy savings, Renewable Energy Sources penetration, and reduction of CO2 emissions 5.Monitoring and continuous improvement of energy efficiency through Energy Management Systems - EMS (ISO 50001) Thus, PEDIA introduces a procedural framework for schools’ energy upgrade to meet NZEB level, by integrating to the existing renovation practices a selection ranking system, energy audits, Green Public Procurement (GPP), and an Innovative Financing Solution. The ranking system will assist the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sport and Youth in Cyprus to the selection of school buildings for energy upgrade, based on environmental, energy, socioeconomic criteria. Upon finalization, the conduction of the energy audit will indicate the cost optimal energy interventions, which in turn will provide the technical specifications for the GPP. As a final step, the establishment of an EMS to the school buildings will ensure future energy savings and continuous improvement of energy performance. Ultimately, the PEDIA project will directly trigger 7.5 M€ investments in energy upgrades of school buildings and will build solid long-term capacity to further renovate the whole school building stock in Cyprus.

Bricks of Skills is a project, co-funded by the Erasmus+ programme of the European Union, that brings together partners from six countries to address common approaches and standards to skills development and mobility of workers across Europe in the context of energy efficient investment in the Construction industry It is the strong will of Bricks of Skills partners to contribute to the necessary evolution of jobs in the construction industry and its strategic role in defining an innovative training design to address the fundamental issue. “A renovation wave for Europe: greening our buildings, creating jobs, improving lives”, published by the EU, in view of reaching the ambitious target for energy saving by 2050, it is clear “creating green jobs, upskilling workers and attracting new talents” is a urgent priority.The Bricks of Skills Objectives •develop flexible learning pathways focused on energy efficiency which can modernise, reward and resource the education and training of people for competitive and innovative solutions in Europe. •design EU recognised and standardised qualification pathways in accordance with the ECVET model, with the aim to overcome the fragmentation of construction professions and facilitate free movement of construction professionals in the EU •favour a cross-cutting understanding of the different trades in the construction sector through the flexibility of blended Learning Outcomes which are transferable and applicable to the different qualifications •enable learners to build a qualification at their own pace from learning outcomes acquired in their own country and abroadOutputs The first step towards achieving the objectives has been a joint design of Units of Learning Outcomes (ULOs), which are conceived as “learning bricks” meant to enable beneficiaries of construction training / education paths to gain knowledge, skills and competences in the field of Energy Efficiency and connected to the qualifications targeted (EQF 4-5 level).Bricks of Skills partners have developed 5 Bricks of Skills Units of Learning Outcomes translated in all the partnership languages•Awareness of Renewable Energies Technologies•Solar Energy•Technology & Materials•HVAC Ventilation mechanical•Energy efficiency of the building envelopeAnd•Bricks of Skills Guidelines to design Energy Efficiency Units of Learning Outcomes•Bricks of Skills Guidance to Implement ECVET for Energy Efficiency The innovative aspect was that Bricks of Skills partners adopted the ECVET model (European Credit system for Vocational Education and Training). This means that Bricks of Skills beneficiaries could achieve a qualification by accumulating the required learning outcomes, achieved in different countries and different contexts while respecting national legislation relating to the accumulation of units and the recognition of learning outcomes.It is Bricks of Skills partners strong belief that such an approach is an important step towards a truly integrated labour market and standardisation of skills which is highly required in the construction industry. Up to now, students in vocational education are not allowed to get their studies from abroad. In our Bricks of Skills partners we tried to demonstrate that through an ECVET approach we could fill this void and offer the chance for the participants to truly benefit from the opportunities offered by an integrated EuropeParticipants The Bricks of Skills partners piloted the delivery and assessment of the designed Energy Skills ULOs with 12 trainers drawn all partners at a Joint Staff Training Learning Activity in January 2020 just prior to the onset of Covid. Once back to their home countries these trainers transferred their knowledge to their colleagues thus replicating the impact of the LA. A further Learning Activity of a Blended Mobility of VET Learners was first postponed and then cancelled due to the pandemic but replaced by in-country piloting which had the benefit of reaching more participants across the partnership than originally planned. Partners have committed to sign a BoS “Memorandum of Understanding” and a “Learning Agreement”, which ensures that the qualifications achieved at one institution will be accepted at the other. For the time being, this is an pilot aimed at demonstrating that the approach can work. We need however a strong commitment from the qualification bodies in each country to make it happen on a wider and regular scale. If students could get their training abroad certified and recognised by their home institution, they would be more motivated to try to complete their training paths abroad and the training institution would greatly increase its attractiveness. This would be a real incentive to undertake vocational learning paths abroad. Improved mobility means that, following a placement abroad, learners come back with a certificate which is recognised in their own training system or learning context.

Cyprus and Malta, being small islands with similar needs, will leverage on the work that they have been doing with EIT Climate-KIC to bring all the relevant partners together, exchange ideas, organize workshop and prepare action plans in the innovation field of their National Energy and Climate Plans.

All over Europe, a good level of knowledge about Sustainable Energy Action Plan (SEAP) development has been reached. There are different good quality methodologies and guidelines available. However, currently municipalities struggle to implement these action plans. There are different reasons for that; one of the most important is the fact that often municipal employees do not feel engaged and are not motivated to take any sort of actions and initiatives, unless someone has actually “obliged” them. In many cases, this lack of engagement and commitment ends up with investments in energy efficiency that do not deliver expected technical and economic outcomes. Hence, the energy efficiency potential is not fully exploited and worse suboptimal investments do not provide expected yields. Moreover, local authorities (LAs) more often are facing also challenges regarding climate resilient infrastructure and climate adaptation. The level of knowledge and understanding is even scarcer as regarding climate mitigation. COMPETE4SECAP is designed to deliver a systematic approach to energy savings in local authorities using energy management systems (EnMS) according to ISO 50001 or European Energy Award with dedicated online monitoring tool and energy saving competitions. EnMS and competitions when combined can trigger significant benefits by providing innovative and efficient way to involve municipalities that have already their SEAPs but do not act in order to foster their integrated development at local level. Trained and engaged municipal employees will be able to better implement energy efficiency projects, which then require higher investments. An EnMS will help the LA to have reliable data for informed decision and further help in monitoring and evaluation of implemented projects. The use of renewable energy and integration of climate adaptation will also be facilitated through EnMS with the set of procedures from an environmental management system (e.g. IS0 140001).

The overall aim of ENERGee Watch is to enable peer to peer learning for regional and local authorities in order to precisely define, monitor and verify their sustainable energy and climate actions. Its main target are associations and networks of cities and regions and the learning process will be focused on how different sustainable energy and climate mitigation projects have been monitored and evaluated. Primarily, we will build on existing platforms and needs assessment surveys to perform a needs assessment and gaps identification with public bodies for learning and match these needs with available best practices. Then, public authorities and their associations and agencies will be selected and matched with one of the seven mentors who are all partners of ENERGee Watch. The learning program will be divided into four modules that include: i) data collection, ii) monitoring and verification, iii) indicators for adaption to climate change, iv) data display, dissemination and validation by final users (local authorities). ENERGee Watch will launch 4 modules per year (one per each topic, twelve in total) with a total of 72 participating mentees, which are all associations or networks which can distribute the knowledge further to their members. The added value of ENERGee Watch is that the learning program is not limited to a capacity building process but instead enables networking and examples from practice shown on the field. In the first step of each cycle - the masterclass - each participant can choose the learning objectives they want to accomplish in order that their progress can be tracked, and thus transparent standards will be set. The learning program will ideally result in improved policies and MRV standards, as well as partnerships for innovative sustainable energy policies and MRV practices.