Doc. 10697

3 October 2005

Preserving the environment by energy savings within the public sector and the Council of Europe

Motion for a recommendation

presented by Mr Schmied and others

      Energy in general and energy saving in particular, as a way to reduce pollution, limit climate change and contribute to the preservation of the environment, has been since a long time on the list of the Assembly’s main topics of interest. The Assembly recalls inter alia its recent Resolution 1435 (2005) on energy systems and the environment.

Public administrations should make conservation and energy efficiency a priority and should be urged to take steps towards contributing to the preservation of the environment through better energy saving policies applied within their own areas of activity.

As a matter of fact, public administrations sometimes tend to neglect simple and cheap possibilities of saving energy. Asking civil servants to turn the lights off after business hours, inciting them to use public transportation instead of private cars for reaching the offices and reducing paper consumption would be only several examples of easy-to-do savings.

The Assembly invites member states to urge public administrations to save energy, among others by:

-       installing solar panel systems on administrative buildings;

-       encouraging civil servants to use public or shared transport to/from the offices;

-       gradually replacing their fleet of cars and buses by environmentally-friendly ones;

-       reducing energy consumption due to lighting, which can represent up to one third of the general electricity consumption in administrative buildings;

-       using more efficient lighting and implementing electricity-saving technologies in administrative buildings;

-       proceeding to recycling of paper and e-waste;

-       developing a real energy-saving culture among civil servants.

The Assembly invites in particular the Council of Europe to have a leading role in saving energy by taking measures to reduce energy consumption, using environmentally- friendly technologies and making use of its position for influencing national administrations.

Signed (see overleaf)

Signed ¹:

SCHMIED, Walter, Switzerland, ALDE

ANNEMANS, Gerolf, Belgium, NR

ANTTILA, Sirkka-Liisa, Finland, ALDE

DORIĆ, Miljenko, Croatia, ALDE

DUIVESTEIJN, Adri, Netherlands, SOC

DUPRAZ, John, Switzerland, ALDE

ETHERINGTON, Bill, United Kingdom, SOC

FLYNN, Paul, United Kingdom, SOC

GUBERT, Renzo, Italy, EPP/CD

JAKAVONIS, Gediminas, Lithuania, ALDE

LENGAGNE, Guy, France, SOC

LOBKOWICZ, Jaroslav, Czech Republic, EPP/CD

MEALE, Alan, United Kingdom, SOC

NESSA, Pasquale, Italy, EPP/CD

PUCHE, Gabino, Spain, EPP/CD

¹        SOC: Socialist Group

      EPP/CD: Group of the European People’s Party

      ALDE: Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe

      EDG: European Democratic Group

      UEL: Group of the Unified European Left

      NR: not registered in a group