Monitoring the sustainability of the Greek energy system

A concise set of energy indicators is proposed to assess the sustainability of the Greek energy system from 1960 onwards. Three generalized indices, each corresponding to one of the three dimensions of sustainable development (social, environmental and economic) are defined, estimated and presented in the form of a ternary plot. Results are used to analyze whether the energy system developed in a sustainable way, and to identify its weaknesses and deficiencies. The analysis further demonstrates the representativeness of the chosen set of indicators, and its ability to describe the most significant changes that occurred during the studied period. The analysis spans a period of 47 years, during which significant political, social and economic events took place in Greece. Results show that the development of the energy system has been mainly driven by social aspects. Environmental performance improvements are particularly evident during the last decade; however, a lot remains to be done to achieve national and European policy objectives. With regard to the social dimension, accessibility has substantially improved and disparities between low and high income households have narrowed. Nevertheless, energy prices have been continuously increasing at a rate higher than income. On economic terms, the initially observed improvement in productivity is misleading, as it was mostly caused by the increase of the Gross Domestic Product rather than energy efficiency improvements, while energy security has been worsening during the last decade

Debating the urban dimension of territorial cohesion

The Territorial Cohesion goal was only included in the EU Treaty by 2009, with a view to promote a more balanced and harmonious European territory. One year earlier (2008), the European Commission (EC) published the ‘Green Paper on Territorial Cohesion—Turning territorial diversity into strength’. Neither one, nor the other, clearly defines the meaning of the Territorial Cohesion concept. The later, however, proposes three main policy responses towards more balanced and harmonious development: (i) Concentration: overcoming differences in density; (ii) Connecting territories: overcoming distance; and (iii) Cooperation: overcoming division. Although not explicitly, this document identifies several ‘urban questions’ to be dealt when promoting territorial cohesive policies: avoiding diseconomies of very large agglomerations and urban sprawl processes, combating urban decay and social exclusion, avoiding excessive concentrations of growth, promoting access to integrated transport systems and creating metropolitan bodies. In this light, this chapter proposes to debate the importance of the urban dimension to achieve the goal of territorial cohesion at several territorial levels.info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

The progress of RES environment in the most recent member states of the EU

The most recent EU member states seem to have important Renewable Energy Sources (RES) potential. However, they have serious structural difficulties in development and integration of RES policies. Indeed, the balanced development of RES between the member states is urgent today. The penetration of the RES in these member states is related to the existence of an appropriate environment (political, economical, social, and technological). The current paper is based on an analytical review and specific PEST analysis aiming to assess the current RES environment and the progress so far in each of these most recent EU members. © 2010 Elsevier Ltd