On 21 April, on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the PRO-SUD community syndicate, the responsible municipal politicians of the Minett UNESCO Biosphere signed a declaration of intent to jointly decarbonise the southern region of Luxembourg by 2050. The aim is to create synergies through close cooperation between the 11 municipalities. These can take place on both a manpower and a financial level.
A first stage goal is a 55% reduction of CO2 emissions in the southern municipalities by 2030. In order to be able to achieve this goal, through concrete projects, joint efforts must be made. On Friday 7 July, a first “Mission Zéro Carbone” workshop was organised, attended by nearly 40 officials from the 11 PRO-SUD municipalities, national institutions, the Ministry of Spatial Planning and the University of Luxembourg.
Course of the workshop
At the beginning of the workshop, Lex Faber, from the planning office Zeyen+Baumann, reminded the participants of the urgency of decarbonisation and explained the course of the workshop, an event scheduled to last three hours. The participants were divided into 5 different groups. Each group dealt with one of the major fields of the regional development strategy of the Ministry of Spatial Planning, which was presented to the municipalities last October: Resilience and Decarbonisation, Economic Development, Urban Planning, Agriculture and Transport.
In this context, the participants were each presented with two concrete projects that had been started or intended to be realised in the next few years, and they were asked to think about how these projects could be implemented together regionally. They had to determine the impact of these projects on the reduction of CO2 emissions and work on proposals to accompany these projects at the local level and to determine their benefits.
Defining strategies
In the second part of the workshop, the 40 representatives of the various institutions were given the task of naming concrete goals that could be incorporated into work plans. Work groups were given the task of strategically approaching the goals, with plans for the next four years, plans for 2030 and 2050. The involvement of society (citizens, associations, companies) and an assessment of the resources needed, both in terms of human and financial resources, were further tasks to be worked on.
To conclude, the individual working groups presented their main priorities that they felt needed to be addressed first.
“Alone you go faster, together you go further”
The results of this major workshop will now be analysed, catalogued and prioritised to be presented to the new PRO-SUD committee, which will start its work in autumn. The community leaders will then be able to decide which priorities they want to take on the path to becoming a climate-neutral biosphere reserve.
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