Description of organisation

Organization CEPA (Center for Environmental Public Advocacy) was founded in 1993 and had two main programs: Sustainable economy program and Public interest law program. Later CEPA joined the international network of environmental organizations Friends of The Earth. In 2004 the two programs were transfered into two independent organizations, one of them is Priatelia Zeme-CEPA (Friends of The Earth-CEPA).

Priatelia Zeme-CEPA is a non-profit organisation, which aims to prepare the conditions for a transformation of a spontaneous, centralised and fosil energetics towards and intelligent energetics on the regional level. Intelligent energetics is such that systematicaly leads towards regional self-sufficiency, is under a local control, respects natural environmental limits and follows energetic priorities in this order: decreasing of final energy need and consumption –> increasing of energy efficiency –> use of renewable energy sources. We dedicate all the activities of the organisation to this ambition. We have a residence in a small village Ponická Huta close to Banská Bystrica city in the middle of Slovakia. We are part of the biggest global environmental organisations network - Friends of The Earth International. We mobilize citizens, improve competencies and skills of our members, help the municipalities, develop awareness and other educational, publishing, informational and consulting activities. We support good energy politics and good projects and we lead campaigns against those, which do not follow the principles of intelligent energetics.

Following these principles, FoE-CEPA is currently working on a project: Towards energetic selfsufficiency: making sustainable energy policy in rural regions. In three target regions (Kežmarok, Rimavská Sobota, Rožňava - rural regions with high unemployment rate in the Central and Eastern Slovakia) we aim to set the conditions for transformation of public administration in energetics from spontaneity into the systematic development. We help creating capacities for this by providing professional and methodological support to Centers for Sustainable Energy, which are the main energy policy makers in the target regions. Centers work independently from the local governments, though have the mandate to prepare and coordinate the transition to low-carbon intelligent energetics for municipalities. In cooperation with Centers and support of municipalities we are preparing the complex package of modern energetic-policy measures and we prepare its trial in practice. We also focus on working with schools. Since primary school and high school educational system does not equip its graduates with the awareness and proper understanding of the future they will be facing in the context of global climate change, and does not create good energetic habits of young people, we are making workshops for teachers about how to teach about climate change, its context and energetics.

Activities:
1) Analytical part: analyzing reasons of the absence of regional energetic policies (local development strategies and planning, local media, public opinion, educational system in context of climate and
energetic literacy).
2) Practical part:
- preparing methodology for regional energetic planning within the local context,
- providing the training and mentoring for the employees and of Centers for Sustainable Energy,
- gaining local and national political support for the Centers for Sustainable Energy,
- building capacities for energetic planning in the target regions,
- designing the innovations in education, leading to increase the energetic literacy of the population in target regions.

We have three target regions mentioned above. Our target groups are local governments, employees of municipalities, people and institutions who form local regional policies (Microregions, Centers for
Sustainable Energy, local Action Groups, Committees for Underdeveloped regions, Local committees of state administration), Professional institutions and entrepreneurs in the energy sector (Slovak Agency for Energetics and Innovation, Slovak association of photovoltics and renewables), schools (and teachers, which want to teach about climate change and energetics in their school) and NGOs, all within the target regions.