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Representatives of the Fund at Komunal 2022 Waste Conference

10.10.2022.

The representatives of the Fund participated in the, organised by Komunal Magazine, which gathered in one place stakeholders from different waste management sectors.

The main topic of the conference dealt with municipal vehicles using alternative fuels, and the conclusion was that zero-emission vehicles were the future, and that utility companies had to start adjusting their operations to the new trends. “The Environmental Protection and Energy Efficiency Fund is prompting the purchase of electric, plug-in, and hydrogen vehicles. Utility companies also have the option to buy energy efficient vehicles through the Fund. Even though the initial investment is a bit higher, over time it pays off,” said Saša Pupovac from the Fund, adding that the citizens need to be educated about all advantages of such vehicles.

“The difference in the price of electric and fossil fuel vehicles is getting smaller – electric vehicles are becoming cheaper, and conventional vehicles more expensive,” said Šimun Lončarević from the Energy Institute Hrvoje Požar, emphasising that the maintenance of electric vehicles was cheaper, and their overall use was much more comfortable, but all this had to be supported by the quality infrastructure. He also stressed that currently the selection of vehicles using alternative fuels was rather limited, but that things were looking up. “The selection of vehicles in the N1 category is good, a bit lacking in categories N2 and N3, but this is changing very fast”.  

One of the conclusions is that in the future, hydrogen vehicles will be in high demand. “At the moment, you will have a hard time finding municipal vehicles using hydrogen fuel, but this will change in the future,” said Pupovac. The mayor of Dugo Selo, Nenad Panian, agreed with him, saying that electric vehicles were only a transitional phase on the path from fossil to hydrogen vehicles. 

On behalf of the Croatian Association of Towns Sonja Polonijo, said that the majority of utility companies had old vehicle fleets, underlining that the transition to alternative fuels was the new industrial revolution of sorts. She also put forward a proposal to EPEEF to finance used vehicles that were more climate-neutral, pointing out that municipal vehicle operators should test the vehicles using alternative fuel in real-life circumstances.

The participants found the results of the Komunal survey about the fleets of Croatian utility companies to be interesting, showing that more than 80% of utility companies used solely fossil fuel vehicles. Similarly, more than 85% of respondents believe that the selection of municipal vehicles using alternative fuels was too limited, while all of them stated that the Environmental Protection and Energy Efficiency Fund should continue co-financing the purchase of fossil fuel vehicles.

Nirvana Franković from the Environmental Protection and Energy Efficiency Fund presented the new public call for local self-government units and counties for the implementation of climate change adaptation measures. The goal is to improve the resilience of local and regional communities and reduce their vulnerability to the negative impact of climate change, which would consequently contribute to the development of a green and climate-neutral Croatia. “Interested units of regional and local self-government can submit their applications to the Fund, which can comprise one or several projects for which the maximum co-financing is 3 million kunas, or 80% of eligible costs,” said Franković, stressing that the resources would be granted until the available budget of HRK 84.2 million was used up.

One of the subjects discussed at the conference was the operation of waste management centres. Along with Marišćina and Kaštijun, WMC Bikarac was recently put into service. The head of EPEEF’s Sector for EU funds, Maja Feketić, said that the waste management centres, in the upcoming period covered by OPCC 2021-2027, would receive municipal waste and other waste fractions such as plastic and paper, and that the centres were an important part of a successful and integrated waste management system. “You cannot be granted EU funding unless everything in the project is first-rate, which is why this process lasts so long,” said Feketić.

“It used to be said that waste management centres were too exaggerated, expensive, and unnecessary, but today we can see that the centres can be the solution”, said the director of WMC Bikarac Robert Podrug.