Annual awards to recognize renewable energy projects
LONDON, England, 2004-06-23 (Refocus Weekly)
Renewable energy projects will receive £140,000 in prize money from the 2004 Ashden Awards for Sustainable Energy.
The 'Green Oscars,' as the awards are nicknamed, are in the fourth year of
recognizing “inspirational and innovative renewable energy projects which both
provide social and economic benefits to local communities and contribute towards
protecting the environment by reducing our dependence on fossil fuels.”
There are seven finalists this year, from a record number of entries from around
the world. The projects in Guatemala, Kenya, two in Pakistan and three in India
will compete for four awards and prize money to help them expand their project
and replicate it elsewhere in the world.
First place winners receive £30,000 while runners-up receive £7,500. Awards
will be offered to two projects within Britain to recognize the “potentially
vital role which small-scale sustainable energy can play in industrialised
countries.”
The award ceremony will take place at the Royal Geographical Society on June 24,
with Sir David Attenborough as the guest speaker. The finalists will also be
congratulated by Prince Charles at a separate ceremony.
“The Ashden Awards aims to support initiatives that contribute to reducing our
dependence on fossil fuels whilst at the same time meeting the urgent energy
needs of the millions of people living in rural areas who still lack access to
electricity,” says award chair Sarah Bulter-Sloss. “This years finalists
have been selected because of their pioneering and innovative use of sustainable
energy to meet the needs of the rural poor.”
The Ashden Awards were created in 2001 to recognize “exemplary and successful
examples of renewable energy use in the developing world and as well as the
UK,” says the group. It wants to persuade policy-makers and funding groups to
“recognize renewable energy as a crucial tool for meeting the human
development needs of poor communities across the globe whilst simultaneously
addressing the urgent environmental issues of deforestation, pollution, GHG
emissions and the threat of climate change.”
The Green Alliance, one of the Ashden partners, will publish new research to
show how micro-generation, with the right political will, can “play a major
part” in helping Britain close its looming energy gap. Another partner, the
New Economics Foundation, will also release information on how sustainable
energy can meet basic needs in the developing world, slow the growth in demand
for fossil fuels while simultaneously addressing the challenge of global
warming.
Click here for more
info...
Visit http://www.sparksdata.co.uk/refocus/ for your international energy focus!!
|