Advertise on podcast: City Stories by Energy Cities

Monasteries, mosques and memorials – Yerevan is a fascinating city that hums with history. And this city, the capital of Armenia, is also moving towards a green and climate-resilient future. They are investing in energy-efficient buildings, in sustainable mobility, and citizen-driven urban innovation. What particular challenges a post-soviet city is facing when it comes to energy and urban planning? Yerevan joined Energy Cities in 2025 - so how does an Armenian city with more than 1 million inhabitants look towards the EU and its common and emerging energy practices? In this episode, Aneta Babayan, Director of Yerevan's Urban Development Agency, takes listeners inside the Armenian capital’s ambitious effort to become more energy-efficient, climate-resilient and liveable. Aneta and her team are operating for the municipality and they manage Yerevan's major city-scale projects. This episode was made possible by Energy Cities and the EU-funded Covenant of Mayors East to which the Municipality of Yerevan belongs. This Eastern Partnership initiative is uniting local and regional authorities from Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine around energy and climate action: https://com-east.eu

District heating and cooling still is a new approach for many local governments. And it’s not just about installing underground pipes, it's a whole urban transformation. We wanted to hear from Frederik Ceulemans from the City of Brussels how they deal with that big challenge. As Deputy Mayor, Frederik has a large portfolio spanning from Urban Renovation and Climate, to Citizen Participation and Dutch-speaking culture. In this episode he told us how they started planning and implementing district heating and cooling in a socially very diverse neighbourhood of Brussels. If you wonder how to design a network that is free of gas, profitable and still affordable, this episode is for you. If you want to learn more about cleaner heating, you should check out Energy Cities’ #MakingHeatSafe campaign: energy-cities.eu/making-heat-safe/

How to turn a city into a “cool” place. Interview with Mariam Emelien, Grenobles Alpes Métropole by Energy Cities

Food is our everyday fuel and we often don’t really know in detail how it has come to our plate. In our Energy Cities network, many cities are figuring out healthy and local food can be provided to everyone and how to grow awareness around it. Albertville in the French Alps is one of those cities. Albertville counts around 20,000 inhabitants and is running several programs as part of its sustainable food plan. known as the Projet Alimentaire Territorial. This masterplan aims to connect producers with local consumers, including public canteens in and around Albertville. Each day, the city’s central canteen prepares around 1,200 meals and it is serving schools, elderly residents, and several neighbouring municipalities. For this episode I spoke with Dorothée Meyer, who is connecting the dots between farmers, residents, school personnel and others around this food masterplan. She is working at the inter-municipal organisation Arlysere. When Dorothée talks about farming and school canteens, her voice and eyes are filled with passion. I felt that Dorothee believes in the power of big transitions starting literally on the ground. Our conversation took us all along the food chain: We talked about the land use challenges of high quality farming, the need to rebuild trust between consumers and those who produce what we eat and the big question of how citizens can pay and eat better local food. Enjoy the episode. Bon appétit. This episode was made possible thanks to the EU-funded SPARKLE project: https://energy-cities.eu/project/sparkle/

There is this one shirt that you won’t wear anymore. It’s too good to be thrown away, but is there any alternative in your town? Each European generates 16 kilos of clothing and shoe waste per year, but only about 15 % is separately collected. The rest still ends up in mixed household waste. That’s why many European cities struggle with that textile waste: Shirts, shoes and towels pollute through microplastics, toxic emissions, and land use. Yes, textiles are a waste AND a climate issue. Torino, one of the 100 Climate Neutral Cities, decided to approach textiles differently by preventing them from becoming waste in the first place. Besides AI monitored containers and a very clever app, the city gave citizens the know-how to reduce, repair or recycle their textiles. and artisan engagement via two local initiatives. Let’s explore with Laura Ribotta, Environmental innovation expert at Comune di Torino how to lift the stigma of second hand, how police uniforms became the sweet spot and what other cities can learn. This episode was made possible thanks to the CLIMABOROUGH project, co-funded by the European Union and CINEA. It has the ambition to bridge the gap between design and implementation of urban innovations, particularly in the face of climatic change and its consequential needs for adaptation and mitigation. https://climaborough.eu/

In many European cities, residents struggle to find affordable housing, whether it’s for rent or purchase. And paradoxically, at the same time, many cities register a growing number of real estate space that is empty and unused. How can we better match housing supply with demand? And how can public administrations regain control over the housing stock? We asked Mr Dennis de Vries, who was our guest at the latest 15/15 Mayors Energy Talk organised by Energy Cities. Mr de Vries is Alderman of the city of Utrecht in The Netherlands and in charge of Housing and Real Estate. He works daily on the challenge of combining sufficiency and wellbeing of all inhabitants. Tune in to hear Mr De Vries share hands-on insights and practical ideas to tackle the housing crisis head-on. This episode was made possible thanks to funding from the French Agency for Ecological Transition ADEME.

Today we’re heading to Central Greece, to the municipality of Domokos. Domokos with its 9000 inhabitants is the recent winner of the Covenant of Mayors award. I’m joined by the Mayor of Domokos Mr Liolios and his colleague Mrs. Zisopoulou from the Mayor’s Office. Together, they’ll walk us through the project that earned them the award: how it came about, who got involved, and what it really takes for a small city to mobilise its people around the energy transition. We’ll also hear their reflections about the advantages — and the challenges — of being a small municipality trying to lead big change. This episode was made possible thanks to funding by the Covenant of Mayors.

In this episode of City Stories, I’m joined by two community energy experts I know well and I loved working with lately: my colleague Anna Francis from Energy Cities and Dimitris Katsakaprakis from Minoan Energy Community, the biggest energy community in Greece. Together, we’ve been working in the LIFE LOOP project, helping cities and communities set up joint local renewable energy projects. We’ll talk about what it takes to make city services and citizen groups work together. What culture and knowledge does it require to come up with a viable energy community where ownership is shared? https://energy-cities.eu/lifeloop This episode was made possible by funding from the EU LIFE-CET program.

In this episode we interview Ilkka Räsänen, a 63-year old jovial Fin who is one of the innovation leaders in his municipality. Electricity prices in Finland are amongst the cheapest in Europe and one reason for Finland’s big move towards electrification of heat. lkka Rasanen works for the municipality of Lappeenranta in the South East of Finland. The 700.000 inhabitants are essentially getting their heat through a district heating network which is owned by the municipality and supplied by clean energy from the municipal utility. The future in that Finnish town is electric and you’ll understand why Lappeenranta was awarded this year’s Covenant of Mayors award as part of the Cities Heat Detox Campaign. Find inspiration for your city’s heat detox at the Covenant of Mayors’ website: www.eumayors.eu.

This is quite a special episode of City Stories: Our host Miriam Eisermann moderated a live session with city makers recorded on the occasion of Energy Cities’ 35th anniversary and the Annual Forum in Besançon. Tune in to the discussions around community engagement and also what role AI can or cannot play in participation and citizen engagement. In this episode you will see that cities and citizens are still somewhat searching for the right way towards energy democracy. It’s become increasingly important to go rethink how we govern, going back to the core: involving citizens in decision-making.

Mechelen has already started its heat journey a while ago. The goal? To switch to a renewable heat supply for all its buildings by 2050. But what political strategies, resources and players does it take to make such a municipal heat shift happen? Ighor Vandevyver may have some answers: Ighor belongs to the climate team of the municipality of Mechelen. When you hear him talk about the city’s very recent municipal heat plan and their Heat Coalition you’ll understand why Mechelen was awarded this year’s Covenant of Mayors award as part of the Cities Heat Detox Campaign. The Covenant of Mayors’ Cities Heat Detox campaign empowers cities and towns to shift away from toxic heat sources, building healthier, more resilient communities. The campaign brings together over 50 cities who are leading the way. Find inspiration for your city’s heat detox at the Covenant of Mayors’ website: www.eumayors.eu.

The shortage of decent and affordable housing, both for purchase and rental, is getting deeper and deeper. Millions of homes in the EU need urgent renovations. But how can we scale up retrofitting efficiently? How can local governments best guide the citizens who would like to improve their home’s energy performance? One-stop-shops are seen as a powerful tool and I’m delighted to have a one-stop-shop expert with me today. My guest is Gabriel Quentin. Gabriel is Partnership Manager at Oktave, a regional one-stop-shop for renovation in the East of France. If someone knows how to design and operate a retrofitting one-stop-shop in the most viable way, it’s him. This episode was produced with support from the EU Peers initiative and funding from the European Union’s LIFE Programme. EU Peers is the European Community of Practice for One-Stop Shops. One-stop-shops provide Integrated Home Renovation Services to homeowners, and their supporters. EU Peers strengthens and upscales renovation rates in Europe. www.eu-peers.eu/

At the next 2025 Annual Forum, many European cities will gather in Besançon. Over two days, cities will exchange knowledge with each other and with other experts. Challenges and strategies to tackle them, concrete practices, tools with tangible outcomes, and thought-provoking discussions—this is what we have prepared for you at this event. Join us: https://annualforum.energy-cities.eu/agenda/ To give you a preview of what’s to come, we wanted to share once again a podcast episode we released in 2023. In this episode, we highlight a management approach tested by two of our members, the city of Mouscron (Belgium) and the city of Brașov (Romania). Enjoy!

This is our second and final episode on how energy poverty affects people not only financially but also through poor health. In the previous episode we looked into coping strategies and needs of people in energy poverty. In this current episode we want to discuss the different pathways we can take for making people’s lives at home healthier. This show is about how local governments can provide answers and concrete help, especially to those that are already in fragile or complicated situations. How can they be supportive in urgency situations while creating long-term conditions that bring wellbeing? This episode is supported in the framework of the WELLBASED project, co-funded by the EU program Horizon 2020.

Since the energy crisis started a few years ago, we hear more often about energy or fuel poverty. But how often do we talk about the concrete challenges and also the coping strategies of the people affected by it? And what does it mean for people’s health when they live in very cold or very hot homes? Our guests today are two brilliant researchers from the University of Leeds: Lucie Middlemiss and Beverly Searle. They have been leading the qualitative data collection in the WELLBASED project, looking at how people in energy poverty felt in their homes, how they dealt with limited access to energy and how this impacted their health and wellbeing. In our conversation Lucie and Beverley share their invaluable insights from over 150 qualitative interviews with people across six cities. We discuss the fragile health condition of people in energy poverty and try to untangle the many complex reasons for it. And when it comes to the solutions, local authorities definitely have a role to play. This episode was produced thanks to the EU-funded Horizon 2020 project WELLBASED: www.wellbased.eu