Follow Us

News

Members of Healthy Cities Association Gathered in Mersin

08.11.2016

Hosted by Metropolitan Municipality of Mersin, the conference titled “Renewable Energy for Healthy Cities” and the 25th Ordinary General Assembly of Healthy Cities Association were held on October, 13 – 14 -15, 2016.

Vice President of Healthy Cities Association and Mayor of Gebze Municipality Mr. Adnan KÖŞKER, Governor of Mersin Mr. Özdemir ÇAKACAK, Mayor of Mersin Metropolitan Municipality Mr. Burhanettin KOCAMAZ, the mayors of associate municipalities, the councillors, the directors of related agencies and institutes, the coordinators of Turkish Healthy Cities Association, the specialists and the press members attended the conference that was conducted at the Congress and Exhibition Hall of Mersin Metropolitan Municipality.

Before the opening speeches, a short film promoting the city of Mersin was shown.

Afterwards, an introductory film made by Healthy Cities Association about the conference “Renewable Energy for Healthy Cities’ was shown.

Making the opening speech of the meeting under the title of “Renewable Energy for Healthy Cities”, Head of the Department of Ecology of Anadolu University and Member of Advisory Committee of Healthy Cities Association – Prof. Dr. Cengiz TÜREwho also chairs the Organizing Committee of the Conference, underlined that the inapplicability of fossile-based energy sources in supplying the world’s energy needs has become evident now.

Highlighting that such resources had expired and have been rapidly running out, Prof. Dr. TÜRE stated, “Enjoying the fossil fuels to the utmost for many years, humanity is now paying the piper. The problems related to these kind of resources confronted today are not only socio-economical, but also socio-ecological.Today’s policies concerning environmental protection aim at making the resourcing and sourcing more productive. It became imperative to implement the 3E system, that is to be carried out in cooperation with regards to Economy-Ecology-Energy, in order to protect th environment and render it sustainable. That’s why today, Healthy Cities Association met up to discuss in detail how to increase the use of renewable resources and ways of using them suitably.”Prof. Dr. TÜRE also spoke of another agenda item, the question of carbon emission, emphasizing that the main reason for climate change and global warming is the greenhouse gases.Drawing attention to the ever increasing carbon emission in our country, Prof. Dr. TÜRE indicated that also the awareness of the cities about this issue increases accordingly and they have been struggling for conducting significant works to designate the size of carbon footprint and to reduce it.

By his opening speech, Mayor Burhanettin KORKMAZ called attention to the fact that rapid growth of industry and population since the 1970s onwards are the reasons of increasing environmental pollution. Laying emphasis on the proportions reached up to the point of climate changes and scarcity of resources, Mr. Kocamaz stated “Therefore, it has become necessary to provide more efficient use of water and electric energy and reduce the negative impacts of the energy use on environment. Environmental consciousness is a modern precautionary approach similar to preventive medicine measures. It seeks to create a sustainable lifestyle for everyone and everything. The vision of creating healthy cities and the efforts to build them, lay heavy burdens on us in terms of shaping the future. We have to create environmentalist resources for future generations as well. Energy efficiency means to use it correctly, without affecting the productivity or quality. Turkey has the capacity to generate 10 % of its consumpiton. Even this percentage value itself proves the need of energy efficiency. Human life is an existence relevant to the nature. Consequently, sustainable and renewable energy is a necessity for everyone and everything.”

Vice President of Healthy Cities Association and Mayor of Gebze Municipality Mr. Adnan KÖŞKER stated that he has eventually recognized the environmental damage caused as a result of humankind’s production and profit objectives. Drawing attention to the fact that energy need is an indispensable component of production, Mr. Köşker stated “The ecological and environmental conflicts we confront related to the energy based upon fossil fuels make it compulsory to try and provide energy from renewable resources which are clean and healthier. Therefore, we should diversify the methods we use to generate energy and use renewable energy resources efficiently. It is rather pleasing that our country is located in such a rich geography with respect to renewable energy resources. Within the boundaries of our country, there are plenty of renewable enery resources such as wind, solar, geothermal, hydraulic, bio-mass, moreover there seems to be investments on wind energy more and more day after day. Though, this is not enough for sure.”

Mayor Köşker highlighted that whilst using renewable energy resources, there are still many works to be done as of energy efficiency, green buildings, isolation and energy saving.

Indicating his confidence in that the findings of the specialists and local administrators at the Mersin gathering of Healthy Cities Association would provide a new road map to the directors, producers and consumers in our country, Governor of Mersin, Mr. Özdemir ÇAKACAK, reminded of the ever increasing significance of renewable energy resources which will substitute for fossile-based energy resources which are anticipated to come to an end in the near future.

After the opening speeches, the budget of 2017 and the performance programme was approved by affiliate members at the25th ordinary general assembly. With the approval of the membership of Akçadağ Municipality of the providence Malatya, the number of associates increased to 64.Mayor of Akçadağ Municipality, Mr. Ali KAZGAN took the floor and expressed his gratitude of being affiliated to the Healthy Cities Association.Putting they were affiliated to the Association so as to built a qualitative and convenient city, Mayor of Akçadağ Municipality Mr. Ali KAZGAN stated that under the roof of the Association,they will struggle against urban poverty and endeavour to create a healthy city, thus healthy and habitable cities.

Following the stated session, the awards of the municipalities that were placed in the Competition of Best Application of Healthy Cities 2016 were granted. The jury president of the the Competition of Best Application of Healthy Cities 2016, Retired Academic Member of Ankara University – Faculty of Political SciencesProf.Dr. Ruşen KELEŞ in his speech said that each applicant Project pit one against another in being valuable as well and led the municipalities to a highly competitive process.

According to the results of the competiton the winners are;

The project of Denizli Metropolitan Municipality titled as “Young Denizli” in the Social Responsibility category,

The project of Kadıköy Municipality titled as “The Bicycle Trails in Kadıköy District” in the Healthy City Planning category,

The project of Bilecik Municipality titled as “I’m not a Technology Addict, Because I’m Smart” in the category of Healthy Living,

and

The project of Çankaya Municipality titled as “Integrating Street Collectors into the System” in the category of Healthy Environment.

Also, the project of Gebze Municipality titled as “Smart Future Academy”, the project of İstanbul Metropolitan Municipality titled as “Volunteering Activities”, the project of Karşıyaka Municipality titled as “An Active City: Karşıyaka” and the project of Mersin Metropolitan Municipality titled as “Solid Waste for Power Generation” were deemed worthy of Jury’s Special Award.

Following the award ceremony, it was passed on to the session titled “The Potential and The Future of Turkey in Renewable Energy” chaired by Prof. Dr. Cengiz TÜRE, Head of the Department Of Ecology of Anadolu University and Member of Advisory Committee of HCA. The first speaker was Prof. Dr. Zafer DEMİR, Faculty Member of Porsuk Vocational School of Higher Education who made a presentation on “Our Resources of Renewable Energy and Power Generation”. After Demir, Faculty Member of METU Faculty of Architecture Department of Urban and Regional Planning Assoc. Prof. Dr. Çetin GÖKSU made his presentation titled “The New Energy Potential and its Evaluation in terms of Healthy Cities”. The last presentation of the session was on “Renewable Resources and Energy Output – Miscellaneous Suggestions” by Faculty Member of Bilecik Şeyh Edebali University Faculty of Engineering – Departmentof Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering Assoc. Prof. Dr. Emin AÇIKKALP.

Following the sessions, the first day of the conference was closed by a trip to the Caves of Kanlıdivane, Kızkalesi, Cennet Cehennem, Astım.

At the second day of the conference programme, before the sessions, affiliate Municipalities which have drawn up Inventory of Urban Carbon Footprint or Action Plans for Sustainable Urban Energy were awarded certificates. The affiliate municipalities that received certificates were respectively Metropolitan Municipality of Bursa, Metropolitan Municipality of İzmir, Metropolitan Municipality of Muğla, Bilecik Municipality, Nilüfer Municipality, Kadıköy Municipality, Pendik Municipality and Tepebaşı Municipality.

Following the certificate ceremony, a session chaired by the Director of Healthy Cities Association, Mr. Murat AR and titled as “Cities’ Vision of Energy and Local Administrations” took place.

First speaker wasHead of the Environmental Protection and Development Department of Bursa Metropolitan and Project Coordinator of HCA – Nalan FİDAN and she made her presentation themed “Energy Efficiency for Struggle Against Climate Change in Bursa” to the attendants. After FİDAN, Head of the Environmental Protection Supervision Office of Mersin Metropolitan Municipality Dr. Bülent HALİSDEMİR made a presentation on “Project of Solid Waste for Power Generation”. The last presentation of this session was titled “New Generation Municipalism” by Mr. Suat YALNIZOĞLU – IT Manager of Tepebaşı Municipality.

The last session of the conference was titled “Renewable Energy and Public Awareness” and chaired by Assoc. Prof. Dr. Emel İRGİL – Retired Member of Uludağ University – Faculty of Medicine, Department of Public Health and Member of Advisory Committee of HCA. The first speaker was Prof. Dr. Emine Didem EVCİ KİRAZ – Academic Member of Adnan Menderes University Faculty of Medicine Department of Public Health and Member of Advisory Committee of HCA, and her presentation was on “The Significance of Surveys on Raising Public Awareness of Renewable Energy”. Following the first presentation, Academic Member of Osmangazi University Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences andMember of Advisory Committee of HCA – Assoc. Prof. Dr. İnci PARLAKTUNA took the floor and made her presentation titled “Renewable Energy and Public Awareness”. The last presentation of the session was made by Prof. Dr. Cengiz TÜRE – Anadolu University, Science Faculty, Biology Department – Head of the Department of Ecology of Anadolu University and Member of Advisory Committee of Healthy Cities Association who also chairs the Organizing Committee of the Conference, on “Significance of Interpersonal Ecological Intelligence for Renewable Energy”.

After the meeting, the conference ended up as the attendants were taken on a trip to the Ship‘Nusrat Mayın’, the Gate of Cleopatra, the Cave of Ashab-ı Kehf.

img_9896 img_9884 img_9859 img_7926 img_7498 img_7482 img_7461 img_7431 img_7426 img_7393 img_1361

Bu Haberi Paylaşın