Professors, researchers and students from Unicamp met with representatives of the public authorities of Campinas and the State of São Paulo, this Wednesday (13), with the aim of discussing plans and actions to promote the regional energy transition. Held at the University's Convention Center, the Energy Transition and Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) forum is part of the Permanent Forums program, of the Dean of Extension and Culture (Proec), and was organized by the São Paulo Center for Energy Transition Studies (CPTEn), one of the Science for Development Centers supported by the São Paulo State Research Support Foundation (Fapesp).
The opening of the forum was attended by the rector of the University, Antonio José de Almeida Meirelles, Marco Antonio Zago, president of the Superior Council of Fapesp, Marisa Barros, Undersecretary of State for Energy and Mining, by Luiz Carlos Silva, director of CPTEn, and Marco Aurélio Cremasco, professor at Unicamp and advisor to Proec. Representing the municipal public authorities, they participated Rogério Menezes, municipal secretary for Green, Environment and Sustainable Development, and Marcelo Coluccini, municipal secretary of Planning and Urban Development.
Meirelles warned that Brazil has already missed several opportunities to change the course of its history and, today, one of the themes capable of contributing to turning this page around is the energy transition. The rector praised CPTEn and the Sustainable Campus project, also directed by Silva, stating that the bodies contribute to the University playing a transformative role in the energy field.
“When I took over management of Unicamp, we developed work in this direction and debated the need to have the aspiration of being the most sustainable university in Latin America. I think we are taking great steps in this direction, towards building a university campus that is very sustainable”, stated Meirelles, highlighting the transversality of the theme, which attracts the attention of society and a large number of researchers, and launching the challenge to expand solar photovoltaic generation on campuses. Currently, of the total energy consumed in Cidade Universitária Zeferino Vaz (Barão Geraldo campus), around 10% comes from photovoltaic sources. At Unicamp units in Limeira, this rate rises to 30%.
Zago highlighted the success of the projects implemented by the Science Centers for Development, considering them examples of a successful policy by Fapesp in its efforts to bring São Paulo science closer to the demands of society and the productive sector. “Today, we celebrate this energy transition research center [CPTEn] which is part of 22 other centers created by our Science for Development notices, launched in 2020 and 2022. We invested around R$220 million. In addition to the energy transition, the subject of this center, the initiatives approved in this program focus on topics such as science applied to security, digital agriculture, climate neutrality in livestock farming and xenotransplants. All of these are considered technological bottlenecks for the development of the State of São Paulo”, he declared Zago.
Campinas and the Sustainable Development Index
Menezes mentioned the process of preparing the Cities Sustainable Development Index (IDSC), which, in an unprecedented mapping in the world, made from one hundred indicators, monitored the situation of the 17 SDGs in 5.570 Brazilian cities. According to the ranking, Brazilian cities are far from development that can be considered minimally sustainable. According to the municipal secretary, this is due not only to the lack of commitments to the environment and the energy transition, but also to other factors. “The result regarding many of the SDGs is poor. For example, the political representation of women and the percentage of women councilors in municipal councils in Brazil are shameful. The SDG ranking target suggests something around 40% representation, which would already be low, given that women represent more than 51% of the national electorate. There are very few cities where this percentage exceeds 10%”, explains Menezes.
The secretary also highlighted that Campinas has an intelligence center to monitor SDG indicators in the city. “Today we have a score of 5,8. Initially, we received a score of 6. Then, we dropped a little during the context of the pandemic. This is a setback, but ours is the second best score in terms of large Brazilian cities. In relation to the SDGs, Campinas is ahead of all Brazilian capitals, with the exception of São Paulo”, he pointed out.
Throughout the day, the forum featured presentations on the Climate Action Plan (PAC 2050) and the State Energy Plan (PEE), both prepared by the Secretariat of Environment, Infrastructure and Logistics of the State of São Paulo, and on energy efficiency actions being developed in the State, in addition to lectures on research and work carried out by experts linked to the eight thematic axes of CPTEn.
