Government of the Azores invests €20 million in climate resilience

O Regional Government of the Azores will invest about 20 million euros, by 2030, through the LIFE IP CLIMAZ project, to strengthen the resilience of the region to climate change, the Azorean executive announced today.

Regional Secretary of the Environment and Climate Action, Alonso Miguel, at the opening of the 2nd Seminar of the LIFE IP CLIMAZ project in Angra do Heroísmo, under the theme “From Planning to Action: Climate Resilience in the Azores”, said that “this investment translates into a transversal and very concrete intervention in the territory”.

This intervention “allows the region’s capacity to anticipate, prevent and respond to the effects of climate change, protecting people and goods, our natural resources and fundamental economic activities for the Azores,” he said, quoted in a press release.

LIFE IP CLIMAZ is the main instrument for the implementation of the Regional Climate Change Programme (PRAC) and has an allocation of around EUR 20 million, co-financed by 60% by the European Union, with a view to contributing to the implementation of around 75% of the adaptation measures and 70% of the mitigation measures covered by the PRAC.

Alonso Miguel highlighted that the project dimension “allows to act simultaneously in areas that determine the resilience of the Azores, from the management of natural risks and water resources to coastal protection, through forests and land use, agriculture, marine environment, energy and transport”.

Under LIFE IP CLIMAZ, 11 senior technicians and 29 operational assistants were already hired, while the teams involved participated in 117 training actions, 55 of which were promoted and funded by the project.

Some €1.3 million was also invested in infrastructure installation and the purchase of personal protective tools, machinery and equipment, with an investment of more than €1 million in the strengthening of vehicle fleets.

The latter allowed the acquisition of two light electric cars and 15 pick-up vehicles, including the first nine electric vehicles of this type in the regional public administration.

In the field of water resources, the review processes of the Regional Water Program, the Management Plan of the Hydrographic Region of the Azores and the Region's Flood Risk Management Plan were completed, and the Dry and Scarf Management Plan of the Azores was also approved.

The project also includes concrete interventions in the territory, including work in 18 streams, in an area of more than 11 hectares, and actions to refurbish pastures and recover native forest in an area of 80 hectares, accompanied by the planting of about 100,000 specimens of endemic and native species.

The intervention also extends to electrical mobility through the entry into operation of another 40 public charging stations for electric vehicles as well as other areas covered by the project, including agriculture, the marine environment and energy.

The governor stressed that island territories, such as the Azores, have “a particular vulnerability to climate change phenomena, such as the rise in the average sea level, coastal erosion, changes in the hydrological cycle and precipitation patterns, the salinisation of soils and aquifers and the acidification of oceans”.

“ We are transforming planning into intervention capacity and concrete actions in the territory. It is this work that makes the Azores progressively more prepared and resilient to the challenges posed by climate change”, concluded Alonso Miguel.