Álvaro Campos-Celador

The rapid growth of Algerian urban agglomerations and the large-scale deployment of subsidised housing (AADL programme) have generated an urgent need for reliable residential energy benchmarks. Yet publicly available census data remain scarce, making it difficult to assess the actual state of neighbourhood occupancy and energy performance. To effectively proxy energy as alternative to census, this study adopts an integrated three-block methodology applied to a 2,750-unit AADL neighbourhood in Sidi Abdellah New City (Algiers). 6 years of electricity and natural gas consumption records from Sonalgaz (2020–2025), a stratified household survey and final clean data of 283 unit, and energy subscription statistics are combined to compute normalised energy performance indicators and track the temporal evolution of neighbourhood occupancy. Gas subscriptions rose continuously from 2,339 in 2020 to 2,620 in 2025, converging toward electricity subscription levels. Using CREG regulated billing thresholds and supported by the survey data, a minimum energy consumption thresholds of 500 kWh and 1,125 thermies as a minimum yearly consumption indicator, effective occupancy is estimated at approximately ~79% of the total housing stock -including concierge units- as of 2025. The study provides a further energy performance benchmark for AADL collective housing in Algeria and demonstrates that energy consumption data (particularly gas subscriptions) coupled with energy consumption levels can serve as a robust proxy for residential occupancy in the absence of population census data. Findings support urban decision-making, energy planning, and future solar energy integration assessments in newly built Algerian cities.

Access to freshwater is one of the major global challenges, driven by population growth, industrial development, climate change, and increasing water stress, particularly in economically constrained regions. In this context, this study designs, builds, and experimentally and numerically evaluates an indirect solar concentration desalination system (ICST) composed of a humidification–dehumidification (HDH) subsystem thermally powered by a Linear Fresnel Concentrator (LFC) under the appropriate technology paradigm. The methodology integrates an experimental campaign conducted under real climatic conditions in Bucaramanga, Colombia, mathematical modeling based on mass and energy balances, and the implementation of a TRNSYS simulation model validated through qualitative and quantitative analyses using absolute and relative errors. Results showed close agreement between experimental and simulated data, with daily freshwater production deviations of 0.53 and 0.65 L/day in tests 04 and 05, respectively, while mean relative errors remained below 5% for the main thermal and productivity variables. Experimentally, an average freshwater production of 1.13 L/h was achieved, with a production gain ratio (GOR) of 0.32 and a recovery ratio (RR) of 0.021, while maintaining total dissolved solids below 500 mg/L. Economic assessment estimated a production cost of $0.065/L, demonstrating the technical and economic feasibility of the system for decentralized small-scale applications in regions with high solar irradiance throughout the year.

The energy crisis and the exacerbation of climate change, along with the associated geopolitical tensions, including the war in Ukraine, are accelerating the energy transition in Europe. A transition from fossil energy sources to renewable energy sources that have a low Energy Return Rate, involves, among many other issues, the use of wide areas to locate the necessary infrastructure for production, transport and storage, altering territories with agricultural, cultural and ecological values. This process is based on the deployment of renewable energy megaprojects in peripheric areas of the continent, mostly in the southern states creating a wide range of social conflicts and resistances. We analyse this process in the case study of the province of Granada, a peripheric territory of south-east Spain considering the category of energy colonialism and the six dimensions that characterise it, arguing that this is a proper approach to address internal colonialism related to the corporate energy transition. We also want to demonstrate the importance of using participatory methodologies for this analysis, so we have developed an online survey, semi-structured interviews and participatory cartography workshops, always focusing on the citizens and stakeholders who are resisting the deployment of renewable energy megaprojects in the province of Granada. The obtained results allow us to confirm the necessity of using participatory methodologies and the colonial aspect of this deployment, including the characteristics of social resistance, the territorial impacts, the land-grabbing process and the inequalities in the production, distribution and use of energy. We conclude with the need to articulate a decolonial energy transition where participatory methods constitute a fundamental tool both to attend the resistances and to build the alternatives.

Energy renovation in buildings is one of the major challenges for the decarbonisation of the building stock. To effectively prioritise decision making regarding the adoption of the most efficient solutions and strategies, it is imperative to develop agile methods to determine the energy performance of buildings on an urban scale, in order to evaluate the impact of these improvements. In this regard, the data collection for feeding building energy models plays a key role in the accuracy and reliability of this issue, and the significant increase in recent years of available data from open data sources offers great potential in this respect. Thus, this study focuses on proposing a systematised and automated method for obtaining information from open data sources so as to obtain the most relevant geometric and thermal characteristics of residential buildings on an urban scale. The criteria for selecting the parameters to be obtained are based on their potential use as input data in different energy demand models aimed at assessing the energy performance of the building stock in a given area and, eventually, to evaluate the potential for improvement and the mitigation of different strategies. Geometric characterisation relies on obtaining and processing open data from cadastres to extract envelope surfaces categorised by orientation through QGIS (Free and Open Source Geographic Information System). For thermal characterisation, an automated process assigns different parameter-based information obtained from cadastral data, such as the year of construction. Finally, the applicability of the method is demonstrated through its implementation in the case study of Bilbao (Spain). The obtained results show that, although additional data should be collected when a detailed analysis of a building or building cluster has to be carried out, the existing open data can provide a first approximation, providing a first global view of the building stock in a region. It demonstrates the usability of the proposed method as an effective way to obtain and process these relevant data.

La crisis energética y la emergencia climática, así como las tensiones geopolíticas asociadas a la guerra de Ukrania y al genocidio que intensificó en el 2023 el estado de Israel en Palestina, están repercutiendo en la política y economía global, siendo una de sus expresiones la aceleración de la transición energética en los países que conforman la Unión Europea. No obstante, lo que se promueve como una transición energética se está manifestando en la instauración de megaproyectos eólicos y fotovoltaicos sobre los territorios periféricos del continente y sobre todo de los estados del sur. Para analizar este fenómeno hemos recurrido a la categoría de colonialismo energético, la misma que en otras investigaciones hemos caracterizado en seis dimensiones que nos permiten sistematizar los casos de estudio. En este artículo se presenta un análisis participativo del despliegue de megaproyectos de energía renovable en la provincia de Granada, un territorio periférico del sudeste español. Los resultados obtenidos debaten sobre las dinámicas coloniales que priman en el despliegue de megaproyectos renovables y además sugiere metodologías participativas para arribar a una transición energética decolonial. Palabras clave colonialismo energético, megaproyectos renovables, transición energética corporativa, territorios, metodologías participativas, Granada. analysis of the deployment of renewable energy megaprojects in the province of Granada, a peripheral territory in southeastern Spain. The results obtained debate the colonial dynamics that prevail in the deployment of renewable megaprojects and also suggest participatory methodologies to achieve a decolonial energy transition.

This article aims to define the category of energy colonialism in order to analyse the conflicts that are arising due to the deployment of renewable energy megaprojects in the Global South and in the peripheries of the Global North. First, the limits of the corporate energy transition are questioned, and based on an exhaustive bibliographic review, the category of energy colonialism is formulated along with six dimensions that characterise it: geopolitical; economic and financial inequalities; power, violence, and decision making; land grabbing and dispossession; impacts on territories and commons; resistance and socio-territorial conflicts. Based on this framework, we analyse and juxtapose different expressions of energy colonialism in four case studies; the isthmus of Tehuantepec (Oaxaca, Mexico), the territories of Western Sahara occupied by Morocco, the Saami territory in Norway, and the rural territories of Spain. The results from this study allow us to conclude that energy colonialism is a useful concept for understanding and critiquing the effects of the corporate energy transition and establishing a base for grassroots and decolonial alternatives in both the Global North and South.

Information about the paper titled "ADDRESSING SUSTAINABILITY AND CLIMATE CHANGE THROUGH PARTICIPATORY SIMULATION GAMES IN A MULTICULTURAL ENVIRONMENT IN HIGHER EDUCATION: AN EXPERIENCE IN A MASTER DEGREE ON SMART CITIES AND COMMUNITIES" at IATED Digital Library

Achieving the ambitious targets set by Europe in its 2050 roadmap, moving away from fossil fuels towards renewable energy sources, while reducing carbon emissions, will require a radical change in Europe’s energy system. Much of the action that will enable this energy transition to be realised in a democratic way is at the local level. It is at this level that many of the decisions regarding the energy transition desired by European citizens will have to be taken. The methodology used in this study is based on data collection, literature review, data validation and analysis. A part of this analysis will also be taken by the mPower project as a diagnostic baseline. The first finding of this research work is that energy transition data availability at the local level is quite low. Second, the local authorities are experiencing difficulties in decarbonising their energy consumption. Finally, the factor with highest positive relationships with other energy transition variables is the number of people employed in the field of energy transition. The results suggest that in order to lead a participatory energy transition, the workforce specifically dedicated to energy transition is a key factor, clearly differentiating it from staff working on the general energy field.