TEHRAN — The city of Yazd, central Iran, was picked as the world’s capital of sustainable cities at the International Conference of Sustainable Cities on January 28-29 for unique implementation of sustainability, Tasnim news agency reported.

The city played host to the 19th Energy Globe World Award as well as the International Conference of Sustainable Cities for two days.

The conference for sustainable cities and towns was organized for the first time. Partner of this conference in Yazd, the birth of sustainability, is the UN program “United Smart Cities”, with about 1000 participant’s cities.

The two-day event has gathered the leading mayors and municipality experts from around the world to exchange and share their experiences and research results about all aspects of sustainable cities.

The event aimed at presenting the best practices and success stories of cities that have projects to achieve sustainability in the areas of “supplying and maintaining clean water resources, reducing air pollution, urban waste management and sustainable tourism development."

By presenting this solutions on the base of “Best Practice”, cities and towns worldwide will be motivated for similar acting to save the world and to preserve a livable future for next generations.

A sum of 70 foreign guests from 25 countries, including Austria, Slovakia, Germany, Finland, Norway, the UK, Spain, Denmark, Sweden, the Czech Republic, Nepal, Australia, Singapore, attended the conference.

Energy Globe World Award

According to the Energy Globe official website representatives of 16 outstanding environmental organizations from 15 countries just met in Yazd for the Energy Globe Award ceremony, accompanied by a conference “Sustainable Town and Cities”. 

The Energy Globe Award was founded in 1999 by the Austrian energy pioneer Wolfgang Neumann and is one of today’s most prestigious environmental awards.

Goal of the Award is to present successful sustainable projects to a broad audience, for many of environmental problems already have good, feasible solutions. Projects which conserve and protect the resources or that employ renewable energy can participate.

The Award distinguishes the best projects in the five categories earth, fire, water, air and youth. International winners divide a prize pool of 10,000 euros. National (country) Energy Globe Awards also distinguish the best project submission from a country. National winners receive an ENERGY GLOBE Certificate which is presented by partner organization (if available) in the respective countries.

National Energy Globe Award of the Islamic Republic of Iran went to “upgrade of tailings disposal & water management system project” submitted by Kerman Copper Region. 

Projects from Germany, Kenya, India, Afghanistan, and the U.S. came in first in categories of earth, fire, water, air, and youth respectively. 

MQ/MG