On June 28th, in Ghent, The URBACT Monitoring Committee approved ten Innovation Transfer Networks, with SPARCS fellow city Maia being part of one of the approved projects. Innovation Transfer Networks are a distinguished typology of networks due to its connection to the “Urban Innovative Actions” (UIA) instrument, currently the European Urban Initiative (EUI) and aims to ensure the transfer of innovation components to urban governance, based on projects already supported and completed within the scope of the UIA.

Maia will participate in the URBACT program for the first time as a partner city of the “EPIU – Energy Poverty Intelligence Unit” network, led by Getafe, which created and implemented an urban intelligence unit to measure and propose actions in the Energy Poverty area. The aim is to replicate and adapt to the territorial context of each city, a system for analysing urban data (“energy consumption”, “income”, among other indicators) that determine energy poverty on three scales: “housing”, “building” and “public space”.

These City Networks for Innovation will start their work on September 2024 and for two years each city must develop an Action Plan addressing energy poverty in disadvantaged communities, committing to work through a participatory approach involving all local stakeholders within a Local URBACT Group.

Participating in this project will allow to improve the city methodologies to face different challenges such as citizen awareness, energy poverty in disadvantaged communities, energy data and cross-sectional collaborative work.

Leveraging the insights and methodologies gained from the SPARCS project, Maia plans to apply these learnings to the URBACT program and  particularly in the implementation of the Energy Community project in Sobreiro Social Housing District, focusing on developing positive energy districts, fostering energy communities, and advancing city digital transformation, thereby enhancing its approach to addressing energy poverty and promoting sustainable urban development.