Smart cities: How is Karlovac becoming energy independent?

Although investors have been waiting for seven years for the adoption of legal regulations that would govern the development of renewable energy projects, and the key document without which it is impossible to start project development is delayed by more than a year, Croatian cities are actively working on their own energy efficiency projects and investments in renewable energy sources, which are currently more important than ever.

One of them is the city of Karlovac, which actively implements an interdisciplinary approach to planning and implementing effective energy and climate policy measures, thus helping to achieve the goals defined through the Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy.

‒ One of our key focuses is to increase the use of renewable energy sources to become as energy independent as possible, and we have focused on harnessing solar energy through photovoltaic power plants and the potential of geothermal sources that exist in the area of Karlovac ‒ stated the city administration.

Thus, in the area of the city of Karlovac, the company Geotermika, founded by the City itself, and the Research Institute for Geological Research from Iceland are implementing the project ‘Utilization of Geothermal Energy for Heating Purposes – PREP4KaGT-1’ within the program ‘Energy and Climate Change’, which aims to bring geothermal energy production closer and install capacities for its use.

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Furthermore, the city aims to increase the use of solar energy in public institutions, and as part of the project ‘SolariKA’, they aim to install 14 photovoltaic power plants on the roofs of public buildings, such as kindergartens and elementary schools, all with the goal of increasing renewable energy sources and reducing CO2 emissions.

In addition to reducing energy consumption, with the aim of improving the quality of lighting in public areas, the City has announced that it will replace existing public lighting with LED lamps and will simultaneously establish a remote management and monitoring system.

‒ The planned replacement of about 10,000 lighting fixtures will reduce installed power by about 65 percent and electricity consumption by about 70 percent ‒ stated the City.

In addition to energy projects, the city administration of Karlovac is also implementing digitization projects, having fully opened its operations to citizens through the web platform ‘Open Karlovac‘, which provides citizens with a range of electronic services related to information or communication with city services and insight into city management.

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Damir Mandić

photo Ratko Mavar

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Also, after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the City introduced services such as e-Market, e-Subsidies, e-Babies… and many others, and they claim that the continuation of the digitization of business processes remains one of their main priorities, as they aim to establish a Master database of the City of Karlovac, which is necessary as a basis for the implementation of the Digital Karlovac platform project. The platform is expected to establish a central registry of users of city and communal services and digitize city and communal services, all with the aim of improving the quality of services for citizens and entrepreneurs.

All information about the latest and future projects of the city of Karlovac can be heard at Lider’s Smart Cities conference on Tuesday, March 28, at the Zagreb Fair, where leaders of Croatian cities will be guests, as well as the mayor of Karlovac Damir Mandić. Join us at the conference with prior registration.