The School of Architecture of the University of Navarra will give -on 17 and 18 June- the summer course "Energy and the city. A discussion on its application in the future Bilbao". Organised by the City Council of the Biscayan capital, this proposal is part of the 2021 summer course offer presented by the City Council under the slogan "Bilbao, university city". The 4 universities with a presence in the city will take part in the courses.

Among them is the School of Architecture, whose professors Asier Santas, José Ángel Medina and Carlos Fernández-Bandera - together with the vice-president of the ATECYR technical committee Ricardo García San José - will be in charge of giving the 4 lectures of the course. The goal is to create a space for reflection where issues such as the energy system of cities and its implications in environmental terms can be discussed; as well as the measures being promoted to reduce the carbon footprint in cities and the profound urban transformations developed in Bilbao. 

registrationThe current rules and regulations and the challenges facing the city in integrating renewable energies will also be the central themes of this course, the first of a series of 6, all of them free of charge, with informative content and open to all citizens, who will be able to follow them online or in person from 18 to 20 h. at Library Services Bidebarrieta in the Biscayan capital (except for the course offered by the Digipen Technology Centre, which will be given in Zorrozaurre).

Bilbao: model for 21st century cities

The ceremony at presentation was presided over by the Mayor of Bilbao, Juan Mari Aburto, the Councillor for Culture and Governance, Gonzalo Olabarría, and representatives of the 4 universities and 2 participating technology centres.

In the case of the University of Navarra, the School of Architecture was represented by Carlos Naya, Deputy Director of Strategic Projects, who recalled the commitment of the University of Navarra to project in Zorrozaurre to create an international reference campus for university Education in the south of Europe. "Although in recent months the pandemic has prevented us from carrying out the activities that we would have liked to in Bilbao, our desire is to collaborate with everyone and to learn in order to contribute our grain of sand to this great initiative", emphasised Naya.

"Moreover, it is of particular interest to us to contribute to the reflection on the city. Bilbao is an example of a capital that has been able to transform itself and must continue to be a model for the cities of the 21st century. This is the direction in which the course we have proposed is heading", concluded the director during the act of presentation, which took place at the city council headquarters.