Romania

There are numerous projects and programs dedicated to public buildings, including schools. The oldest remains Casa Verde (Green House), run since 2010. Among the new programs we mention: Photovoltaic systems (2019), Energy efficiency for public buildings (2021), Cleaning Romania of waste (2022), Education and public awareness regarding environmental protection (2023), Safe and Healthy Schools National Program (2023).

The “Green Week” program is a national program, in accordance with the provisions of the report “Education on climate change and the environment in sustainable schools”, developed by the group of work at the level of the Presidential Administration, of the National Education Strategy for environment and climate change 2023-2030, approved by GD no. 59/2023 and of the National Strategy for the sustainable development of Romania 2030, approved by GD no. 877/2018.

SMARTER Finance for Families is a European Horizon 2020 project that aims to implement a series of ambitious and practical Green Homes & Green Mortgage programs in 12 European countries, with the participation and collaboration of 17 experts in green construction, sustainable energy, research and other organizations. Organizations from Belgium, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Georgia, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Turkey and Ukraine participate in this complex project.

CircularBIM: Educational platform focused on advanced strategies for reframing construction materials in the industrial value chain to promote the transition to the circular economy through the use of BIM learning technologies; Participating organizations: Asociación Empresarial de Investigación Centro Tecnologicodel Marmol Y La Piedra, Cype Soft SL, Universidade Do Minho, Centro Tecnologico Da Ceramica E Do Vidro, Universitatea Transilvania Din Brașov, Association Romania Green Building Council; Earth Hour was organized for the first time on March 31, 2007 in Sydney, when 2 million people and over 2,100 businesses in Sydney switched off their lights for an hour, thus demonstrating concern for one of the biggest problems of today: global warming. Since 2008, Earth Hour has become a global movement, including 100 million people in more than 30 countries of the world.

During Earth Hour, WWF Romania organizes various actions that help to restore the balance of nature. All schools in Romania are invited to organize symbolic actions dedicated to the planet, to create fun, memorable and accessible experiences for all students. Romania Green Building Council, the main national organization dedicated to buildings sustainability, has launched a certification system for schools, called Green Schools. A multidisciplinary team of experts, representatives from the Romanian National Lighting Committee, Zero Waste Romania, the National Radon Association, the Technical University of Construction Bucharest – Faculty of Installations Engineering, contributed to the elaboration of the technical criteria.

Currently, 14 schools under construction or major renovation in Bucharest, Iasi and Cluj-Napoca, are in the process of Green Schools certification. “Builder Greener Schools” is an initiative of the Romanian Green Building Council to place all children in schools where they have clean and healthy air to breathe, where energy and resources are conserved and where they can be inspired to dream of a brighter future.

Romania Green Building Council started the initiative for green schools at the national level, in the form of a campaign aimed at offering all children schools where they can have clean and healthy air, where energy and resources are conserved and where they can receive the inspiration to dream of a future brighter. All schools in Romania interested in expanding their efforts to change the design, construction and use of educational units were invited to participate in a competition to win a prize package for the “greening” of the school where they study.

The winner of the first edition was the school from Câlnic, a primary and secondary school where 120 students between the ages of 6 and 14 study, in an area recognized as world heritage and included on the UNESCO conservation list.

Bulgaria

World Green Building Week 2022 puts people back at the center of the built environment. On September 19, BGBC celebrated World Green Building Week with the Urban Development Forum 2022. The main topics discussed at the forum are: Environment and economy – territorial renewal. – The meeting raised the alarm about the trends of aging and low energy efficiency of the building stock, which, in combination with the prohibitive costs of heating households worldwide, will lead to an increase in the number of homeless people.

Government policies should ensure affordable and energy-efficient housing for all. People and aesthetics – public spaces and local identity. – The importance of preserving the appearance of cities and cultural monuments for their aesthetics and identity is considered here. The concerted action (CA EPBD) refers to Directive 2010/31/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of 19 May 2010 on the energy performance of buildings (recast) (EPBD). It aims to contribute to the reduction of energy consumption in European buildings by exchanging knowledge and best practices in the field of energy efficiency and energy savings between all 28 EU member states plus Norway. The project activity is organized in regular plenary meetings between the national teams, bringing together 120 participants from 29 countries. These meetings are accompanied by other measures to improve communication, including a web-platform and national reports.

Participant in the project from the Bulgarian side is the Agency for Sustainable Energy Development (AUER). The Agency for Sustainable Energy Development (AUER) is the legal successor of the Executive Agency for Energy Efficiency. AUER is a budget-supported legal entity with headquarters in Sofia and has the status of an executive agency under the Minister of Energy. The Executive Agency for Energy Efficiency /AEE/ was established in 2002. The Agency for Sustainable Energy Development is an administration under the Minister of Energy for the implementation of the state policy on increasing energy efficiency in the final consumption of energy and the provision of energy services, as well as for promoting the production and consumption of electrical energy, thermal energy and energy for cooling from renewable sources, the production and consumption of gas from renewable sources and the production and consumption of biofuels and energy from renewable sources in transport. “ECO PARTNERS BULGARIA” JSC is the newest packaging waste recovery organization on the Bulgarian market, founded in 2016 by a team of professionals with many years of experience in this industry.

The company is a joint-stock company that does not distribute profits, and the funds received are invested in the construction and development of systems for the separate collection and utilization of packaging waste. In order to carry out activities as an organization for the recovery of packaging waste, the company was issued Permit No. ООп-ОО-7-00/05.12.2016 of the Minister of the Environment and Waters, the effect of which was continued with Decision No. ООп-ОО -7-02/03.11.2021. Since its creation, until today, they have built systems for the separate collection of packaging waste in 21 municipalities across the country, with a total of more than 908,000 residents covered by separate collection systems, served by more than 3,900 separate collection containers with a total volume of more than 6 760,000 liters. At the end of 2021, the Ordinance was adopted to reduce the impact of certain plastic products on the environment, which is in force from the beginning of 2022! It lays down a requirement to improve the separate collection of plastic packaging from beverages with a volume of up to 3 liters, and this is exactly what we are focusing on in this campaign! T

he campaign “Give a Pet: School Race” aims to collect separately absolutely all such bottles that will be generated as waste in the period until March 31 of this year in the municipality of Gorna Oryahovitsa and Gabrovo, and during the campaign, explained the meaning and benefit of their separate collection and recycling, as well as the rest of the packaging waste. The first observance of Earth Day was in 1970 on April 22 in the United States and Canada, and its purpose was to draw people’s attention to the protection of the planet and to promote an ecological lifestyle.

Later, the initiative was taken up by an international committee and in the 21st century it became the largest non-religious holiday in the world, celebrated by over half a billion people. In Bulgaria, there is an almost century-old tradition of honoring nature. On December 14, 1930, at the proposal of the Minister of Agriculture, the first celebration of the Bulgarian land took place, and on April 22, 1992, President Zhelyu Zhelev signed an oath in the name of the Earth. The country joins the international initiative and every year the holiday is accompanied by various outdoor musical and artistic events. The infographic presents data on the protected areas and objects, as well as on the costs of environmental protection and restoration in Bulgaria. March 22 was declared World Water Day by the UN General Assembly in 1993. Since then, this date has been celebrated with initiatives around the world. The day emphasizes the value of water and what it means to people.

This year, more attention has been paid to raising awareness regarding the global water crisis. The motto of the campaign was “Let’s accelerate the change!” Millions of people from more than 7,000 cities in 180 countries celebrated Earth Hour – the largest global initiative dedicated to the protection of our common home – planet Earth. This spring, the event, organized by the international environmental protection organization WWF, took place for the 13th year in a row. Traditionally, on the last Saturday of March (28.03.) between 20:30 and 21:30, millions of people from all over the world symbolically turned off the lights in their homes, and iconic buildings darkened their facades.

The global Earth Hour campaign focuses on protected nature – our main ally against the climate crisis. Earth Hour in Bulgaria will pay attention to the care of forests, which have a key role in controlling climate change by absorbing CO2 from the atmosphere and storing it in trees, vegetation and soil. WWF Bulgaria is working on a Forest Restoration and Protection Program, which sets two key goals by 2022: the protection of over one million acres of centuries-old forests and the cultivation of half a million young trees along the banks of Bulgarian rivers. The campaign “Let’s clean up Bulgaria together” is the largest volunteer initiative in our country, which aims to build public sensitivity on issues related to environmental protection and make Bulgaria cleaner and more beautiful in the long term.

The emblematic campaign gives Bulgaria a leading place among the countries with the best voluntary practices in the care of the environment in the world. Based on the results achieved in the thousands of clean-up, beautification and reforestation actions in 2019, the initiative received global recognition for uniting the largest number of volunteers per capita in the name of the green idea – 6.2%, among 180 participating countries in the great cleaning of the planet World Clean Up Day. In 2022, for the 10th consecutive year, “Let’s clean Bulgaria together” united schools, institutions, non-governmental and business organizations and volunteers in the name of the cause of a cleaner environment.

And this year the campaign will be held in support of the causes of the largest civil movement in the world “Let’s Do It World”. In 2022 The world day of cleaning the planet, in which Bulgaria will participate for the sixth time in a row, was held on September 17. In the past year, the largest national voluntary initiative in our country – “Let’s clean Bulgaria together” was held under the title “Give nature a hand”. It was focused on personal responsibility and contribution in caring for the cleanliness of the planet, the future and the education of children. Since the beginning of “Let’s clean Bulgaria together” so far, nearly 2,500,000 volunteers, armed with gloves and sacks, have cleaned the country. According to the Eco-Ministry, they managed to collect 94,338 tons of waste, which is equivalent to more than 200 fully loaded Boeing 747 airplanes, and to remove more than 18,800 landfills from the face of Bulgaria.

Lithuania

Students have a lot of knowledge about environmental protection, climate change, natural pollution, but they usually do not use it in practical activities: only part of the students sort waste, the other part of society uses ecological washing and cleaning products, reusable shopping bags. Jurkšaitienė, Markevičienė (2011) states that it is expedient to add environmental materials to the curricula of teaching courses (Biekša, Valiulė, 2022) Future problems can be reduced by integrating environmental issues into the education system, which encourages children to be interested in, care for, and pay attention to the environment from an early age. Sustainable education changes the mentality of the community, improving the quality of life and achieving sustainable development.

Learning is necessary in order to preserve and improve the quality of life of future generations (Jančius, Gavenauskas, 2021). It has been noticed that activities integrated into the education system at an early age provide students with an awareness of environmental protection and develop love for nature. Since 2015, the Sustainable School program has been implemented in Lithuania. This is a continuous program of sustainable development, which is carried out by encouraging the communities of educational institutions to be interested in environmental protection and to develop sustainable development skills, to practically apply environmental impact reduction measures. Lithuanian educational institutions of various levels (from pre-school, general, professional education to non-formal education) and members of the community who work (learn) in them participate in it. The participants of the program are introduced to the farm of the educational institution, its energy and water resources, feeding and sorting habits, materials used in educational activities, their need, biological diversity, and the goals of sustainable development. Communities are encouraged to reduce the ecological footprint of institutions by implementing new practical activities and forming sustainable development skills. In 2015, the sustainable school program was recognized as the winner of the social project of the year at the Swedish Business Awards in the nomination “Corporate social responsibility initiative of the year”. Sustainable development skills are assessed in 11 categories: 1) food; 2) water; 3) electricity; 4) heat energy; 5) waste; 6) use of substances; 7) sustainable development education; 7) biological diversity; 8) healthy educational environment; 9) sustainable mobility; 10) harmonious school communities; 11) additional activities. In the consumption category, institutions tried to use recycled paper, which had to make up at least 25 percent. school paper resources.

In addition, secondary raw materials and used paper were used during the lessons. Institutions have initiated initiatives to reduce consumption. Institutions actively sorting. Most of them carry out a waste audit and confirm the waste sorting plan, designed so that unsorted waste makes up at least 15 percent. of all school waste. Institutions carry out sorting initiatives, encourage many educational sessions on the topic of sorting, created effective sorting conditions (marked containers, trash cans, distributed “green” buckets, installed composting bins). There was no great activity in water consumption and saving, however, most institutions encouraged water saving and reached 5% annually. reduce its consumption.

The most relevant initiatives to reduce water consumption are various campaigns and lessons about the benefits of water consumption (“Water drop journey”). The winners were institutions that used rainwater for watering plants and toilets. They also tried to use energy-saving light bulbs and save electricity by turning off lighting and electrical appliances. It was renovated, windows, radiators and interior doors were replaced. Institutions rich in biological diversity introduced the participants to plants, insects, and other small animals living in educational institutions. They prepared school biodiversity conservation projects, carried out initiatives promoting biodiversity conservation.

Health education institutions are trying to support: in their activities, they used environmentally and health-friendly cleaning products, most educational institutions conduct an internal quality survey, prepare plans for maintaining a healthy and orderly environment, improving community health, and implementing programs for improving environmental air quality (reducing air pollution). The most active institutions running this institution organized informative events on the theme of sustainable development, STEAM creative workshops, natural bird and other animal institutions, organized educational activities, took care of a healthy environment, tried to use environmentally friendly household chemicals Summarizing the research conducted, K. Biekša, V. Valiulė (2022) state that there is an increasing interest in sustainable development, environmental changes and climate change problems in educational institutions.

Students, teachers, members of the community of the educational institution actively participate in the implementation of various environmental education programs and activities, where environmental and sustainable development problems are analyzed. Communities of educational institutions organize and actively participate in environmental public actions, willingly share information and knowledge, assessing the negative impact on the environment, aiming to reduce the environmental footprint of the activities of educational institutions by appropriate means.

The Pilaites gymnasium was newly built in the Pilaites micro-district of Vilnius, which was organized by the Vilnius Vilnius studio “DO Architects”. The team of architects proposed to first look at the sustainability of the building through the social prize and to program the communality, immediacy and openness of the students with the surrounding environment. “These are long-term and very important personality-forming foundations” (Baldišiūtė A. 2022). An urban, viewable, cozy and safe environment is created at the entrances of the gymnasium, and the building itself invites the community of Pilaite to get involved in activities and create an active relationship with the street. The school functions not only as an educational, but also as a public building. “In the center of the plot, a covered courtyard is planned for sports and recreation.

A football stadium, basketball and volleyball courts and a recreational outdoor space with outdoor classrooms and the school’s inner square have been designed in the yard. It is planned that the Pilaite community will also be able to use these spaces during non-working hours”. (Baldišiūtė A. 2022) A. Baldišiūtė (2022) states that when designing the building, efforts were made to implement a high-quality concept of walls and to connect science classrooms, teachers’ rooms, sports, and common spaces with the windows and showcases inside the building, thus creating a close connection between the premises and people. From the outside, in the southern part of the plot, an open square is formed for the local community. There is a relief bicycle track, a skateboard park, and a children’s playground. The square forms a green connection between residential blocks located on the other sides of Tolminkiemis and Isruties streets.

The school frame was built in just six months, using fewer resources on the construction site, resulting in less waste and less construction time. Tolminkiemis Gymnasium is an A++ energy class building and it widely uses renewable energy resources: both for heating, hot water preparation and electricity generation. K. Žaliukas (2022) claims that the design took into account the fact that the maintenance of engineering systems will require expenses, which may lead to the abandonment of expensive and complex engineering systems during operation. Therefore, it was aimed to design systems that are as simple as possible to maintain and require minimal maintenance during the operation of the building.

There are 12 outdoor units of ventilation systems that serve all indoor spaces. An innovative engineering systems management solution is a general building management system (BMS), which will enable monitoring and, if necessary, controlling the operation of part of the building’s engineering equipment. (Tamašauskaitė A., 2022).

Türkiye

According to the data presented in environmetally friendly green buildings, when the green building certificate work in Turkey is analyzed, there are 498 LEED certificate, 70 BREEAM certicate projects available. In total 568 projects has completed the process during the period from 20.03.2020.

The National and Domestic Green Certificate System (YeS-TR), developed for the purpose of disseminating energy efficient and environmentally friendly building and settlement practices at national and local level in Turkey, goals to issue certificates to buildings and settlements by authorized institutions. The Ministry of Environment, Urbanization and Climate Change stated that the reasons such as global warming and climate change, decrease in water resources, environmental pollution and rapid consumption of natural resources make it a necessity to construct environmentally friendly green buildings in the construction sector.

In this case, the Ministry of Environment, Urbanization and Climate Change and Istanbul Technical University (ITU) signed the “National Security Council” on February 26, 2016, in order to evaluate and certify buildings and settlements that are suitable for climate data and the region, that consume energy and water as much as they need, that use renewable energy resources.

A protocol was signed for the development of the “National Evaluation Guide”. Then, in 2018, a “Certificate System Guide” was prepared within the framework of the main categories of “building” and “settlement” specific to Turkey, in order to disseminate building practices that evaluate the building within the framework of its life cycle from land selection to its demolition, are compatible with nature, are sustainable and use the geographical features of the location.

Italy

By the Ministry of Education, the School Regeneration Plan came out in 2020, providing a collection of good practices. The participating schools, on a voluntary basis, will be ‘accompanied’ in the ecological and cultural transition and in the implementation of the sustainable development education paths envisaged in the teaching of civic education. Schools have the task of educating students to inhabit the world in a new and sustainable way and to make them protagonists of change. The Plan intends to valorise, systematise and implement the projects and activities already in place in schools and to offer a vast repertoire of tools and resources that schools can use to develop projects on topics related to sustainable development.

It is based on three fundamental pillars that are the positive feedback that green practices have on sociality, the environment and the economy. With Article 10 of Legislative Decree no. 196 of 8 November 2021, the Plan becomes part of the educational offer of school institutions. Research has focused on numerous aspects in recent years, starting with the beneficial effects of a green environment on students’ learning abilities. An interesting case study was carried out by researchers at the University of Florence, who tested the learning abilities of a dozen children aged between 8 and 10 years, finding a significant increase in the children’s ability to concentrate when immersed in a predominantly vegetal environment (cf. Mancuso S.;Azzarello E.;Rizzitelli S., 2006).

A sustainability paradigm was then developed by some researchers who, in a theoretical way, imagined curricular outcomes. In fact, Cecilia Smaniotto, Anna Saramin, Laura Brunelli and Maria Parpinel emphasised in a study entitled ‘Insights and next challenges for the Italian education system to teach sustainability in a global context’ the advantages of developing sustainability-related skills, hypothesising a gradual adoption of ‘green’ curricula. (Cfr. Smaniotto, C.; Saramin, A.; Brunelli, L.; Parpinel, M., 2023) More practical, on the other hand, is the discourse brought forward by Teacher For Future, which is currently formulating curricula proposals to be applied to the various school curricula. At the level of teacher preparation, on the other hand, an interesting survey was conducted by the University of Udine in 2021. a study was conducted among Italian compulsory school teachers to investigate their knowledge, sources of information and attitudes towards the SDGs on the basis of a questionnaire filled in by 417 teachers.

The overall knowledge score shows a median of 42.9%, but with very low peaks depending on the individual topics (see Smaniotto, C.; Brunelli, L.; Miotto, E.; Del Pin, M.; Ruscio, E.; Parpinel, M., 2022) An interesting role is played, finally, by handbooks and platforms for school learning, which suggest not only content but also learning units and lessons, with their respective materials, testing methods and remedial possibilities. Among the many, the work proposed by Hub Scuola, full of ideas and exercises, and the session “4 simple and creative ideas to make your school sustainable” created by Scuola.net is particularly interesting.