RuralMED Mobility project, co-financed by the ERDF funds of the European Union through the Interreg Euro-MED Programme, is an almost three years project promoting improvement of electric mobility infrastructure, management and services.
BSC, Ltd, Kranj – Regional Development Agency of Gorenjska, Slovenia is a partner in the project, together with twelve other partners from Spain, Portugal, Italy, Greece, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria and Croatia. The project started in January 2024 and will end in the end of September 2026. The lead partner of the project is Extremadura Regional Energy Agency (AGENEX) from Spain.
In March 12th and 13th, 2024, in Koprivnica, Regional Energy Agency North hosted kick-off meeting of the RuralMED Mobility project. During the working part of the meeting, Mihaela Babic, Senior Project Manager of the North-West Croatia Regional Energy and Climate Agency (REGEA), presented the objectives and key upcoming activities of the Green Living Areas thematic area from the Interreg Euro-Med program.
Following the working part of the meeting, a visit to the pilot location was organized, where a charging station for electric vehicles will be installed in front of the Health Center in the municipality of Kalnik as part of the project.
Zvonimir Perko, Project Manager at REA North, presented technical details and the procurement process for the future charging station to partners and representatives of the Municipality of Kalnik.
In addition to the Kalnik municipality, the RuralMED Mobility project envisages the installation of electric vehicle charging stations in the municipalities of Gornja Rijeka, Ferdinandovac, and Gola.
On the second day of kick-off meeting, organized by REA North and the Koprivnica-Krizevci County, an international conference on the Development of Electromobility in Rural Areas was held at the Community Open University in Koprivnica.
Alongside project partners, representatives of higher education institutions, local and regional government units, representatives of the Environmental Protection and Energy Efficiency Fund, and representatives of electric mobility solution providers participated in the conference.
Among other topics, conference participants were presented with measures from the Environmental Protection and Energy Efficiency Fund to promote electromobility, charging infrastructure, current data on the number of electric and hybrid vehicles registered in Koprivnica-Krizevci County, challenges in managing charging infrastructure, and opportunities for utilizing public lighting infrastructure for building electric vehicle charging stations.
The Second Meeting of the RuralMED Mobility Project was held on the second and third of July 2024 in Thessaloniki, Greece. In the content part of the meeting the second Transnational Forum of partners was held, where the current status of the development of the platform to be used for electric vehicle charging stations was presented. Each partner with a planned investment in platform development presented the technical details of their investment, such as the number of charging stations they plan to install, the power of the chargers, AC or DC connectors, the number of electric cars they plan to acquire and to whom these cars will be available to.
As part of the meeting in Thessaloniki, a study visit to the Center for Research and Technology (CERTH) was organized, where the project partners were introduced to the work of the center, specifically applications for monitoring CO2 emissions and traffic in the city of Thessaloniki.
