The second meeting of Cooltorise partners took place on the 15th and 16th of March at the premises of the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (UPM). During the first day, UPM provided a practical example of the workshops that are normally given in Madrid. Thus, a demonstration of the summer energy culture workshop and collaborative mapping was given, the latter proposed this year as a complementary workshop to the one on indoor strategies.
The day of 15th March ended with a visit of all Cooltorise partners to the space in which UPM led an outdoor intervention during 2022, located in the self-managed neighbourhood park Sputnik, in the district of Puente de Vallecas. Neighbours of the association shared the process of how this space was being shaped up to the present day and how was the process of collaboration with the Cooltorise project. The second day, of a more organisational nature, consisted of an extensive review of the project, in which the main highlights for planning and coordination between partners were reviewed.
In addition to the partners’ meeting that took place in Madrid, some electricity bills and heat culture workshops began in Barcelona. The first one was at Vila Olímpica with a neighbours association, another was held in Bon Pastor on March 22th, and two more were delivered at ABD project CAMS (housing for people living with HIV) and at Espai Llavors (a library with a community space in L’Hospitalet de Llobregat) on March 31th.
There were also the final sessions of the SEPAs training promoted by Ecoserveis and ABD. A three-day training (the first one in February and the other two sessions in March) to teach volunteers how to involve themselves and help all those who may suffer summer energy poverty. It was held at ABD headquarters.
But the highlight of the month was the visit to the Jardí Fènix project. On the 24th of March, a group of volunteers got to know the project that uses ecological agriculture as a tool to empower and help social and labour inclusion of people in drugs and addictions treatment. They visited the garden located at the CAS Sarrià premises, where the project coordinator Edgar Peñas, explained the different plants they have and how they work with the people attended at the CAS Sarrià. Not only they have an outdoor activity and can decide how they organise the garden’s work, but they also grow vegetables that have an impact on their self-esteem and their health and on other people in need, since the fruits and vegetables grown at the Jardí Fènix are used to provide food for social projects such as La Botiga.
The volunteers also did a mapping activity to identify spaces of shadow and heat in different neighbourhoods, in Sarrià and the City Centre. They were able to spot the differences while locating more trees, access to water and places with shadow in Sarrià than in the City Centre, and they shared information about the climate shelters that can be used in hot seasons and are found in the two areas.
