Themes and assigning criteria

A general criterion of assessment will be improvement of "air quality", also in terms of potential reduction of the green house effect and climate change slow-down.

Positive assessments will be granted to products, services, technologies, processes, production and management systems notably contributing to the reduction of gas emissions polluting the environment and altering the climate situation, thus aiming at the achievement of a substantial improvement of the air quality.

Special attention will be given to innovations belonging to the following fields:

Moving and Trasporting

Today people and property mobility is a crucial necessity, although generating general drawbacks in terms of traffic jams, people health damage,architectural and artistic heritage damage, sound and air pollution. Therefore mobility future trends are strictly related to the implementation of modern and environmental friendly transports, that is low energy transports also taking into account the economical and social needs of our country. Positive assessment will be granted to new technologies, policies, organisational and management systems aiming at the improvement of urban, metropolitan and long-distance mobility and transports. These can be: low emission engines and vehicles for people and property transport, telematic services, organisational systems, logistic solutions potentially completing or replacing the traditional mobility system based on physical transfer, innovative systems for the prevention and limitation of polluting emissions in the atmosphere, management systems for a more efficient exploitation of the existing infrastructures.

Quality of the environment: living and working

The Environment Friendly Innovation Award is targeted at all innovations bringing about significant improvements in the quality of the environment. Special attention will be given to projects aimed of creating buildings and work spaces able to harmonise quality of life and energy and production efficiency with the fundamental respect for the environment.

Today human activities are characterised by a growing dependence on confined spaces: in advanced economies people spend 90% of their life at home, at school, in offices, in factories etc. and buildings have therefore gained increasing and crucial importance among people's primary needs. This is the reason why the quality of buildings can radically modify the quality of human life and that of the surrounding environment.

Positive assessment will be granted to projects able to create buildings and spaces assuring the quality of human life while respecting the surrounding environment and reducing necessary energy consumption. The Environment Friendly Innovation Award is therefore targeted at innovations belonging to the fields of eco-compatible housing and architecture, eco-design, domestic automation, interior design, lighting, energy saving appliances and systems, detergents and whatever may contribute to the improvement of the connections between human beings, the buildings where they live and work and the environment.

The global assessment of all presented innovations will take into account the following criteria:

- reduction of the gas emissions polluting the environment and altering the climate situation;
- efficient exploitation of resources throughout all project steps;
- reduction of the consumption of non renewable energy sources and raw material resources and reduction of relevant pollution and waste (in terms of quantity and danger) throughout the whole life cycle;
- use of renewable sources, valorisation or re-generation of local resources, better implementation possible of the existing infrastructures, particularly those related to transports;
- impact of the innovation on the production system and/or on the general level of consumption, taking into account the existing situation and the efficiency of similar activities;
- ability to involve in the project different actors (suppliers, producers, institutions, associations, consumers) adapting the consumption patterns;
- efforts made in order to give objective and transparent communication of the results achieved from a social and environmental point of view; special appreciation will be granted to regular (therefore non episodical) communication.

Special attention will be also granted to those innovations presenting the following characteristics:

- voluntary quality certification (ISO 14000, EMAS, Ecolabel, SA8000, Green Energy, Bio-certification, Green Certificates for renewable energy production) or controlled management according to environmental and/or social standards (environmental and/or sustainable budget);
- state of the presented innovation: commercial offer (present or future) or industrial prototype (being tested or patent pending).