Throughout the past decade, a considerable amount of experience has been gained from technology transfer programmes on energy efficiency and renewables energy technologies in the UK. This paper describes theessential elements of a successful technology transfer programme and gives details of some of these elements within the UK Department of Energy's Best Practice programme, its predecessor the Energy Efficiency Demonstration Scheme and the Renewables Energy programme.

The European Community's Thermie programme is outlined, covering financial support for commercial implementation of new energy technologies; measures for energy technology promotion, through a network of Organisations for the promotion of Energy Technology (OPETs), and coordination of technology promotion activities at European level. If future funding is to be secured for Thermie and other technology promotion programmes, their relevance to the key political challenges of the day must be shown.

The papers are divided into sessions under the following headings: technical barriers and market employment, energy efficiency and the environment, national and regional programmes, international collaboration aspects.

In recent times energy conservation has gained tremendous importance in India and is being looked upon as an untapped energy source. In the last 40 years there has been a phenomenal increase in India's production of commercial energy, demands of the developing Indian economy have outstripped the available energy supplies, an energy shortage has persisted for a long time

Ecolonia is being built in an urban expansion area in the Dutch municipality of Alphen aan den Rijn. The urban development plane was prepared by the Belgian town planning architect Lucien Kroll. He came up with an unusual design for a living and working environment, in which as many "natural" elements as possible are incorporated. It is a project which challenges the occupants to act in an energy-saving and environmentally-conscious way.

This paper investigates the feasibility of the application of ice storage/cold air distribution based air conditioning systems in commercial buildings in the South-Eastern Mediterranean area. An office building currently under construction in