Prof. Dr. Güray Çelik: Leading Turkish Environmental Engineer and Champion for Sustainable Climate Solutions Professor Dr. Güray Çelik is a full professor in the Department of Environmental Engineering at Uludağ University (Bursa Uludağ Üniversitesi) and holds her post-doctoral degrees from The University of Texas at Austin and Universidad de Sevilla. Her academic background spans over...
In Türkiye, the shift toward a greener future isn’t reaching everyone in the same way. For many low-income families, particularly in rural areas or urban neighborhoods with limited services, renewable energy remains too expensive to consider. While solar panels, better heating systems, and electric vehicles are becoming increasingly common in wealthier parts of cities, others...
Türkiye’s long-term climate strategy emphasizes a multifaceted approach to emission reduction, combining Nature-based Solutions (NBS) with technological and policy interventions. The strategy primarily includes increasing renewable energy capacity and enhancing energy efficiency. NBS complements these efforts by providing cost-effective and sustainable methods for carbon sequestration and ecosystem resilience. Although urban areas in Türkiye are not...
Türkiye’s public transportation primarily relies on conventional buses, trams, and metro systems, all of which require human operation. Istanbul and Ankara have extensive metro networks, and Istanbul’s Metrobus system serves as a high-capacity Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) model. However, no fully automated public transport systems are currently in operation. Türkiye’s Policy and Development Plans on...
Electric vehicles (EVs) accounted for 10.2% of the 1,014,830 cars registered between January and December 2024. However, overall, as of the end of 2024, only 183,776 (1.1%) of the 16,232,458 cars registered in traffic were EV. Given the minor percentage, the number of EVs on Turkish roads increased more than double, from 80,043 at the...
Ms. Diden Limgin, General Manager of TEMA Foundation The concept of environment was first mentioned in world literature at the Stockholm Conference in 1972. However, the environmental and sustainability concepts we understand today stepped into our lives at the United Nations Environment and Sustainable Development Conference in 1992. Two distinguished businessmen of Turkey, Hayrettin Karaca,...
In Turkey, each household produces about 2 kg of waste daily, resulting in a total waste of over 70,000 tons each day. Traditionally, waste has been dumped in wastelands, leading to significant environmental risks and issues. While generating energy from waste is not a new concept, its widespread and commercial use can be considered innovative....
Forests cover almost a third of Turkey. They are almost all state-owned and vary from temperate rainforest in the northeast to maquis in the south and west. Pine, fir, oak, and beech are common. While the forest area in Turkey accounted for 26.7% of the country’s surface area in 1999, this percentage increased to 29%...
The NDC Partnership is a network of over 120 countries, facilitated by UNFCCC, that is dedicated to helping each other strengthen their Paris Agreement Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) Pledges. The Partnership has just released Version 3.0 of the NDC Navigator, an interactive tool that supports the development of updated country NDCs to be submitted in...
Turkey has come a long way since the 1990s, from mostly dependent on fossil fuels to producing more renewable energy. Turkey’s energy production methods are similar to those of comparable countries in the world, with a dependence of over 85 percent on fossil fuels. In 2019, Turkey’s primary energy supply was around 30 percent oil,...
