16. Calls on the Member States to modernise their national energy grids and interconnect them with a European super smart grid while providing major energy storage capacities within the EU (including multi-use gas/hydrogen facilities, large and small hydropower, high-temperature solar and other technologies)and a stable and secure flow of affordable energy; furthermore stresses the need for all grids to be adapted, in a way that allows for unhindered feed-in of electricity generated by renewable energy and for the full use of opportunities for the best possible environmental outcomes in the routeing of power lines, and the need to modernise the grids in order to avoid losses of energy; stresses also the need to take further action t ...[+++]o connect isolated territories (e.g. islands and peripheral regions) to the European electricity grid;

The value could be increased by developing new uses such as highly efficient and ecological thermal insulating material.

To build a spirit of ecological integrity which will unite the isolated places of the land into a mosaic that protects ecological integrity.

J. whereas infrastructure such as roads, dams and ports fragment landscapes and isolate populations of flora and fauna from one another; notes that the fragmentation and shrinkage of habitats is having the effect of isolating populations from one another and thus reducing genetic exchanges as well as hampering populations" survival, and preventing the establishment of Natura 2000 as a coherent ecological network based on Special Protection Areas (SPA) under the Birds Directive, and the Special Areas of Conservation (SAC) designated ...[+++]under the Habitats Directive; whereas adequate ecological corridors and buffer zones are an essential contribution to nature conservation in Europe; whereas larger, interlinked areas of protection are necessary in order to guarantee the success of the Habitats Directive; whereas there is an urgent need to improve environmental impact assessment and introduce strategic environment assessment of transport projects and other land use planning initiatives to secure the coherence of Natura 2000,

For example, if I construct a very well insulated building, but I only use oil-based insulating panels — and bear in mind that oil is a non-renewable resource and that the panel itself is not recyclable — my energy efficiency level will be high, but my green rating will be much lower because of the choice of materials.

While each of the projects on its own might not pose a grave threat to the ecological integrity of a particular region, the density of the proposed infrastructure that we are seeing in southwest B.C., where there are more than 250 development proposals, means that the environmental impacts become very real.