Multilevel climate and energy dialogue to deliver the Governance Regulation and the post–2030 energy and climate policy framework

Expected Impact:

Proposals should present the concrete results which will be delivered by the activities and demonstrate how these results will contribute to the topic-specific impacts. This demonstration should rely on a solid analysis of the current situation, realistic assumptions and baselines, and establish clear causality links between proposed activities, results and impacts.

In terms of qualitative impact, proposals under this topic should demonstrate how they will contribute to the following outcomes, as relevant:

• Improved Member States multilevel dialogues in the context of the achievement of the Union’s climate-neutrality objective and the different scenarios envisaged for energy and climate policies, including for the long term, and review progress.
• Improved coherence and synergies in strategies and measures across different stakeholders and governance levels.
• Improved engagement of different administrative levels and stakeholders on energy and climate matters to ensure an effective and shared implementation of policies and delivery of related investments.
• Improved sharing of information and good practices for an effective and timely multilevel dialogue.

In terms of quantitative impact, proposals should quantify their results and impacts using the indicators provided for the topic, when they are relevant for the proposed activities. Proposals are not expected to address all the listed impacts and indicators. The results and impacts should be quantified for the end of the project and for 5 years after the end of the project. The quantitative indicators for this topic include:

• Newly developed/reinforced governance structures/dialogue platforms to enhance exchanges between different administrative layers and stakeholders.
• Newly developed/reinforced governance or process models establishing a solid reporting mechanism for the NECPs.
• Number of institutionalised collaborations on the energy transition between public authorities with different administrative layers (local, regional, national) and stakeholders (civil society, communities, youth, academia, industry and business).
• Number of updated NECPs integrating the outcomes of the project measures.
• Number of contributions/synergies built with other European and national initiatives (e.g. National and Regional Partnership Plans, National Building Renovation plans, Social Climate Plans, EU Agenda for Cities, Heating and Cooling plans).
• Number of stakeholders (organisations) engaged in the process, broken down by administrative layers and stakeholder groups.

Proposals should also provide indicators which are specific to their proposed activities.

Proposals should also quantify their impacts related to the following common indicators for the LIFE Clean Energy Transition sub-programme:

• Primary energy savings triggered by the project in GWh/year.
• Final energy savings triggered by the project in GWh/year.
• Renewable energy generation triggered by the project (in GWh/year).
• Reduction of greenhouse gas emissions (in t CO2-eq/year).
• Investments in sustainable energy (energy efficiency and renewable energy) triggered by the project (cumulative, in million Euro).

Specific consortium requirements: Proposals must be submitted by at least 3 applicants (beneficiaries; not affiliated entities) from 3 different eligible countries.

Expected project duration: Indicatively 36 months

Maximum Funding rate and maximum EU contribution:

Maximum funding rate: 90%

Maximum EU contribution: The Commission considers that proposals requesting an EU contribution of up to EUR 2 million would allow the specific objectives to be addressed appropriately. Nonetheless, this does not preclude submission and selection of proposals requesting other amounts.

Objective:

The contracting authority expects to award only 1 grant under this funding topic.

The Governance Regulation^[1] sets out the rules for planning, reporting and monitoring on the Energy Union and Climate Action. It requires Member States to ensure reasonable timeframes for the public to be informed, to participate, and to express their views in the preparation of National Energy and Climate Plans (NECPs) and Long-Term Strategies. It also requires Member States to establish a permanent multilevel climate and energy dialogue bringing together local authorities, civil society organisations, the business community, investors and other relevant stakeholders to discuss energy and climate policies.

However, the 2025 European Commission EU-wide assessment^[2] of the final NECPs found that implementation of these provisions has been uneven across Member States. The European Commission^[3] encourages them to maintain and improve dialogue processes at all levels of society to ensure effective implementation of policies. This involves coordinating different governance layers alongside civil society organisations, business community, investors and other relevant stakeholders - in view of the update of the NECPs and for their monitoring and reporting, foreseen every other year.

The upcoming revision of the Regulation on the Governance of the Energy Union and Climate Action planned for Q4 2026 will review the NECPs as a governance tool for the post-2030 period. In this context, the European Commission will work to simplify, strengthen and modernise the referred regulation. The NECPs must evolve into strategic investment plans that foster investment predictability and credibility, consumer confidence, innovation and market growth for clean technologies.

Scope:

Proposals should

• Establish a permanent dialogue and create/strengthen structured synergies between different administrative levels (regions, cities, national governments) and stakeholders to reach ambitious and shared decarbonisation targets. The aim is to better define the role and contribution of the regional/local level to the national energy and climate policies, ensuring complementarity among various actors and political leadership to provide legitimacy and continuity to the dialogue process.
• Increase co-definition and coherence of strategies and measures at different governance levels, and improve reporting schemes at local level (e.g. Heating and Cooling plans, Sustainable Energy and Climate Action Plans (SECAPs), European Energy Award (EEA), etc.) and national level (e.g. NECPs, National Building Renovation Plans, Social Climate Plans) to support the Energy Union Governance Regulation, increase sharing of good practices, institutionalise the improved governance processes and strengthen political commitment.
• Deliver governance or process models to allow for robust and consistent reporting mechanisms, integrating vertical and horizontal administrative layers and delivering innovative monitoring and verification schemes mixing different approaches (e.g. top-down and bottom-up) and applying such models for the updating of NECPs in appropriate time horizon.
• Make links to other ongoing initiatives and existing dialogue fora aimed at enhancing and implementing connected and relevant policies (e.g. National Building Renovation plans, Social Climate Plans) and / or initiatives (e.g. national hubs of the European Energy Efficiency Financing Coalition).

Proposals are not expected to develop any new tools, databases, or digital platforms, unless their added value is clearly justified and their potential scale-up beyond the project convincingly addressed.

Proposals should seek to ensure the sustainability of the newly created dialogue structures or strengthen existing dialogue structures in the long-term, e.g. through their institutionalisation. Proposals should demonstrate that their concept makes strong use of established successful practices developed in previous EU initiatives and projects^[4] and/or other already existing national initiatives aiming at strengthening multilevel governance in national energy and climate policies.

Proposals should aim to establish or strengthen permanent multilevel climate and energy dialogues in 6 to 10 EU Member States. They should provide a clear rationale for the selection of each country, including the current level of development of multi-level climate and energy dialogue, an analysis of existing mechanisms and how the proposed activities will complement them. Priority will be given to proposals focusing on geographic areas in which multi-level climate and energy dialogue are less developed. Proposals should identify which stakeholders they would rely on to ensure a neutral facilitation process which allows to include all relevant stakeholders. The proposed approach should be fully participatory giving stakeholders an active role in the multilevel dialogues.

[1] https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:32018R1999&from=EN

[2] https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:52025SC0140

[3] https://eur-lex.europa.eu/resource.html?uri=cellar:61de6ed0-3b8d-11f0-8a44-01aa75ed71a1.0001.02/DOC_1&format=PDF

[4] such as LIFE21-CET-GOV-NECPlatform