Tools for the Municipal Energy Transition. Local GoGREEN
Municipalities play a highly significant role in achieving the medium-term (2030) and long-term (2050) climate objectives adopted by the Member States of the European Union. As the level of administration closest to citizens, local authorities have a strong capacity to lead by example and encourage behavioural change among residents, beyond the local regulations they establish regarding the decarbonisation of private buildings and the mobility of people and goods.
Given the major influence municipalities have on the energy transition, an important challenge arises: how to select and prioritise the many projects and initiatives that local governments may undertake.
Particularly relevant areas include energy efficiency — following the “Energy Efficiency First” principle established by European legislation — the expansion of renewable thermal and electrical energy generation, sustainable mobility and electrification, the use of waste as an energy source (including wastewater, municipal waste and green waste), and land-use strategies aimed at increasing carbon dioxide absorption.
In this context, the European Project Local GoGREEN, funded by the LIFE Clean Energy Transition programme, has developed several tools to help municipalities plan and manage their energy transition processes.
Among these solutions, a project decision-making tool is designed to assess the preliminary feasibility of potential actions and prioritise them according to objective criteria such as data availability, investment requirements, expected economic returns, social impact and CO₂ emissions reduction.
To present this tool and other resources developed within the framework of Local GoGREEN, an open webinar will be held on 21 May at 10:00 CET, especially aimed at municipal technicians and local authorities, although open to all interested participants.
During the webinar, the project coordinator, Professor Roman Kekec, will present the different tools developed to support municipal energy transition planning.
The overall objective of the Local GoGREEN project is to empower local authorities and strengthen their capacities to design, implement and monitor ambitious short- and medium-term plans that accelerate the clean energy transition and contribute to achieving the European 2030 climate targets.
The project includes representatives from Germany, Bulgaria, Croatia, Slovenia, Spain, Estonia and Italy, while municipalities from all participating countries except Estonia directly benefit from the initiative. In Spain, the project partners are the Municipality of Ponferrada and the Asociación de Empresas de Eficiencia Energética (A3E).
Guillermo J. Escobar, CEM and CMVP
