Best practices and interim results from IEE-project SEAP-PLUS Georg C. Priesner, Climate Alliance Austria Conference: „Meeting the energy grand challenge with the EU Budget“, Brussels, 27 June 2013

SEAP PLUS (IEE/11/978/SI ) Overview –No. of partners:13 –Coordinator:Technical Chamber of Greece –Duration:30 months (04/12 – 09/14) –Benefits:Cooperation at regional level Collaboration with energy utilities Support to local authorities Dissemination of CoM-topics –Major expected Adhesion of more CoM-Signatories outputs: Adhesion of more Supporting Structures Knowledge transfer through twinning partnerships Elimination of non-technical-barriers More emission sectors in a typical SEAP Access to reliable energy data

13 European project partners JOKKMOKK ICLEI Europe DIBA ARE ALESSCO CAA VP AMRR BSRAEM TCG EPTA CEA LEAP

WP 2: Twinning Partnerships  Two rounds of twinning visits already completed (12 visits)  Third round now running  36 visits to take place in total  3x6 roundtables in the learning partners with 100 participants in total for all regions  6 Memorandum of Understanding to be signed for long-term cooperation  4 Learning partners to become CoM Supporting Structures => two already accepted  6 twinning pairs of experienced – learning partners Learning Partners Experienced Partners TCG (GR) ALESSCO (IT) BSRAEM (BG) LEIF (LV) AMRR (RO) LEAP (SL) DIBA (ES) CEA (CY) CAA (AT) JOKKMOKK (SE) ICLEI Europe (DE) ARE Lig (IT)

Lessons learnt – Challenges to face  Familiarization is the key!  Need to obtain the background and specific information on the visiting regions – identify the differences; experience cannot be directly transferred from one country / region to another  Continuous capacity building is needed!  Importance of ensuring the capacity building activities after the end of the project => Memorandum of Understanding between partners is the answer  En ergy data is a common problem  Need to engage energy providers and energy agencies, provide incentives, seek political support  Financing SEAPs  Identify financial mechanisms, experience transfer, seek for European and national funds. Work together

WP 3: SEAP-PLUS work towards energy stakeholders Main targets:  Raising awareness and committing regional and local energy stakeholders  Memorandum of Cooperation with energy stakeholders  Developing recommendations how to successfully involve energy stakeholders

Raising awareness and committing regional stakeholders A data base of arround 950 energy stakeholders from has been built up Energy stakeholders receive regular information about CoM, SEAP implementation work, best practices via newsletters and personal contacts 80 bilateral meetings with energy stakeholders in all project regions 8 energy stakeholder workshops were organised (200 participants) Memorandum of Cooperation (MoC) with energy stakeholders A common MoC basic text was developed by SEAP-PLUS project team 7 MoCs with energy stakeholders were signed in Latvia and Sweden –access for municipalities to reliable energy data –cooperation regarding research and data analysis –cooperation on monitoring and improvement of data quality

WP 4: Challenges of Local Governments‘ (LG) mobilisation & assistance Motivate – European sustainable energy policies and initiatives vs. national framework conditions Explain – funding opportunities to CoM signatories vs. limited staff capacity and varying application procedures Provide – guidance to technical staff within the SEAP process vs. need of interdepartmental involvement Facilitate – cooperation between LG and energy provider vs. potentially conflicting interests Involve – all governmental levels and relevant energy stakeholders vs. need of different forms of involvement (information, consultation, cooperation)

Technical assistance to LGs Related performance and achievements: 12 reports on technical help and SEAP PLUS promotion (1 per region) – pending 65 SEAPs prepared and submitted as a result of SEAP PLUS – currently overachieved: 80 LGs receive SEAP support (70 SEAP development / 10 SEAP improvement) 12 proposals in SEAP related funding mechanisms prepared and submitted – 1 done, 11 to go 4 learning partners become CoM Supporter – 2 done, 2 to go

Climate Alliance Austria (CAA) Europe: – cities and municipalities in 20 countries Austria: – 940 cities and municipalities – All 9 regions in Austria – 780 private sector businesses – 360 schools and educational institutions Central Aims: Think globally – act locally! All members of Climate Alliance Austria engage in:  minus 10% CO 2 emissions every 5 years, reaching minus 50% emissions until 2030 per inhabitant (reference year 1990)  Support of indigenous partners in the Amazon: preservation of the rainforest and their lifestyle

Importance of IEE programme for Austrian municipalities and CAA  Bringing CoM topics directly to mayors and citizens - CoM Awareness Building and CoM Public Relations through events, presentations, websites, flyers and newsletters  Possibility of European cooperation between municipalities, towns, regions and organizations regarding EE and RES topics  Knowledge transfer and transfer of new methods and technologies through pilot projects which can be rolled out afterwards in the regions (twinning partnerships, best practices)  IEE as basis for installation of and development for a sustainable CAA CoM-Expertise. Positioning of CAA as CoM Competence Centre for IEE climate and energy topics for municipalities  Information and networking for municipalities  Method of cofinancing for EE and RES pilot projects

Concrete results from IEE projects  PRO EE – Public Procurement boosts Energy Efficiency Manual for public procurement for Austrian municipalities  Come2CoM First Promotion of the CoM in Austria, first signatories  NET-COM – Networking the Covenant of Mayors Foundation of the Austrian Covenant Club, 6 NET-COM information and networking workshops, CAA becomes CoM supporting structure, adhesion of Vienna  100% RES communities Bringing rural communities into the CoM, adhesion of group of municipalities (Waldviertler Kernland), twinning partnership between „experienced“ and „learning“ region  REPOWERMAP Interactive map for promoting the use of RES and EE, 800 Austrian installations registered