Bringing the EU together on climate action

PROJECT DESCRIPTION

BACKGROUND

There is an urgent global need for concerted, immediate decarbonisation of the economy. With the Paris Agreement (2015), countries committed to keep global temperature rise well below 2C, while pursuing efforts to limit warming to 1.5C. The current emission reduction targets for 2030, including those of the EU and its Member States, do not match these targets. As a result, they need to be adjusted based on a long- term decarbonisationstrategy. They need the full support of civil society to meet these targets.

To meet at least the current targets, the EU needs adequate coordination, implementation and monitoring tools in its Member States. From the adoption of the Energy Union Governance Regulation in December 2018 two new opportunities resulted: 1. National Energy and Climate Plans (NECPs) for 2030; 2. National Long-Term Strategies (LTS) on climate and energy.

OBJECTIVES

The overall aim of the LIFE UNIFY project is to help EU Member States transition quickly and effectively to low carbon and resilient economies by facilitating horizontal and vertical coherence between: 1. programming of EU funds; 2. National Energy and Climate Plans (NECPs); 3. Long Term Strategies (LTS).

The three specific objectives for 2022 are: 1. the 10 target EU Member States will be on track to meet or exceed 2030 targets, with programming of EU funds at national level directly enabling NECP implementation; 2. European NGOs within these 10 target Member States will have become highly effective at monitoring progress towards the Paris Agreement goal and holding Member States accountable at national level; and 3. best practices and quantitative modelling tools developed through LIFE UNIFY will strengthen NECP and LTS implementation.

LIFE UNIFY will contribute to implementing and reviewing NECPs primarily in ten target EU countries, and assessing how these match the EUs long term energy strategies. It will support more ambitious EU 2030 targets and encourage an expansion of the Covenant of Mayors. The project will also raise awareness about where and how EU funds should be better aligned with 2030 climate and energy strategies and NECPs. Towards project closure and beyond the project lessons-learnt will be shared with all CAN-E member organisations in all EU countries, so that the policy impact is replicated in all EU member states.

RESULTS

Expected results: The overarching result of LIFE UNIFY is an effective and early transition of EU Member States to a low carbon and resilient economy by unifying programming of EU funds, National Energy and Climate Plans, and Long Term Strategies, both at national level and at the EU level of coordination, steering and reporting. This incorporates global climate policy processes such as the Paris Agreement.

Specific results include the following:

in 10 target countries, NGO and policy makers gain strengthened capacity, and support groups aligning the three processes at the national level are established. These give input to NECP implementation, reporting and bi-annual stocktaking at national and EU level;

an EU-wide quantitative and qualitative toolbox for NECP implementation is in place and used widely throughout the EU, going beyond the original 10 target countries;

a full assessment of the current EU regional fundsperformance on climate action and how EU funds are integrated into NECPs is compiled and fed into EU level policy processes;

at least six new signatories of the Covenant of Mayors and their Sustainable Energy and Climate Action Plans (SECAPs), along with increased local stakeholder capacity to develop and implement SECAPs; and

national assessment in the 10 target Member States of their Long Term Strategies, leading to policy papers, reports and presentations for EU policy makers, as well as giving information for national-level advocacy activities by CAN-E members.

Thanks to these materials, the project expects policy makers and national and EU-level NGOs to gain understanding, knowledge and capacity. Through public information and social media campaigning, the project expects the public to become more aware of the connections between national, EU and global policy around climate change, energy and EU funding.