Editorial: EnercitEE’s sub-projects

Since the last couple of years the central role of the energy policies in the agenda of the decision makers has been stressed.

More and more, it is becoming clearer even at local level that energy efficiency and sustainability is relevant not only for contributing to solve environmental problems but also because it plays an important role on the economic development and occupation. Nevertheless, policy makers have also to face dramatic cuts in the public budget, the available resources for implementing local policies are decreasing continuously.

Having in mind this framework it is clear that in order to reach the ambitious goal of 20-20-20 and at the same time improve competitiveness with less resources the new energy policies would need a revised policy paradigm with a greater involvement of the main actors of the game: local authorities and citizens.

EnercitEE’s sub-projects (SP) are exactly focusing on these two target groups; they have the important mission of increasing the participation and involvement of citizens and local authorities on the design, the exchange and the share of energy policies.

Today EnercitEE includes 43 partners involved in 11 sub-projects. 22 partners work on awareness raising of citizens and on improving their energy efficiency. 21 other partners are acting towards local authorities in several fields of energy efficiency policies such as financing instruments, local climate policies, training tools, etc.

The EnercitEE sub-projects’ concept is ambitious: public partners (municipalities, associations, public agencies) applied to two Calls for Proposals with their project idea. For each sub-project currently being implemented, European partnerships were formed, each partner bringing in its experience, motivation and know-how to build 11 joint projects with their own objectives.

Within every sub-project, the partners regularly meet to share and make progress with each other’s experience. It is very motivating to see the quality of these technical meetings. Experience exchange is the core of the European project EnercitEE. Citizens and local authorities of our five partner regions will benefit greatly from this work and will gradually move forward in energy management and energy efficiency, as requested by Member States of the European Union.

The path toward the 20-20-20 goal is still very long but we are confident that thanks to our sub-projects the partner regions will make an essential step forward.