Closed

Community-driven clean energy transition in coal, peat and oil-shale regions

LIFE Project Grants

Basic Information

Identifier: LIFE-2021-CET-COALREGIONS
Programme: LIFE Clean Energy Transition
Programme Period: 2021 - 2027
Status: Closed (31094503)
Opening Date: July 13, 2021
Deadline: January 12, 2022
Deadline Model: single-stage
Budget: €4,000,000
Min Grant Amount: –
Max Grant Amount: –
Expected Number of Grants: –
Keywords: LIFE-2021-CET-COALREGIONSLIFE-2021-CET

Description

Expected Impact:

Investments into sustainable energy triggered by the project through public and/or private funding (cumulative, in million Euro)
Number of citizens with increased level of awareness for the clean energy transition
Increased economic activity in the area of energy efficiency and renewable energy including jobs created and skills developed
Number of strategies developed/adapted and aligned with the objectives of the clean energy transition
Number of households taken out of energy poverty
Primary energy savings/renewable energy generation triggered by the project (in GWh/year)
Reduction in greenhouse gases emissions (tCO2eq/year)

Objective:

Coal infrastructure is present in 108 European regions and close to 237 000 people are employed in coal-related activities, whereas almost 10 000 people are employed in peat extraction activities and around 6 000 are employed in the oil shale industry.

The shift to a low-carbon economy presents many opportunities to carbon intensive regions. However, the economic and social impacts of such a transition need to be carefully taken into account and an inclusive and bottom-up approach engaging with local stakeholders and citizens is essential to make this transition a success.

The European Union's Just Transition Mechanism – comprising the Just Transition Fund, a dedicated InvestEU scheme and the Public Sector Loan Facility – aims to mobilise up to €75 billion to support coal, peat and oil shale regions in their efforts to decarbonise and become climate neutral.

It is important to ensure that investments triggered by the Just Transition Mechanism support the transition towards an energy-efficient, renewable energy-based economy, which is based on an inclusive, consumer-and community-centred approach.

This topic aims to empower coal, peat and oil-shale regions to advance the clean energy transition in their territories by developing and implementing the sustainable energy-related elements of their territorial just transition plans and effectively combining the support provided by the Just Transition Mechanism and/or and other sources of available funding.

Scope:

Proposals should build capacity amongst communities in coal, peat and oil-shale regions to maximise spending of the Just Transition Mechanism in the area of the clean energy transition leading to increased uptake of energy efficiency and renewable energy solutions. Proposals should support local/regional bottom-up activities, that are in line with territorial just transition plans and aim to use effectively the resources of the Just Transition Mechanism and/or and other sources of public and/or private funding. The proposed activities should have a strong focus on engaging local communities and citizens in the clean energy transition.

Proposals could focus on the following areas (non-exhaustive):

alignment of local/regional strategies with the clean energy transition and strengthening the implementation by deploying support from the Just Transition Mechanism, which should also include strong citizens’ engagement in the governance structures and decision making processes
building capacity and understanding amongst key stakeholders, local communities and citizens for the clean energy transition, in particular, with an emphasis on the economic and social opportunities and environmental and health benefits
alleviating energy poverty including demonstration of the wider benefits including improved health
developing sustainable energy project pipelines such as the energy-efficient renovation of buildings, energy-efficient district heating and cooling systems or low carbon transport solutions.

Proposals should put emphasis on skills development and job creation effects as well as revitalisation and regeneration of economy in the area of clean energy transition, for example, skills and jobs in energy efficiency and renewable energy fields and in line with the European Green Deal and particularly the Renovation Wave.

Proposals should involve at least three different target regions in three different Member States in order to disseminate good practices and experiences across borders and strengthening the EU added value. In addition, proposals should build upon the activities of the Just Transition Platform[1] Just Transition Platform https://ec.europa.eu/info/strategy/priorities-2019-2024/european-green-deal/actions-being-taken-eu/just-transition-mechanism/just-transition-platform_en].

The Commission considers that proposals requesting a contribution from the EU of up to EUR 1 million would allow the specific objectives to be addressed appropriately. Nonetheless, this does not preclude submission and selection of proposals requesting other amounts.

View on EU Portal →

Eligibility & Conditions

Conditions

Conditions

1. Admissibility conditions: described in section 5 of the call document

Proposal page limits and layout: described in Part B of the Application Form available in the Submission System

2. Eligible countries: described in section 6 of of the call document

3. Other eligibility conditions: described in section 6 of the call document

4. Financial and operational capacity and exclusion: described in section 7 of the call document

Submission and evaluation processes: described section 8 of the call document and the Online Manual

Award criteria, scoring and thresholds: described in section 9 of the call document

Indicative timeline for evaluation and grant agreement: described in section 4 of the call document

6. Legal and financial set-up of the grants: described in section 10 of the call document

Documents

Call documents:

Call document

Standard application form — call-specific application form is available in the Submission System

Detailed budget table

Participant information

LIFE General MGA v1.0

LIFE Work Programme 2021-2024

LIFE Regulation 2021/783

EU Financial Regulation 2018/1046

Info session recordings and presentations

Support & Resources

Funding & Tenders Portal FAQ – Submission of proposals.

IT Helpdesk – Contact the IT helpdesk for questions such as forgotten passwords, access rights and roles, technical aspects of submission of proposals, etc.

Online Manual – Step-by-step online guide through the Portal processes from proposal preparation and submission to reporting on your on-going project. Valid for all 2021-2027 programmes.

Latest Updates

Last Changed: May 16, 2022

Topic code	Call Topic	Budget (M EUR)
LIFE-2021-CET-LOCAL	Technical support to clean energy transition plans and strategies in municipalities and regions	7
LIFE-2021-CET-POLICY	Towards an effective implementation of key legislation in the field of sustainable energy	6
LIFE-2021-CET-GOV	Multilevel climate and energy dialogue to deliver the energy Governance	5,5
LIFE-2021-CET-BUILDRENO	Large-scale rollout of industrialised deep renovation solutions	6
LIFE-2021-CET-AUDITS	Uptake of energy audits recommendations for the energy transition of companies	5,5
LIFE-2021-CET-VALUECHAIN	Fostering sustainable energy uptake along the whole value chain in industry and services	4
LIFE-2021-CET-BUILDSKILLS	BUILD UP Skills – rebooting the National Platforms and Roadmaps	6
LIFE-2021-CET-COOLING	Facing the increase in cooling demand of buildings in the coming years	4
LIFE-2021-CET-SMARTSERV	Establish innovative business models and contractual schemes for smart and sector-integrating energy services	4
LIFE-2021-CET-SMARTREADY	Creating the conditions for a global improvement of smart readiness of European buildings	6
LIFE-2021-CET-MAINSTREAM	Mainstreaming sustainable energy finance and integrating energy performance in EU sustainable finance criteria and standards	5,5
LIFE-2021-CET-INNOFIN	Innovative financing schemes for sustainable energy investments	5,5
LIFE-2021-CET-HOMERENO	Integrated Home Renovation Services	6
LIFE-2021-CET-HOMERECOM	EU community of "Integrated Home Renovation Services" practitioners	2
LIFE-2021-CET-COALREGIONS	Community-driven clean energy transition in coal, peat and oil-shale regions	3
LIFE-2021-CET-PDA	Disruptive PDA – Technical Assistance to advance market boundaries for sustainable energy investments	6
LIFE-2021-CET-ENERPOV	Addressing building related interventions for vulnerable districts	5,5
LIFE-2021-CET-ENERCOM	Developing support mechanisms for energy communities and other citizen-led initiatives in the field of sustainable energy	7

The results of the evaluation are as follows:

Call LIFE-2021-CET:

Number of proposals submitted (including proposals transferred from or to other calls): 171