TOwards Multi-stakehOldeRs transition ROadmaps With citizens at the centre

Project Information

TOMORROW

Grant agreement ID: 847136

DOI

10.3030/847136

Project closed

EC signature date 15 April 2019

Start date 1 September 2019

End date 30 November 2022

Funded under

• SOCIETAL CHALLENGES - Secure, clean and efficient energy

Total cost

€ 1 499 767,50

EU contribution

€ 1 499 767,50

Coordinated by

ENERGY CITIES/ENERGIE-CITES ASSOCIATION
France

Periodic Reporting for period 2 - TOMORROW (TOwards Multi-stakehOldeRs transition ROadmaps With citizens at the centre)

Reporting period: 2021-03-01 to 2022-11-30

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

TOMORROW aimed at empowering local authorities to lead the transition towards low-carbon, resilient and more liveable cities by engaging citizens and stakeholders in the development of 2050 transition roadmaps.
During the project implementation, we have seen the European Union adopt a 2050 long-term strategy with the objective of “achieving a climate-neutral EU by 2050”; the launch of the European Climate Pact to unite everyone around a common cause; the upgrade of the Covenant of Mayors Europe to include climate-neutrality as a long-term objective and the engagement of citizens and local stakeholders in the climate and energy transition; last but not least the launch of the EU Mission for 100 climate-neutral and smart cities with a strong emphasis on empowering cities as leaders of the transition of their whole community.
This clearly demonstrates how strategic and timely TOMORROW was from the start, aligned with key European policies and urban initiatives.
Despite the multiple crisis that hit Europe during the project implementation (e.g. Covid 19 crisis, Russian war against Ukraine, energy price crisis), the Pilot Cities, encouraged by Energy Cities and DRIFT, have successfully progressed, albeit at different paces, in adapting their governance both internally and with their community in order to advance in their transition.
Every Pilot City has set up a transition team, embracing different services as in Brest-Metropolis and sometimes different institutions like in Brașov, thus overcoming the silo-approach and putting in place a governance model to manage the energy transition. They developed a “long-term roadmap”, used as a key chapter of a larger 2030 urban strategy in the case of Valencia or as an updated and upgraded Sustainable Energy Action Plan in the case of Mouscron. They engaged their community of stakeholders, citizens, SMEs, Universities around one shared goal of transitioning their city to climate-neutrality: using a communication campaign such as the Zero Together campaign in Dublin or by launching a local Conference of Parties like in Brest-Metropolis.
To close the gap between those frontrunner cities and the rest of local authorities in Europe and beyond, TOMORROW also organised knowledge sharing and capacity building activities which attracted 125 participants during 2 learning relays and 2 Master-classes. Valuable policy recommendations and methodological guidelines elaborated with the Pilot Cities were also published and shared widely. The community of practice created via a LinkedIn group is also instrumental to sharing the knowledge, experience and methodology developed by the project and will be sustained through Energy Cities’ Hub on future-proof governance.

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

From 2019 to 2022, TOMORROW supported six pilot cities – Brest-Metropolis (FR), Brașov (RO), Dublin (IE), Mouscron (BE), Niš (RS), Valencia (ES) - in developing 2050 energy transition roadmaps together with citizens and other local stakeholders. The project accompanied the cities as they implemented innovative forms of governance, based on the concept of transition management.
1) Finding inspiration
The innovative engagement processes that were developed in the pilot cities over the course of the project were based on a review of existing methodologies and approaches successfully used by some frontrunner “lighthouse” cities: Leuven, Ghent, and Nantes.
2) Learning how to co-design a roadmap for your city
To ensure pilot cities involve citizens and stakeholders in designing their climate-neutral futures through innovative forms of governance, TOMORROW trained them in Transition Management. This alternative governance approach aims at facilitating and accelerating sustainability transitions through a participatory process of visioning, learning, and experimenting. With this methodology, the cities learned methods for analysing transition dynamics and multi-stakeholder engagement approaches.
3) Developing local Energy Transition Roadmaps and kick-starting first steps of implementation
Each pilot city completed a public engagement process to develop its own Roadmap. Governance structures and management bodies (transition teams) were put in place to manage the process and make sure that the roadmapping efforts will be sustained after the project ends.
4) Beyond the TOMORROW cities
As the pilot cities worked on implementing the processes learnt in the diverse workshops, more cities and professionals were invited to hear about the approaches and methodology developed in TOMORROW during two Energy Transition Learning Relays and two Masterclasses sessions on Energy Transition Road mapping.
5) Recommendations from TOMORROW project
Two sets of policy recommendations provide:
- the lessons-learnt from the pilot cities engaging their community in designing their transition towards climate neutrality;
- the needed changes in legislative and administrative frameworks at European and National levels to support the role of cities in transition.

6) Disseminating the project’s outputs and results
During the three years TOMORROW’s dissemination activities focused on fostering the uptake of the knowledge generated by the project around the development of transition roadmaps. The idea was for more cities to use TOMORROW’s outputs and engage their local stakeholders in developing their city’s roadmap through a toolbox, and to create a European community of practice around the project. To follow up and further extend this dynamic, Energy Cities is managing a Hub on Future-Proof Local Governance.
7) Supporting the research
DRIFT, as TOMORROW’s academic partner, discusses the democratic legitimacy of transition management in a first scientific paper, while another paper was submitted for review to an academic journal in November 2022.

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

The Pilot Cities developed and endorsed 6 Energy transition roadmaps after conducting a local engagement process. They now each have a management team and new governance models in place to sustain the energy transition of their territory.
148 public officers were trained throughout the project, 150 stakeholders and more than 4000 citizens were involved in the local energy transition process in the 6 pilot cities.
Through TOMORROW, the pilot cities defined an individual and specific path on how to develop a shared roadmap and drive their climate and energy transition. They now have the tool to steer their energy transition process.
TOMORROW provided tools to replicate the methodology put in place by the pilot cities (Methodological Guidelines For Using Transition Management / Workbook I / Workbook II) in order to give the opportunity for any city to take on the challenge for itself. Further on, a dissemination strategy was put in place to exploit the results and maximise the impacts of the project and a community of practice was consolidated to engage other practitioners and local authorities.
The successful journey initiated by our pilot cities through the project led half of them (Brașov, Dublin city, Valencia) to apply to the EU Mission for climate-neutral cities, with eventually Dublin and Valencia being selected. TOMORROW also contributed to the City of Valencia being awarded EU Green Capital 2024 according to the project manager in charge and led the City of Brașov to consider an application in the coming years.

TOMORROWs team at Kicki Off Meeting