When European collaboration makes energy efficiency policies more effective

Panel: 2. Policy: governance, design, implementation and evaluation challenges

This is a peer-reviewed paper.

Authors:
Vincent Berrutto, European Commission - Executive Agency for Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (EASME), Belgium
Martin Eibl
Michele Sansoni
Janna Schönfeld
Stamatis Sivitos
Björn Zapfel
Sergio Ferreira

Abstract

This paper shows how EU-funded projects are facilitating the definition, implementation and monitoring of energy efficiency policies. It focuses on actions supported by the Horizon 2020 programme for research and innovation (2014-2020) and the Intelligent Energy Europe programme (2013-2020). These two EU programmes have co-funded hundreds of collaborative projects supporting legislation by: Generating, testing and converting into actions new policies; checking compliance on the grounds; building capacity amongst market actors; and mobilising large scale investments. Of all EU programmes, they have had the closest link to EU energy efficiency policy developments. This paper explains and illustrates the different means of intervention that have been used. It provides examples and lessons learned in various end-use sectors. It builds as much as possible on results from recent evaluations which have measured the extent to which EU-funded projects have supported energy efficiency policy goals.