Sustainable Energy & Covenant of Mayors in our Cities

• Workshop Programme and Presentations [PL - Polski]

The workshop focused on Polish cities that are already convinced of the benefits of local sustainable energy policies and those that signed up to the Covenant of Mayors initiative. The main objective was to find solutions which ensure the smooth implementation of the Covenant initiative within the Polish context.

The workshop helped to improve the capacities of municipalities to:

• allocate sufficient human capacities
• develop and implement local Baseline Emissions Inventories (BEI) and Sustainable Energy Action Plans (SEAP) in order to achieve the goals of the Covenant of Mayors (at least a 20% CO2 reduction by 2020)
• engage local stakeholders and citizens
• make use of existing funding opportunities and the experiences of other signatories

The Covenant methodology, the available financing mechanisms and the first concrete achievements of Covenant cities were presented, while training was provided on the development and implementation of SEAPs.

Participants were invited to clearly identify local authorities’ needs as well as measures that should be put in place to boost the implementation of the Covenant of Mayors initiative in Poland. The possibility to set up a Covenant national platform was explored.

The Polish regions and networks of local authorities were encouraged to become ‘Covenant Territorial Coordinators’ or ‘Covenant Supporters’. Other key actors were invited (ministries, associations), in order to encourage networking and interaction with municipalities.

As the Covenant of Mayors initiative is not well known in Poland yet - only 11 cities signed up -, there is still a huge potential for action. The achievement of the Covenant targets by the cities participating in the workshop helped to motivate more cities to join.