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This study investigates the climate emergency declaration (CED) movement in cities and its effects and synergies with local climate planning. Urban areas are experiencing a wide range of climate-induced extreme events, particularly those located in the Mediterranean hotspot. The focus is on Italian cities, which have only recently become key players in climate planning. The method is based on the collection, analysis, and comparison of data on CEDs and local climate plans (LCPs), integrated with information on city membership in climate networks, to extrapolate key performance indicators of the CED movement. The results show that the CED movement can motivate municipalities to become more ambitious in climate action. As of February 2021, the “climate emergency” movement was supported by 105 Italian cities geographically concentrated in the northern regions (66.7%). The motivation behind a CED is often attributable to local populations calling for concrete climate action (91.1% referred to the Fridays for Future movement) but also to a greater perception of the impacts of climate change (85.6% referred to the Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5 °C). Networking plays an important role (85 cities in the Covenant of Mayors). Interestingly, 36 cities (34.3%) were not engaged in local climate planning previously, but the CED shows now they see the urgency to act. 24.4% cities aim at carbon neutrality in their CEDs (most with local adaptation aspirations), with a much smaller fraction of cities doing so in LCPs and generally lower ambition in terms of greenhouse gas emission reduction targets.

As recognized by the Paris Climate Agreement of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), local and subnational regions are crucial actors to achieve international mitigation and adaptation commitments. Scientific literature and empirical evidence point at multi-level climate governance as a crucial factor to engage subnational levels in the achievement of national and international objectives. This work focuses on the multi-level climate governance arrangements in Italy to investigate how Italian regions/provinces/cities are contributing to the achievement of national commitments. To this purpose, the paper undertakes a review of the climate policies of different tiers of government adopted to date and of the interrelationships among them. The results of the analysis show that the effective coordination between the different government levels should be strengthened to further incentivize and support initiatives at the local level. Results also show the relevant role played by international regional and city climate networks in boosting local and regional climate planning in Italy. © 2021 Elsevier Ltd

In Europe, regions in the Mediterranean area share common characteristics in terms of high sensitivity to climate change impacts. Does this translate into specificities regarding climate action that could arise from these Mediterranean characteristics? This paper sheds light on regional and local climate mitigation actions of the Mediterranean Europe, focusing on the plans to reduce greenhouse gases emissions in a representative sample of 51 regions and 73 cities across 9 Mediterranean countries (Croatia, Cyprus, France, Greece, Italy, Malta, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain). The study investigates: (i) the availability of local and regional mitigation plans, (ii) their goals in term of greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets on the short and medium-long term, and (iii) the impact of transnational climate networks on such local and regional climate mitigation planning. Results of this study indicate an uneven and fragmented planning, that shows a Mediterranean West-East divide, and a link with population size. However, overall, both regional and city action seem insufficiently ambitious with regards to meeting the Paris Agreement, at least at city level. While national frameworks are currently weak in influencing regional and local actions, transnational networks seem to be engaging factors for commitment (at city level) and ambitiousness (at regional level). The uneven and fragmented progress revealed by this study, does not align with the characteristics shared by investigated regions and cities in terms of environmental, socio-political, climatic and economic conditions. The results support the call of a common green deal at the Mediterranean level to further address specific Mediterranean challenges and related needs. This will allow to capitalise on available resources, generate local-specific knowledge, build capacities, and support Mediterranean regions and cities in preparing the next generation of more ambitious mitigation plans. info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion

This is a reply to the paper by Miroslav Variny [...]

International audience; Climate Action Planning is one of the top priorities of cities in order to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and strengthening climate-resilience, as pointed out by the New Urban Agenda and the Paris Agreement. This study aims at assessing the development of climate change mitigation and adaptation planning in Italian cities. To this end, we analysed the availability of Local Climate Plans (LCPs) in 76 cities, which are included in the Eurostat Urban Audit (UA-2015) database. In a further step, we analysed the content of the urban climate change mitigation and adaptation plans available in a smaller sample of 32 Italian cities of 2007 Eurostat Urban Audit database (UA-3), looking at the single actions undertaken for addressing mitigation and adaptation to climate change. Results show the almost total absence of comprehensive and stand-alone urban climate change adaptation plans in Italy (except for two cities, Ancona and Bologna), whereas we found that in 61 out of 76 cities municipal civil protection plans are the instruments that deal with local emergencies associated to extreme weather events. On the other hand, 56 out of 76 urban climate change mitigation plans (i.e. Sustainable Energy Action Plans) are being developed in the framework of the Covenant of Mayors, which is a transnational network of local governments created by the European Union (EU) in 2012. The results obtained on the mitigation side point out that, in absence of a national law that imposes Italian cities to develop LCPs, transnational networks are an effective boost to voluntary commitment to reach EU climate and energy objectives.

This is a reply to the paper by Miroslav Variny [...]

This paper investigates the energy system of the Basilicata region (southern Italy) to highlight, through a scenario analysis, its possible future development in compliance with the European Commission's long-term vision. The IEA-ETSAP methodology was utilized to model and analyse the Basilicata energy system in a business-as-usual scenario, based on the assumptions of the 2010 Regional Energy and Environmental Policy Plan, and in two low-carbon scenarios, decarbonisation and high energy efficiency, which, in line with the long-term European strategy, foresee an 85% carbon dioxide emission reduction and a 20% energy efficiency increase in 2050. The results highlight that electricity production from renewable energy sources (in particular wind energy), strongly supported by the regional policy, goes beyond the Basilicata Regional Energy-Environmental Plan forecast, with a further increase in the decarbonisation scenarios. In addition, solar thermal and highly efficient technologies are adopted in commercial and residential end-use sectors. An additional 9% reduction in energy consumption is achieved in the high energy efficiency scenario by passive houses. The proposed approach shows the usefulness of a modelling framework typically used for national and supranational analyses to support regional authorities in their decision-making process to obtain results in line with the European and national strategies. Application to the Basilicata region shows the usefulness of a consolidated framework for policy assessment at a local scale to assess regional contribution to the achievement of national climate mitigation targets that tend towards climate neutrality.

Cities across the globe recognise their role in climate mitigation and are acting to reduce carbon emissions. Knowing whether cities set ambitious climate and energy targets is critical for determining their contribution towards the global 1.5 °C target, partly because it helps to identify areas where further action is necessary. This paper presents a comparative analysis of the mitigation targets of 327 European cities, as declared in their local climate plans. The sample encompasses over 25% of the EU population and includes cities of all sizes across all Member States, plus the UK. The study analyses whether the type of plan, city size, membership of climate networks, and its regional location are associated with different levels of mitigation ambition. Results reveal that 78% of the cities have a GHG emissions reduction target. However, with an average target of 47%, European cities are not on track to reach the Paris Agreement: they need to roughly double their ambitions and efforts. Some cities are ambitious, e.g. 25% of our sample (81) aim to reach carbon neutrality, with the earliest target date being 2020.90% of these cities are members of the Climate Alliance and 75% of the Covenant of Mayors. City size is the strongest predictor for carbon neutrality, whilst climate network(s) membership, combining adaptation and mitigation into a single strategy, and local motivation also play a role. The methods, data, results and analysis of this study can serve as a reference and baseline for tracking climate mitigation ambitions across European and global cities. info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion

The European Union&rsquo, s 2030 climate and energy policy and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development underline the commitment to mitigate climate change and reduce its impacts by supporting sustainable use of resources. This commitment has become stricter in light of the ambitious climate neutrality target set by the European Green Deal for 2050. Water, Energy and Food are the key variables of the &ldquo, Nexus Thinking&rdquo, which face the sustainability challenge with a multi-sectoral approach. The aim of the paper is to show the methodological path toward the implementation of an integrated modeling platform based on the Nexus approach and consolidated energy system analysis methods to represent the agri-food system in a circular economy perspective (from the use of water, energy, biomass, and land to food production). The final aim is to support decision-making connected to climate change mitigation. The IEA-The Integrated MARKAL-EFOM System (TIMES) model generator was used to build up the Basilicata Water, Energy and Food model (TIMES-WEF model), which allows users a comprehensive evaluation of the impacts of climate change on the Basilicata agri-food system in terms of land use, yields and water availability and a critical comparison of these indicators in different scenarios. The paper focuses on the construction of the model&rsquo, s Reference Energy and Material System of the TIMES model, which integrates water and agricultural commodities into the energy framework, and on the results obtained through the calibration of the model &beta, version to statistical data on agricultural activities.

Cities are gaining prominence committing to respond to the threat of climate change, e.g., by developing local climate plans or strategies. However, little is known regarding the approaches and processes of plan development and implementation, or the success and effectiveness of proposed measures. Mainstreaming is regarded as one approach associated with (implementation) success, but the extent of integration of local climate policies and plans in ongoing sectoral and/or development planning is unclear. This paper analyses 885 cities across the 28 European countries to create a first reference baseline on the degree of climate mainstreaming in local climate plans. This will help to compare the benefits of mainstreaming versus dedicated climate plans, looking at policy effectiveness and ultimately delivery of much needed climate change efforts at the city level. All core cities of the European Urban Audit sample were analyzed, and their local climate plans classified as dedicated or mainstreamed in other local policy initiatives. It was found that the degree of mainstreaming is low for mitigation (9% of reviewed cities; 12% of the identified plans) and somewhat higher for adaptation (10% of cities; 29% of plans). In particular horizontal mainstreaming is a major effort for local authorities; an effort that does not necessarily pay off in terms of success of action implementation. This study concludes that climate change issues in local municipalities are best tackled by either, developing a dedicated local climate plan in parallel to a mainstreamed plan or by subsequently developing first the dedicated and later a mainstreaming plan (joint or subsequent “dual track approach”). Cities that currently provide dedicated local climate plans (66% of cities for mitigation; 26% of cities for adaptation) may follow-up with a mainstreaming approach. This promises effective implementation of tangible climate actions as well as subsequent diffusion of climate issues into other local sector policies. The development of only broad sustainability or resilience strategies is seen as critical. We thank the many council representatives that supported the datacollection. Special thanks to Birgit Georgi who helped in setting up this large net work of researchers across the EU-28. We also thank the EU COST Action TU 0902 (ledbyRichardDawson) that established the core research network and the positive engagement and interaction of th emembers of this group. OH is Fellow of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research and was funded by the UK EPSRC LC Transforms: Low Carbon Transitions of Fleet Operations in Metropolitan Sites Project (grant number EP/N010612/1). EKL was supported by the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports, Czechia, within the National Sustainability Program I (NPU I) (grant number LO1415). DG ac-knowledges support by the Ministry of Education, University and Research (MIUR), Italy ("Departments of Excellence" grant L. 232/2016). HO was supported by the Ministry of Education and Research, Estonia (grantnumberIUT34-17). MO acknowledges funding from the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (MINECO), Spain (grant number IJCI-2016-28835). SS acknowledges that CENSE's research is partially funded by the Science Foundation, Portugal (grant number UID/AMB/04085/2019). The paper reflects only the views of the authors. The European Union, the European Environment Agency or other supporting bodies are not liable for any use that may be made of the information that is provided in this manuscript.

In the Mediterranean area most of the public authorities need to enhance their institutional capacity in the field of Energy Efficiency (EE) and use of Renewable Energy Sources (RES) in order to contribute to the Energy Performance of Buildings and the Energy Efficiency Directives, developing solutions suited to various regional contexts. The PrioritEE project, funded by the Interreg MED programme, aims at reinforcing the capacities of public administrations in selecting and implementing eco-friendly and cost-effective energy planning measures. This paper aims to describe the main efforts carried out by local public authorities and professional institutions from five MED countries (Italy, Portugal, Spain, Greece and Croatia) in order to reduce energy consumption and prioritize EE investments in Municipal Public Buildings (MPBs). In particular, it focuses on the methodological framework describing the main components of the proposed toolbox, the main objectives and expected outcomes but also the current achievements and the way forward.

Energy consumption can be significantly reduced by targeting consumers behaviour to achieve sustained energy savings and promote sustainable consumption patterns. In this context, the younger generations are a privileged target group to promote virtuous energy behaviours in the whole community. This paper describes the Schools4energy initiative, a program developed within the Interreg MED PrioritEE project, aimed at increasing energy efficiency in municipal public buildings by raising energy awareness in public schools while demonstrating the effectiveness of pupils’ engagement to promote energy savings through virtuous behaviours. Schools4energy was based on a multifold “learning by doing” methodology implemented in the Living Lab of the Potenza case study. During the 2018/2019 school year, children aged between 3 and 14 belonging to four primary and middle schools owned by the Municipality of Potenza (Southern Italy) were involved in three sets of activities designed to valorise the power of young generation in promoting more conscious behaviours: a competition among schools to reduce energy consumption (School Race) based on the adoption of good energy practices based on a common Energy Charter, an artistic competition among students to support creative thinking (Art4energy) and gamification as an alternative method to learn about energy (Play4energy). The consumptions of natural gas and electricity were monitored from August 2018 to April 2019 to highlight the effects of the adoption of Energy Charter in terms of energy and money saved. Data analysis highlighted different trends among the participating schools, underlining their different commitment and the infrastructural barriers. Despite the harsher winter, an average decrease of 4% in natural gas consumption was observed in the school in which energy saving measures complemented technical interventions and a limited increase in electricity consumption (between 0.5% and 4.3% per capita), which led to savings on the energy bill of about 1122 Euro. The enthusiastic participation of the children highlighted the great potential of educational programmes in driving a steady change of mentality in the society.

Making public buildings smarter and more energy efficient requires tailored solutions to overcome the barriers in implementing suitable technology options in a large variety of building types. The PrioritEE project aimed to strengthen the policy-making and strategic planning competencies of local and regional public authorities in the energy management of Municipal Public Buildings, gaining experience in five local pilots in the Mediterranean area. This paper focuses on the PrioritEE toolbox, describing both the “soft components” and the technical components. These components are widely applicable and replicable in all European cities for supporting local administrations in improving energy efficiency and the use of renewable energy sources in municipal public buildings. The Energy Technologies and Building Retrofit Database is a technology repository of energy efficiency measures and renewable energy technologies, providing the main reference data on costs, technical performance and lifetime. With the Decision Support Tool users can assess current building stock energy performance, evaluate different efficiency and renewable interventions, and compare, rank, and prioritize technical options through a set of key performance indicators. A sample of the results to date in the five partner regions are also presented, comparing the main individual characteristics in order to derive replicable solutions for local authorities. This project also highlighted how crucial stakeholder involvement is for tool improvement, capacity building and enabling knowledge transfer. info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion

Translating resource efficiency into practical European, national and local policy frameworks which integrate the various economic, social and environmental components passes through short to long term visions, strategies as well as measurable targets. The RE-SEEties project was funded by the South East Europe programme in order to contribute to the resource efficiency challenge. The project investigated on energy consumption and waste production and disposal; potential changes in consumption patterns and how policy making alternatives may support the achievement of resource efficiency targets. This paper aims to present the main results of this unique international cooperative experience carried out by research centres and municipalities in the South East Europe area. First, the paper focuses on the methodological toolkit and criteria for assessment which aims to support municipalities in creating a sustainable and resource efficient future through coherent and appropriate planning practices. Second, the paper discusses the main results obtained and lessons learned on a wide range of interrelated issues covering the policymaking process, financing of local resource-efficiency investments, good practices, tools to support decision-making and assessment methodologies. It also covers behavioural change and how policy can stimulate public authorities, companies and citizens to become more sustainable.

The European Union 2050 climate neutrality goal and the climate crisis require coordinated efforts to reduce energy consumption in all sectors, and mainly in buildings greatly affected by the increasing temperature, with relevant CO2 emissions due to inefficient end-use technologies. Moreover, the old building stock of most countries requires suited policies to support renovation programs aimed at improving energy performances and optimize energy uses. A toolbox was developed in the framework of the PrioritEE project to provide policy makers and technicians with a wide set of tools to support energy efficiency in Municipal Public Buildings. The toolbox, available for free, was tested in the partners&rsquo, communities, proving its effectiveness. The paper illustrates its application to the Potenza Municipality case study in which the online calculator DSTool (the core instrument of the toolbox) was utilized to select and prioritize the energy efficiency interventions in public buildings implementable in a three-year action plan in terms of costs, energy savings, CO2 emissions&rsquo, reduction and return on investments. The results highlight that improvements in the building envelopes (walls and roofs), heating and lighting and photovoltaic systems allow reducing CO2 emission approximately 644 t/year and saving about 2050 MWh/year with a total three-year investment of 1,728,823 EUR.

Building a climate-ready adaptation society is an urgent question that cannot be postponed. Along the path towards an increase in climate resilience, a stimulating role is played by EU projects as well as by international climate networks such as the Covenant of Mayors Initiative on Climate Change Adaptation (Mayors Adapt), launched in 2014, and the new Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy which “pledge to reduce CO2 emissions by at least 40% by 2030 and to adopt an integrated approach to tackling mitigation and adaptation to climate change”. These initiatives stimulate engagement and networking among cities and raise public awareness encouraging policy makers to take action to adapt to climate change. Adaptation operates at different spatial and societal scales. Accordingly, the development of climate change adaptation strategies requires a holistic and multi-perspective approach with scale-specific studies. This paper provides an overview of adaptation initiatives undertaken in 11 South East European countries participating in the SEE OrientGate project, with reference to the policies and measures promoted by the EU and implemented at national level. In particular, a cross-sectoral policy analysis is performed and an inclusive representation of measures and policies undertaken by countries with an interdisciplinary approach is provided. The analysis of the country measures reveals that unless national governments and local communities are concerned with the impacts of climate change only few of the countries included in the analysis have developed a comprehensive National Adaptation Strategy and a National Action Plans. Nevertheless, almost all the countries have undertaken adaptation actions across sectors. Although these actions have only partially generated a full commitment towards climate adaptation, they attest an increasing awareness as well as a high involvement of national and local authorities that will boost cooperation among stakeholders to find out innovative solutions to strengthen society and protect the environment.

The Paris Agreement aims to limit global mean temperature rise this century to well below 2 °C above pre-industrial levels. This target has wide-ranging implications for Europe and its cities, which are the source of substantial greenhouse gas emissions. This paper reports the state of local planning for climate change by collecting and analysing information about local climate mitigation and adaptation plans across 885 urban areas of the EU-28. A typology and framework for analysis was developed that classifies local climate plans in terms of their alignment with spatial (local, national and international) and other climate related policies. Out of eight types of local climate plans identified in total we document three types of stand-alone local climate plans classified as type A1 (autonomously produced plans), A2 (plans produced to comply with national regulations) or A3 (plans developed for international climate networks). There is wide variation among countries in the prevalence of local climate plans, with generally more plans developed by central and northern European cities. Approximately 66% of EU cities have a type A1, A2, or A3 mitigation plan, 26% an adaptation plan, and 17% a joint adaptation and mitigation plan, while about 33% lack any form of stand-alone local climate plan (i.e. what we classify as A1, A2, A3 plans). Mitigation plans are more numerous than adaptation plans, but planning for mitigation does not always precede planning for adaptation. Our analysis reveals that city size, national legislation, and international networks can influence the development of local climate plans. We found that size does matter as about 80% of the cities with above 500,000 inhabitants have a comprehensive and stand-alone mitigation and/or an adaptation plan (A1). Cities in four countries with national climate legislation (A2), i.e. Denmark, France, Slovakia and the United Kingdom, are nearly twice as likely to produce local mitigation plans, and five times more likely to produce local adaptation plans, compared to cities in countries without such legislation. A1 and A2 mitigation plans are particularly numerous in Denmark, Poland, Germany, and Finland; while A1 and A2 adaptation plans are prevalent in Denmark, Finland, UK and France. The integration of adaptation and mitigation is country-specific and can mainly be observed in two countries where local climate plans are compulsory, i.e. France and the UK. Finally, local climate plans produced for international climate networks (A3) are mostly found in the many countries where autonomous (type A1) plans are less common. This is the most comprehensive analysis of local climate planning to date. The findings are of international importance as they will inform and support decision-making towards climate planning and policy development at national, EU and global level being based on the most comprehensive and up-to-date knowledge of local climate planning available to date. EU COST Action TU0902 that made the initial work possible and the positive engagement and interaction of the members of this group which led to this work. MO acknowledges funding from the Spanish Government (Grant no. FPDI-2013-16631). EKL was supported by the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports of CR within the National Sustainability Program I (NPU I), grant number LO1415. OH and RD were funded by the EC project RAMSES Reconciling Adaptation, Mitigation and Sustainable Development for Cities (contract Ref 308497) and the EPSRC project LC Transforms: Low Carbon Transitions of Fleet Operations in Metropolitan Sites Project (EP/N010612/1).

A Smart City is a place in which innovative technologies and ICT-based solutions coexist with an active citizen participation in order to tackle effectively major challenges in urban development. This paper aims at contributing to the discussion on how the use of technologies can foster an active engagement of citizens, discussing the example of a Social Urban Network developed for the town of Matera (SUN4Matera), that has been awarded European Capital of Culture 2019. The SUN4Matera has been developed within the "Smart Basilicata" R&I Project, on the basis of a prototype designed for L'Aquila town (Annunziato and Pede 2012), aimed at producing integrated information for the valorization of community knowledge assets and facilitating the sharing of new ideas. The proposed approach is based on an in-depth analysis of the local community, considering citizen feedback since the design phase. To this end, an innovative methodology based on an argumentative and participative approach was adopted supported by structured interviews with citizens, stakeholders and tourists (in January 2014) by a multidisciplinary staff to identify a core set of priorities and sustainable behaviours. These informal interviews overcome the limits of traditional research and socio-anthropology reportages, experimenting a multitasking approach to collect deep needs, wishes, creative ideas and enhancing individual freedom and capacities. Based on the priorities identified by the survey, the SUN4Matera will contribute to people empowerment by facilitating the exchange of tangible/intangible assets and services, fostering initiatives to support socially vulnerable groups, and implementing multilayer interactive areas and interactive tools for tourists and citizens.

The role of cities and their commitment to meet the European targets on energy and climate has steadily increased in the latest years as testified by the large number of ambitious initiatives undertaken by European cities to face multiple challenges towards sustainability. Many projects and initiatives have arisen all around Europe to support cities in the achievement of the Europe 2020 targets of smart, sustainable and inclusive growth. RE-SEEties “Towards resource-efficient urban communities in SEE” is one of the projects funded under the South East Europe program aimed to enhance the policy-making and strategic planning competences of municipalities in the field of energy efficiency, renewable energy sources and waste valorization. This paper focuses on the methods developed and the main results achieved in the framework of RE-SEEties. The main focus is on the eight partner cities (The Local Government of Budapest District 18 – Hungary/HU, Municipality of Aigaleo – Greece/EL, Municipality of Potenza – Italy/IT, City of Nitra – Slovakia/SK, City of Skopje – Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia/FYROM, City of Miercurea Ciuc – Romania/RO, Municipality of Ptuj – Slovenia/SI, City of Ivanic-Grad – Croatia/HR) and how they were assisted by professional institutions in translating their commitments towards resource efficiency into Local Strategies and Action Plans. A critical comparison of these final results points out differences and similarities in the state-of-the-art of cities across South East Europe as well as a the level of ambition and difficulties faced to turn into resource efficient urban communities.

International audience; Globally, efforts are underway to reduce anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions and to adapt to climate change impacts at the local level. However, there is a poor understanding of the relationship between city strategies on climate change mitigation and adaptation and the relevant policies at national and European level. This paper describes a comparative study and evaluation of cross-national policy. It reports the findings of studying the climate change strategies or plans from 200 European cities from Austria, Belgium, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Spain and the United Kingdom. The study highlights the shared responsibility of global, European, national, regional and city policies. An interpretation and illustration of the influences from international and national networks and policy makers in stimulating the development of local strategies and actions is proposed. It was found that there is no archetypical way of planning for climate change, and multiple interests and motivations are inevitable. Our research warrants the need for a multi-scale approach to climate policy in the future, mainly ensuring sufficient capacity and resource to enable local authorities to plan and respond to their specific climate change agenda for maximising the management potentials for translating environmental challenges into opportunities. © 2015 Elsevier Ltd.

In order to create in Europe a greener and low-carbon economy, based on a more effective use of resources, coordinated actions between local and regional governances must be carried out according to a bottom-up, cross-level approach. In this framework energy efficiency and the promotion of renewable energy sources are two key aspects for reducing emissions, improving the security of energy supply and competitiveness as well as making energy more accessible for consumers. In recent years, feed-in tariffs and other incentives have boosted in some European countries, including Italy, the distributed generation of electricity from renewable sources requiring a reorganisation of current electric power systems from passive to active networks where "prosumers" can play a key role in balancing the electricity system (smart grids). Microgrids can be considered as the "building blocks of smart grids" which utilise local load and local microsource generation, providing a large variety of economic, technical, environmental and social benefits to different stakeholders in terms of flexibility of ownership constitution, global optimisation of power system efficiency and motivation of end-consumers (Schwaegerland Tao 2014). This paper presents the results of an ongoing research concerning a comprehensive assessment of benefits and costs that microgrids development can provide at local/regional scale. First, the role of smart grids and microgrids is discussed with reference to the latest normative regulations and scientific findings. Second, we introduce a local case study (City of Potenza, Basilicata region, Southern Italy) which has been recently under the focus of a feasibility study focusing on microgrids. Finally, the main costs and benefits (economic and environmental) associated with the proposed intervention are evaluated, discussing about their replicability in other territorial contexts and providing some lessons learnt and final conclusions.

This paper deals with an experience of cooperative research carried out in the context of EU Sixth Framework Programme’s Integrated Project New Energy Externalities Developments for Sustainability (NEEDS, 2004–2008), and in particular in the research stream 2a ‘Modelling internalisation strategies including scenario building’, co-ordinated by the IMAA, CNR. The main objective of this work is to analyse scenarios with generated partial equilibrium technology rich energy models of 29 countries (EU-25 States plus Iceland, Norway, Romania, Switzerland), integrated into a Pan-European model, capable of analysing the impacts of different policies and price mechanisms, and also evaluating them at technology level both at the country level and from an EU-wide perspective. All these models are characterised by a multi-period structure (base-year: 2000, last milestone year: 2050) and will include, in the Pan-European model, the most important life-cycle emissions, materials, and costs analysed by other NEEDS research streams (life cycle assessment and ExternE). This paper describes the current status of the work carried out in research stream 2a, including the basic methodological assumptions and scenario generation.

The evidence of relationships between climate change induced by greenhouse gases of anthropogenic origin, and energy-economic issues (inappropriate use of fossil fuels and technologies, uncertainty in fuels price and demand trends, etc.) asks for the adoption of a holistic approach in order to re-orient the anthropogenic activities’ system towards a configuration that harmonizes environmental protection, economic growth and security of energy supply. In this framework, energy system sustainability represents one of the major challenge the EU is facing and its implementation passes through a path of coordinate actions carried out by local governments in which objectives of sustainable development become integral part of strategic programming. The aim of this research is to provide local administrations with an analytical support tool to guide key strategic decisions in energy and climate planning on the medium-long term, assessing the possible role of local energy systems in the achievement of sustainable objectives at national/European scale. This paper focuses on the implementation of a partial equilibrium TIMES-generated model in a real case study, the regional energy system of Basilicata region (Southern Italy). First, it describes the adopted methodology. Second, it is provided a step-by-step description and characterisation of the reference energy system and the model’s data input which represents the first step for an in-depth knowledge of the present energy system on which to build effective and sustainable local energy and climate plans.

Interregional cooperation is fundamental to improve the effectiveness of local sustainable energy policies, as a response to overarching EU strategies and commitments. The RENERGY and RE-SEEties projects represent valuable international cooperative experiences, which have proved that the transfer of knowledge among scientific institutions and local authorities, can support a real synergy among politicians, businesses and citizens and the achievement of the main Covenant of Mayors targets. Both the projects produced a methodological toolkit aimed at supporting local authorities in creating a sustainable and resource efficient future giving rise to local implementation plans ready to be endorsed. The RENERGY project, aimed at developing efficient energy policies at regional level in an inclusive, integrative approach, focused on the transformation of urban communities from consumers to producers of energy. The RENERGY toolkit had the purpose to provide local authorities with a roadmap to develop their Local Implementation Plan (LIP). The methodology was tested by 11 partners' countries giving an innovative and positive approach to local energy policy whereas good practice exchanges, Energy Labs and Case Studies contributed to the transfer of knowledge and to increase local communities awareness. The RE-SEEties project was aimed at contributing to the resource efficiency challenge by investigating on energy consumption and waste production and disposal, examining the role of potential changes in consumption patterns and policy making alternatives to support the achievement of resource efficiency targets. A comprehensive approach to energy and waste flows at urban level was thus adopted in order to reduce the overall carbon footprint of cities. A step by step methodology was devised to approach jointly energy and waste issues, whereas structured initiatives were promoted to support a change of behaviour and a tight cooperation between municipal officers working on different themes. The interest aroused within and beyond the involved communities as well as the important results achieved in these two projects testify the importance of a proactive engagement of local governments and communities on energy and climate themes as well as the necessity of adopting a long-term comprehensive approach to ensure a socially inclusive growth and a steady transition towards a low-carbon society.

This study aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of the MARKAL comprehensive model in the development of coherent medium-term strategies and sound climate protection policies at local level. The local case study (Val d’Agri, Basilicata region, Italy) discusses the possible role of local communities in the achievement of the national objectives derived by the Kyoto Protocol, investigating the traditional sectors responsible for air pollution and providing a full picture of the main energy and material flows. A scenario by scenario analysis was performed to analyse the response of the modelled system to the introduction of an exogenous constraint on carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. The main effects are presented with reference to fuel mix, technology choice, real market prices and reduced costs of competing options. The comparison of the solutions obtained for the different scenarios is useful to point out the effects of the CO2 constraint on the total system cost and on the emission levels of other atmospheric pollutants. A further multiobjective optimisation was performed to analyse the effects of combined environmental constraints (CO2 and particulate) on the overall system cost as well as in terms of marginal costs.

The MARKAL models generator was utilised to build up a comprehensive model of the anthropogenic activities system which points out the linkages between productive processes and waste disposal technologies. The aim of such a study is to determine the optimal configuration of the waste management system for the Basilicata region (Southern Italy), in order to support the definition of the regional waste management plan in compliance with the Italian laws, A sensitivity analysis was performed to evaluate the influence of landfilling fees on the choice of waste processing technologies, in order to foster waste management strategies which are environmentally sustainable, economically affordable and highly efficient. The results show the key role of separate collection and mechanical pre-treatments in the achievement of the legislative targets.

Supporting cities’ efforts towards a highly efficient and sustainable resourceefficient future requires a detailed description of the present energy and waste management systems and a comprehensive evaluation of alternative pathways. The development of a reliable baseline is also a prerequisite for the application of efficient forecasting methodologies. Starting from a careful examination of data, methods and tools currently used by municipalities in their planning activities, an extensive research was carried out on internationally recognized methods and tools to support decision-making on local energy planning and waste management. This research was carried out in the framework of the on-going RE-SEEties project “Towards resource-efficient urban communities in SEE” funded by the South East Europe programme. First, this paper focuses on the integrated toolkit, which is a key component of the overall RE-SEEties methodology. Second, some exemplifying results obtained in two partner cities are discussed in terms of energy forecasting and quantification of the ecological footprint of the waste management system.

Cities are widely recognised as being pivotal to fight climate change. They magnify the drivers of climate change, experience the impacts and also concentrate the highest room for action. Although urban areas are broadly claimed to be climate leaders, there is no archetype of right actions given the highly contextual differences among them. Yet, the how and why cities respond to global environmental challenges in the context of increasingly competitive economies needs further research. In this paper we aim at advancing in this regard by assessing the state of the art on urban climate actions in two European Mediterranean Countries: Spain and Italy that face similar climate change challenges. Based on an extensive review of documents, we analyse mitigation and adaptation plans of 26 Spanish and 32 Italian Urban Audit cities, as representative samples. Our results show relevant differences between Spanish and Italian cities in terms of the starting time of their climate actions as well their implementation. We concur with existing literature in that mitigation is more advanced than adaptation actions and take evidence in both countries and we also demonstrate that international and national networking initiatives are being instrumental in engaging cities in climate action.

Cities are widely recognised as being pivotal to fight climate change. Cities magnify the drivers of climate change, experience the impacts and also concentrate the highest room for action. Given the 70% of the global emissions that cities are responsible for, national governments are unable to meet their international commitments for addressing mitigation and adaptation without the action and cooperation of cities. In turn, the capacity of local governments to address climate change is largely determined by the institutional architecture within which they are integrated. As a result, the relationship between the different arenas of authority and the integration of cities in national and international networks is considered critical in shaping the global capacity to govern climate change. This work aims to understand how multi-level climate governance and alliances of cities (national and international) are influencing the climate change capacity and performance of municipalities. This has been done by focusing on two national contexts of the European Union, Italy and Spain, in which climate policy, multi-level governance frameworks, the effects of the national and international networks of cities, and the climate response of cities are analysed through an extensive review of scientific and grey literature, and institutional documents. The results concur with existing literature on the importance of constructing collaborative multi-level climate frameworks at the national scale, that fully integrate the local level, in order to support cities to develop consistent climate action and raise awareness of the responsibility they have in this policy field.

Air pollution is one of the most pressing environmental problems which affects likewise urban, industrial and rural areas. Environmental planners, regulators and decision makers need reliable, scientifically based tools to find out strategies for controlling air pollution in a cost-effective way, taking into account the whole productive system. In this framework the basic elements of energyenvironmental planning have to be extended to include also waste processing technologies amongst the usually considered pollution sources. Bottom-up optimizing models, based on linear programming techniques and customized for specific cases, represent a powerful tool in energy-environmental management. This paper focuses on the integrated modeling of material flows and energy system performed on a local scale case study (Basilicata Region, Southern Italy) using the linear programming model IEA-MARKAL. We have evaluated the feasibility of the model in representing the waste management system to estimate the environmental impact of the waste processing technologies in the context of the whole productive system. A sensitivity analysis has been carried out to emphasize the connections between tariffs, waste disposal technologies assessment and atmospheric emissions.

This presentation will focus on a coordinated project aimed to promote smartness among local areas in a small region in Southern Italy (Basilicata). The "SMART Basilicata" project constitutes a unique attempt in which, by working together, multi-layer public authorities, private enterprises, research organizations and universities drafted the basis for a regional strategy for smart-related issues. The project is structured around five main operating objectives (Smart Environment, Smart Energy, Smart Mobility, Smart Culture & Tourism, Smart Participation) which are smartly integrated in a systematic approach towards a more sustainable configuration of the regional widespread "town". All the research activities converge into four "demonstrators" located in different areas of Basilicata (SMART_ENV: Val d'Agri/Basilicata, SMART_BIOFUEL: Val d'Agri, SMART_STREET: Potenza, sMArTERA: Matera) which aims to constitute reference models for territorial development fostering the participation of multiple stakeholders from the public sector, civil society, and the private sector. The local areas involved in this study are characterized by different dimensions, cultural identities, vocation and peculiarities whereas the replicability of the proposed solutions makes SMART Basilicata a "smart" attempt to draw a common innovation strategy on the medium/long term with a regional perspective.

Climate change adaptation and mitigation are two complementary features that should be tackled comprehensively exploiting their interrelationships and synergies to reduce climate change risk and its impacts on natural and human systems and regions. In last decades climate change challenge became a priority for EU policy [1] that promulgated an exhaustive legislation to be taken in by national and local governments in suited plans aimed at enhancing ecosystems' resilience and improving energy systems performances. In particular, the "EU Energy roadmap 2050" [2] set tight greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets (- 80-95% by 2050 respect to 1990 levels) to be achieved by developed countries as a group whereas the "Strategy on Adaptation to Climate Change" [3] provides comprehensive guidelines to develop, implement and review adaptation strategies, identifying barriers to the uptake of suitable strategies at national level. This study, carried out in the framework of the ongoing South East Europe "OrientGate project" [4], concerns the collection and critical review of the existing policy framework as well as mitigation and adaptation strategies, measures and plans in the 13 partners' countries (Albania, Austria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Montenegro, Romania, Serbia, The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia and Ukraine). The overall aim is to characterise the mitigation and adaptation policy background coordinating climate change adaptation efforts in SEE countries and identifying transferable best practices among partners as well as to strengthen the relationship among regions with different features and needs to boost the transfer of knowledge.

As well known, pollutants emissions released by energy-related activities are transported in the atmosphere causing health and environmental damages. These external damages are responsible of indirect costs for the society that usually are not taken into account in the commodities' prices. In recent years the scientific community deployed many efforts to assess energy externalities, as well as to give guidance for supporting the design of internalisation measures. The ExternE methodology, developed under a EU-funded ExternE project series, represents the main reference to estimate the external costs of energy technologies, providing generalised values (Euro/ton of emission) per country for the most important pollutants. A subsequent fundamental step is to integrate the external costs into a partial equilibrium model to individuate sustainable development patterns that reduce the overall environmental damages of human activities and take into account these energy-related hidden costs. The IEA-ETSAP makes available a sound modelling framework to combine into an unique platform the economic, environmental and energy-technology data in order to better understand the behaviour of energy systems, to plan their optimal development over a medium-long term horizon, and thus to provide direct, usable inputs to the formulation and evaluation of energy policies in the overall framework of sustainability. In particular, the TIMES models' generator allows developing flexible and detailed energy-technology- models on different spatial scales to perform an in-depth characterisation of the analysed energy system, from demand to supply side, and to explore contrasting scenarios representing the potential development of the energy panorama over the time horizon according to the take up of different policy measures (resources and technology availability, pollutant emissions reduction, renewable share, etc.). The integration of externalities into this modelling framework set up thus an innovative tool to support policy-oriented multidisciplinary investigations, aimed at achieving a sustainable resource management notably taking account of the economic, environmental and social dimensions of energy policies. Selected scenario results concerning the NEEDSItaly model will be presented to illustrate the expected role of different energy sources and energy related-externalities in the definition of air quality policies.

Sustainability of energy systems is a common priority that involves key issues such as security of energy supply, mitigation of environmental impacts - the energy sector is currently responsible for 80% of all EU greenhouse gas emissions (European Environment Agency, 2007), contributing heavily to the overall emissions of local air pollutants - and energy affordability. In this framework, energy planning and decision making processes can be supported at different stages and spatial scales (regional, national, pan-European, etc.) by the use of comprehensive models in order to manage the large complexity of energy systems and to define multi-objective strategies on the medium-long term. This Chapter is aimed to outline the value of model-based decision support systems in addressing current challenges aimed to carry out sustainable energy systems and to diffuse the use of strategic energy-environmental planning methods based on the use of partial equilibrium models. The proposed methodology, aimed to derive cost-effective strategies for a sustainable resource management, is based on the experiences gathered in the framework of the IEA-ETSAP program and under several national and international projects.

This work is aimed to illustrate the potentiality of the multi-region NEEDS-TIMES modelling platform, in the economic evaluation of the environmental damages due to air pollution. In particular the effects of external costs on the least-cost optimised energy system configuration were analysed in a national case study with the NEEDS-TIMES Italy model, considering the externalities related to local and global air pollutants (NOx, SO2, VOC, particulates and GHGs). Different scenarios were compared to emphasise the role of external costs in the achievement of strategic environmental targets. The main results obtained are discussed, focusing on the changes in energy fuel mix as well as in local air pollutants and GHG emissions, highlighting the main conclusions in terms of policy strategies.

The implementation of resource management strategies aimed at reducing the impacts of the anthropogenic activities system requires a comprehensive approach to evaluate on the whole the environmental burdens of productive processes and to identify the best recovery strategies from both an environmental and an economic point of view. In this framework, an analytical methodology based on the integration of Life Cycle Assessment (LCA), ExternE and Comprehensive Analysis was developed to perform an in-depth investigation of energy systems. The LCA methodology, largely utilised by the international scientific community for the assessment of the environmental performances of technologies, combined with Comprehensive Analysis allows modelling the overall system of anthropogenic activities, as well as sub-systems, the economic consequences of the whole set of environmental damages. Moreover, internalising external costs into partial equilibrium models, as those utilised by Comprehensive Analysis, can be useful to identify the best paths for implementing technology innovation and strategies aimed to a more sustainable energy supply and use. This paper presents an integrated application of these three methodologies to a local scale case study (the Val D’Agri area in Basilicata, Southern Italy), aimed to better characterise the environmental impacts of the energy system, with particular reference to extraction activities. The innovative methodological approach utilised takes advantage from the strength points of each methodology with an added value coming from their integration as emphasised by the main results obtained by the scenario analysis.

Sustainability of energy systems has a strategic role in the current energy-environmental policies as it involves key issues such as security of energy supply, mitigation of environmental impact (with special regard to air quality improvement) and energy affordability. In this framework modelling activities are more than ever a strategic issue in order to manage the large complexity of energy systems as well as to support the decision-making process at different stages and spatial scales (regional, national, Pan-European, etc.). The aim of this article is to present a new model for the Italian energy system implemented with a common effort in the framework of an integrated project under the Sixth Framework Programme. In particular, the main features of the common methodology are briefly recalled and the modelling structure, the main data and assumptions, sector by sector, are presented. Moreover the main results obtained for the baseline (BAU) scenario are fully described.

The relationships between anthropogenic activities and the environment require a careful analysis of economic and technological implication of energy-climate policies, to redirect the energy systems towards a sustainable configuration. This implies the implementation of innovative decisional tools for policy assessment to support the policy makers in the definition of effective energy-environmental strategies, coherent at different spatial scales. In this framework partial equilibrium models as the TIMES models generator, developed under the IEA-ETSAP Programme, represent a powerful tool to analyse global, national and local issues and to support the formulation of comprehensive policies. These tools are utilized in the framework of the Integrated Project NEEDS of the VI Framework Programme to implement a unique modelling platform, the Pan European NEEDS TIMES model, based on the integration of the energy system models of 30 EU countries, which are linked by energy and emissions trades. This paper is aimed to describe the NEEDS TIMES methodological approach in the Slovenia case study, providing a full picture of the actual national energy system and discussing the model indications for its development on a 50-year time horizon, based on a least-cost approach in an unconstrained (Business As Usual - BAU) scenario.

This paper deals with an experience of cooperative research carried out in the context of the EU Sixth Framework Program's Integrated Project NEEDS (2004-2008), and in particular in the research stream 2a "Modelling internalisation strategies including scenario building", co-ordinated by the IMAA - CNR. The main objective of this work is to analyse scenarios with generated partial equilibrium technology rich energy models of 29 countries (EU-25 States plus Iceland, Norway, Romania, Switzerland), integrated into a Pan-European model, capable of analysing the impacts of different policies and price mechanisms, evaluating them also at a technology level both at the country level and from an EU wide perspective. All these models, characterised by a multi-period structure (base-year: 2000, last milestone year: 2050), will include the most important life-cycle emissions, materials, and costs analysed by other NEEDS research streams (LCA and ExternE). This paper describes the current status of the work carried out in the Research Stream 2a, including the basic methodological assumptions.

This paper provides the preliminary results of a project for the monitoring of the urban and sub-urban areas of Potenza and Matera towns (in Southern Italy). This study is aimed to individuate the activities causing the most serious environmental impacts and to draw the guidelines for setting up a dynamic and efficient monitoring to control the state of the environment (air, soil and water). The main purpose of this study is the socio-economic and environmental characterisation of the Potenza industrial district, consisting of Commercial sector, and Mechanical and Iron & Steel industries, in order to individuate the most important environmental and anthropogenic parameters, integrating and interfacing them to the territory. In such a context a characterization of productive activities was carried out, estimating their energy consumption and the related emissions.

Approaching the national Kyoto Protocol (KP) targets involves a re-definition of the actual configuration of local energy systems. This study deals with a local scale application of the IEA-MARKAL models generator, in which the anthropogenic system of Basilicata Region (Southern Italy) is investigated to support the definition of coherent long-term strategies and sound climate protection policies. A scenario by scenario analysis points out the behaviour of the optimal mix of fuels and technologies in the presence of carbon dioxide emissions constraints. Trade off curves and reduced costs analyses outline the most effective actions for contributing to the national KP targets, with particular emphasis on the interventions in Civil (Residential, Commercial & Services) and waste management sectors.

Renewable sources represent an effective alternative to fossil fuels for preventing resources depletion and for reducing air pollution. However, their diffusion requires huge capital investment and major infrastructure changes, which have to be assessed to verify their effectiveness. The article present an application of the R-MARKAL model to investigate the feasibility of renewable use on a local case study for electricity and thermal energy production. A comprehensive modelling approach is used to emphasise the relationships and feedback between conversion and demand sectors (residential, services and commercial), taking into account contemporaneously legal issues and physical limits of the system. The model's solutions represent the minimum cost choice and the results show that even in absence of exogenous environmental constraints, many renewable technologies are profitable demand device and their investment costs are paid off in a medium term by lower operating and maintenance expenditures. In this context the use of thermal energy from incinerator allows one to achieve a consistent reduction of atmospheric pollutant emissions and, particularly, of greenhouse gases emissions due to waste degradation. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.