Swedish national Energy Efficiency Support Program for municipalities
Region: Sweden
Implemented on: National level
Target group: Municipalities
Summary:
All Swedish municipalities and county councils participating in the energy efficiency programme for public buildings and transport receive annual financial support within a 5-years-period. A total of SEK 99 million (=about 11 million Euro) per year has been set aside. The Swedish Energy Agency is administrating and implementing the funding instrument; the County Administrative Boards are working as supporting structure on regional level.
Municipalities apply once for the whole period with a simple application form. The amount of funding per municipality is related to the number of inhabitants. After application, municipalities need to set up a baseline energy inventory and have to develop energy efficiency targets and an action plan. Once a year, municipalities have to report both their quantified targets and a yearly energy balance, using an online reporting tool. The Swedish Energy Agency is doing evaluation of the achieved results.
Objectives:
- Increase investments for energy efficiency measures on the regional and local scale;
- Contribute to Swedish and EU climate and sustainable energy targets;
- Support local authorities and County Councils in developing and implementing energy efficiency programs with defined quantitative targets.
Funding/Costs:
Total cost in Euros: approx. 11 mill € per year for 2010-2014
Financing: Public money
Results:
Municipalities are setting quantified targets on the local level and are obliged to measure and quantify their results. No final evaluation is done yet.
Lessons learnt:
- It was difficult to introduce a consistent reporting and evaluation system/tool, but important to link funding to reporting;
- Success factor: 5-year funding for strategically work on energy efficiency, that means: 5 years of continuous work and capacity building on local level;
- Good choice to focus on strategic work on local level, even for small municipalities otherwise lacking capacities for such type of work.
- Success factor: Support by the County Administrative Boards.