PAVE: Pathways to Wider Adoption of Local Energy Systems through Practical Collaboration and Governance Models

PAVE will enhance the scalability, credibility, and investability of local energy systems, supporting more coordinated pathways toward climate-neutral urban transformation in Europe. It will achieve this by systematically learning from existing pilots, co-designing governance and collaboration models with key stakeholders, testing these models in selected municipal contexts, and translating the results into actionable guidance for wider adoption.

We are developing practical collaboration and governance models for local energy systems — tested in 3–5 real municipal contexts across Europe, with banks and financial institutions embedded in the design process from the start. The project produces a transferable replication toolkit that any municipality can use to move from pilot to implementation without external research support.
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Challenge:** Local energy systems are widely recognised as important for climate-neutral cities, but most initiatives remain at pilot stage due to fragmented governance, weak coordination, limited investment readiness, and insufficient implementation capacity.

Project response: The project will develop practical collaboration and governance models that help municipalities and other local actors move from promising pilots to wider adoption.

Approach: The work follows a four-step logic:

·       learn from existing pilots

·       co-design models with key actors,

·       test them in selected municipal contexts,

·       and translate results into guidance for wider use.

Distinctiveness: A central innovation is the early involvement of banks, financial institutions, and investors, combined with a strong focus on strengthening municipal capacity for implementation.

Main outputs: The project will deliver tested collaboration and governance models, a financing and bankability guide, a municipal capacity toolkit, and policy-relevant recommendations for replication.

Expected impact: The project will improve the scalability, credibility, and investability of local energy systems and support more coordinated pathways toward climate-neutral urban transformation in Europe.
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