HANDS-ON

LIFE-HANDS-ON: Public Sector Learning and Innovation for the Future of Energy

Transition measures to overcome the climate and energy crisis face a major structural challenge. In many cases, the approach to designing them is purely technological, overlooking local adaptation, cultural nuances, and the social fabric surrounding these measures. Consequently, social groups such as women, youth, the elderly, and households suffering from energy poverty are often excluded from climate strategies.

Furthermore, local and regional public authorities lack sufficient capacity to collaborate and work across departments, significantly hindering the design, implementation, and evaluation of effective public climate policies within their territories.

This is how LIFE-HANDS-ON emerged: a project that seeks to develop and implement a durable, participatory public innovation method based on learning-by-doing, designed specifically for public administrations. The ultimate goal is to design effective, cross-sectoral, data-driven public policies aimed, above all, at accelerating a just energy transition.

The application of this method will foster debate, cross-disciplinary learning, consensus, as well as the evaluation and improvement of innovative public policy design and implementation.

This will be achieved by institutionalizing two governance structures:

• Interdepartmental Working Groups within public authorities, allowing different areas (urban planning, social services, legal and financial, environment, culture, etc.) to achieve cross-cutting diagnoses, co-design shared policies, and collaborate on their implementation and evaluation.

• Multi-Actor Energy and Climate Assemblies, bringing together representatives from public administrations, local social, cultural, and economic actors, as well as citizens—including underrepresented groups—to deliberate on energy policies through new participatory approaches.

To accomplish this over the project’s three-year duration, HANDS-ON is structured around five specific objectives:

• Apply multidisciplinary research that combines Social Sciences and Humanities with a scientific and technological approach. This will help understand the current state of local public policies and identify where training should focus for both pilot city authorities and their replicators. This approach also seeks to strengthen multi-actor relationships and understand the social perceptions of groups furthest from the climate transition.

• Practically develop the capacities of technicians and politicians within the interdepartmental working groups, providing training in dynamic skills to collaborate, understand diverse issues, find innovative solutions, and guide the direction of the multi-actor assemblies.

• Foster the participation and collaboration of multiple departments. Hands-On aims to leverage the joint influence of public institutions, citizens, social groups, and private entities through these assemblies. The goal is to empower these groups to address complex issues and formulate transformative public policies that promote climate change adaptation from a social justice perspective.

• Demonstrate the impact in pilot cities. This involves testing this cross-cutting, multi-actor methodology (the ‘learning by doing’ approach) in three cities with diverse problems and contexts (Parla in Spain, Vidin in Bulgaria, and Copenhague in Denmark), applying participatory methodologies for monitoring and evaluation.

• Drive the dissemination and replication of project results. One of Hands-on’s goals is to apply the capacities acquired and the new governance models from the pilot cities to spread the project’s methodology and tools, replicating them in more than 35 municipalities across Europe.

What will be the most relevant results?

The project’s actions are designed to leave an organizational legacy and useful tools that accelerate change:

• Creation of intermediate-level governance spaces: Interdepartmental working groups and multi-actor energy and climate assemblies will be launched, connecting institutional, economic, educational, social, and media representatives. These new governance spaces will strengthen the capacities and working methods of the participating local agents.

• Development of the LIFE-HANDS-ON Toolkit: A set of more than 20 practical tools will be created to engage participants, stimulate debate, facilitate agreements, raise public awareness, and evaluate the impact of the processes.

• Co-creation and implementation of local policies: Concrete strategic plans with allocated budgets will be developed in the pilot cities. In Parla, a Community Energy Action Plan and a Sociocultural Change Plan will be co-designed; in Vidin, a Cross-Sectoral Energy Plan and a governance model for SMEs and energy communities; and in Copenhagen, a neighborhood-scale District Heating Plan.

• Energy and climate justice framework: A framework will be developed to ensure inclusion, recognition, and equity in decision-making, accompanied by continuous evaluation to measure progress and correct potential deviations.

• Replicability through peer-to-peer learning: The solutions, tools, and innovations developed will be transferred through training to more than 35 European municipalities in Spain, Italy, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Denmark, and the Netherlands. These municipalities will be grouped according to their needs to ensure tailored and effective support.

Meet the international and multidisciplinary LIFE-HANDS-ON team

• TRAZA TERRITORIO, S.L.L. (Spain)

• TECHNISCHE UNIVERSITEIT DELFT (Netherlands)

• SOFIA ENERGY AGENCY ASSOCIATION (Bulgaria)

• KOBENHAVNS KOMMUNE (Denmark)

• R2M SOLUTION SPAIN SL (Spain)

• Collective Futures (Denmark)

• THE DEMOCRATIC SOCIETY AISBL (Belgium)

• Ayuntamiento de Parla (Spain)

• OBSHTINA VIDIN (Bulgaria)

• COMUNIDAD FORAL DE NAVARRA (Spain)

LIFE-HANDS-ON Toolkit

A set of tools has been developed to foster long-lasting, multi-stakeholder innovation, enabling public-sector representatives to select and combine the tools that best suit their specific objectives and needs.
The tools are organised according to the different phases involved in the creation and development of meso-level governance structures:

• Tools to recruit and engage.
• Tools to debate and learn .
• Tools to co-create.
• Tools to communicate.

You can download the Toolkit here.

 

 

This Life Project nº 101215499 is funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the The European Climate, Infrastructure and Environment Executive Agency (CINEA). Neither the European Union nor CINEA can be held responsible for them.

R2M’s role:

R2M plays a key role in several of the project’s main areas:

• R2M leads WP5 (Sustainability, Replication, and Exploitation): This work package includes activities aimed at ensuring the long-term impact of the project, such as consolidating a visual identity, developing and implementing the Communication and Dissemination Plan, and creating visual resources to support the project throughout its lifespan and beyond. Additionally, R2M designs and executes the replication and exploitation strategy for the HANDS-ON methodology through workshops, the dissemination of the project “Toolkit,” and participation in high-impact events.

• Within WP2 (Understanding Local and Regional Authorities and Socio-Environmental Challenges): R2M collaborates on analyzing the status of local policies and leads the assessment of the environmental and climate dimension across all pilot cities. This work includes analyzing energy consumption, renewable energy production, emissions, and local climate risks, among other factors. R2M applies a multidisciplinary and multi-scale methodology that facilitates a comprehensive diagnosis of energy risks and territorial sensitivity, serving as a baseline for co-designing policies with local stakeholders.

• Data Management: Finally, R2M is responsible for ensuring ethical, robust, and consistent data management throughout the entire duration of the project.