While the necessity of ambitious climate action is broadly recognised by the public across the EU, recent years have seen increasing concerns around the distribution of costs of transition both within societies and across different geographies. These two dimensions of the just transition – distributional and territorial – have therefore increased in prominence in EU politics since the publication of the first set of NECPs in 2019, with dedicated funding and governance mechanisms developed at the EU level. At the same time, both dimensions require a solid grounding in the broader climate and energy policy, which should be ensured by NECPs.

The 2024 update of NECPs should therefore put stronger emphasis on issues related to just transition. Given that the EU Member States were required to provide a draft of the update a year before the deadline for submission of the final version, there is an opportunity for the civil society to contribute to improvement of the drafts.

The purpose of our project implemented in cooperation with BlueLink Foundation, ECCO and Ecologic Institute is to facilitate this process by providing a methodological framework for the assessment of the updated NECPs from just transition perspective, and then apply it to the selected Plans.

Methodological report

The methodological framework described in the report can be used to evaluate both the contents of the documents and the procedures of their preparation. It constitutes a comprehensive checklist of good governance criteria, which should be fulfilled for proper integration of just transition policies and measures into NECPs. We encourage stakeholders across Europe to utilise this framework, either by directly applying it or adjusting the methodology to their specific needs.

The report is available in Polish, English and Italian (below).

Country-level assessments

• Italy

Italy is a significant economic player with a diverse and advanced industry. However, it simultaneously faces certain challenges that impact its economic situation.

Like many other countries, Italy confronts the challenge of adapting to a changing world, especially in the context of climate changes and their far-reaching effects. The areas of the Province of Taranto and Sulcis Iglesiente have been indicated among the territories most severely affected by the transition to a climate-neutral economy. It is precisely on these territories that the analysis below mainly focuses on.

Even though Italy is implementing significant aspects related to the Just Transition, it is difficult to find information about it in the NECP. Such details are more likely to be found in other documents and they must be added to the final version of the NECP that Italy is working on.

Find out more about the Italian NECP in the Assessment Report prepared by the Reform Institute in cooperation with ECCO available below.

• Other

The country-level assessment for Germany will be published in March 2024. Further assessments for Bulgaria and Poland will be published depending on the availability of the draft NECPs.