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Call key data
Alleviating household energy poverty in Europe
Funding Program
LIFE - sub-programme “Clean Energy Transition”
Call number
LIFE-2026-CET-ENERPOV
deadlines
Opening
21.04.2026
Deadline
16.09.2026 17:00
Funding rate
95%
Call budget
€ 6,000,000.00
Estimated EU contribution per project
€ 1,750,000.00
Link to the call
Link to the submission
Call content
short description
Actions should contribute to actively alleviating energy poverty and build on the tools, indicators and resources of existing initiatives, such as the Energy Poverty Advisory Hub and the energy poverty pillar of the Covenant of Mayors.
Call objectives
European households continue to spend a high share of their income on energy, leading to higher rates of energy poverty and negatively affecting living conditions, well-being and health. Most recent estimates suggest that 9.2% of Europeans are unable to keep their homes adequately warm. Higher energy prices, combined with low incomes and poor energy efficiency of buildings and appliances, are root causes of energy poverty. Moreover, the increased occurrence of extreme summer heatwaves in recent years is further exacerbating the challenges faced by energy poor households and increasing household cooling needs, with data indicating that over 20% of European households were unable to keep their dwelling comfortably cool during the summer (‘summer energy poverty’). In addition to its causal multidimensionality, energy poverty cuts across different policy sectors beyond energy, such as health, housing and social policy, requiring coordinated, holistic efforts at all governance levels, and involving different sectoral actors.
The European Green Deal sets out to ensure an energy transition that is socially just and inclusive. In accordance with the Fit for 55 package, and in particular the recast Energy Efficiency Directive (EED), Member States shall take appropriate measures to empower and protect energy poor people and implement energy efficiency improvement measures as a priority among people affected by energy poverty, vulnerable customers, people in low-income households and, where applicable, people living in social housing. In addition, the revised EPBD requires Member States to target the least efficient building stock first in line with the “worst first principle” and the EED (recast) underlines the need to address the split incentive dilemma and remove barriers to energy efficiency measures in multi-owner properties. The social dimension of the Energy Union is further strengthened in the Citizens Energy Package through more ambitious commitments to reduce energy poverty and build on the implementation of the Fit for 55 package. To ensure more coordinated action on energy poverty, the EC has also published guidance on the implementation of EED requirements, and an EC Recommendation on Energy Poverty and accompanying Staff Working Document further set out a series of measures and policies that can be adopted.
In this context, increasing the uptake of building renovation measures, including cooling solutions, can bring significant long-term benefits to energy poor households, and lead to lower energy bills, improved living conditions and health, as well as improving social inclusion. Efforts should focus on offering support to overcome barriers to the uptake of renovation measures in residential multi-apartment buildings requiring coordinated action amongst homeowners and tenants, as well as supporting relevant actors, including diverse public authorities, in designing longer-term strategies and coordination frameworks to mitigate energy poverty at different governance levels.
The EU is facing important increases in energy prices, driven by market volatility and exacerbated by its dependence on imported fossil fuels. A key priority for the EU is to strengthen the resilience of its energy system vis-a-vis geopolitical crises impacting the global energy market. Therefore, applicants under this topic are invited, where possible, to develop and implement long-term structural sustainable and energy efficiency measures to enhance EU energy system resilience against future crises, in coherence with short-term energy relief measures needed to respond to the current shock on the global energy markets.
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Expected effects and impacts
Proposals should present the concrete results which will be delivered by the activities and demonstrate how these results will contribute to the topic-specific impacts. This demonstration should rely on a solid analysis of the current situation, realistic assumptions and baselines, and establish clear causality links between activities, results and impacts.
In terms of qualitative impact, proposals under this topic should demonstrate how they will contribute to the reduction of (summer) energy poverty for the targeted households (Scope B) and the development of successful coordination structures (Scope A), which can be replicated in other regions or Member States. Prebound/rebound effects should be taken into account and factored in the quantification of impacts, where relevant.
In terms of quantitative impact, proposals should quantify their results and impacts using the indicators provided for the topic, when they are relevant for the proposed activities. Proposals are not expected to address all the listed impacts and indicators. The results and impacts should be quantified for the end of the project and for 5 years after the end of the project. The quantitative indicators for this topic include:
- Number of energy poor households with reduced energy costs (Scope A and B)
- Number of energy poor consumers benefitting from the activities (Scope A and B)
- Number of residential multi-apartment buildings renovated (or renovations triggered by project end) (Scope B)
- Number of governance and decision-making structures reinforced/adapted for residential multi-apartment buildings to facilitate energy renovation investments (Scope B)
- Number of tailored financing strategies developed for multi-apartment building renovation with energy poor residents (Scope B)
- Number of agreements concluded between homeowners and tenant associations demonstrating commitment to energy renovation investments (Scope B)
- Number of energy poverty coordination structures established or reinforced (Scope A)
- Number of legislative or implementing acts, policies or strategies created/adapted on energy poverty, including summer energy poverty where relevant (Scope A and B)
- Number of public authorities and stakeholders with increased capacity and skills (mainly Scope A)
- Number of training hours per participant in capacity-building programmes (Scope A)
- Increased energy poor household ability to maintain home below a critical heat threshold (Scope A and B)
- Quantified multiple benefits for energy poor households, such as improved physical and mental health, comfort and indoor environment, better indoor air quality, improved social inclusion, reduced public health expenditure (Scope A and B).
Proposals should also provide indicators which are specific to their proposed activities.
Proposals should also quantify their impacts related to the following common indicators for the LIFE Clean Energy Transition sub-programme:
- Primary energy savings triggered by the project in GWh/year
- Final energy savings triggered by the project in GWh/year
- Renewable energy generation triggered by the project (in GWh/year)
- Reduction of greenhouse gas emissions (in tCO2-eq/year)
- Investments in sustainable energy (energy efficiency and renewable energy) triggered by the project (cumulative, in million Euro).
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Expected results
Proposals are encouraged for actions with a specific focus on summer energy poverty alleviation and/or actions focusing on geographic areas with less developed energy poverty alleviation measures and frameworks.
Proposals should cover only one of the two scopes below, either Scope A or Scope B of the topic. The scope addressed should be specified in the proposal introduction.
Scope A: Policy and coordination support to public authorities and stakeholders
Actions should support national, regional and/or local authorities and relevant stakeholders in setting up formalised, long-term, cross-sectoral coordination structures to tackle energy poverty. The coordination structures should foster cross-departmental and cross-sectoral collaboration across national, regional, and/or local government structures, and involve relevant public bodies and private/public stakeholders, such as civil society organisations, healthcare providers, economic operators or academia. The proposal should outline the organisational structure (including the engagement strategy for participating actors), main methods of operation and key objectives (e.g. development of definitions, criteria, or indicators, data collection, advice on support methods or schemes to reduce energy poverty, etc). The proposal should also identify the specific local/regional/national challenges or gaps the coordination structure(s) aim to address. Where similar coordination structures (e.g. energy poverty observatories) already exist or are already in development, the proposal must clearly demonstrate the need for, and added value of, any new coordination structures and must also demonstrate the support of, or existing cooperation with, the existing structure(s).
To facilitate the set-up of such structures and build the necessary organisational expertise, proposals should also include the delivery of tailored capacity-building activities for the specific national, regional and/or local authorities and stakeholder organisations involved in the coordination structures. The capacity-building should consist of structured, in-depth training tailored to the specific needs and languages of the coordination structure members, ensuring improved skills and capacity in the long term.
The composition of the coordination structures is expected to represent all relevant sectors, including energy, social, health and housing sectors, to ensure a holistic participatory approach to the alleviation of energy poverty in the long term.
The main public authorities involved in the coordination structure(s) must be identified in the proposal. The public authorities and stakeholders, such as consumer or social organisations, the housing sector, energy companies, or healthcare providers, should be either directly involved in the consortium or their concrete commitment and involvement in the coordination structures should be demonstrated in the proposal through, for example, tailored letters of support at executive decision-making level.
The proposal should make clear whether the proposed coordination structures address the national, local and/or regional level. If several governance levels are addressed, the need for this should be justified in the proposal.
The proposal should set out a convincing plan to ensure long-term sustainability of the coordination structures beyond project duration, including the expected hosting entities.
Scope B: Facilitating residential multi-apartment building renovation
Actions under Scope B should support the energy renovation of residential multi-apartment buildings in spatially related vulnerable districts/neighbourhoods with predominantly energy poor inhabitants, with a view to reducing and optimising their heating and cooling needs and improving the health and comfort of energy poor residents.
In order to facilitate the uptake of renovation measures, proposed actions are expected to concretely support the renovation of multi-apartment buildings by implementing strategies and approaches, which may include reinforcing and/or adapting the governance and decision-making structures of building management and homeowners or tenants associations, tackling related regulatory barriers such as property/rental laws and/or condominium laws, defining appropriate financing strategies for the specific target group, addressing split incentives (where relevant), and setting up and/or coordinating relevant support or advisory services (e.g. resource centres, one-stop shops). Where such support/advisory services are already in place, proposals should demonstrate how they build on them, rather than establish new services.
The proposed actions are encouraged to consider both winter and summer energy poverty and integrate building-level measures with community or neighbourhood-level approaches, where appropriate. These approaches may include, for example, integration of sustainable active cooling solutions with passive cooling measures (e.g. nature-based solutions, urban greening), or social leasing schemes.
Regardless of the specific measures proposed, the proposal should demonstrate their affordability for energy poor residents in terms of both upfront and longer-term costs.
The renovation actions supported should also ensure the ability of residents to remain in their homes after works, thereby avoiding so-called renovictions.
It is expected that the homeowners or tenant associations and housing organisations, in particular, in addition to other relevant actors (e.g. financial institutions), are either directly involved in the consortium or their concrete commitment and involvement in the project is clearly demonstrated in the proposal through, for example, tailored letters of support.
For both Scope A and Scope B
Proposals should take into account multiple benefits from energy efficiency and renewable energy for different energy poor target groups, such as improved health, comfort, air quality, better social inclusion etc. Specific attention could be paid to particular groups which are more at risk of being affected by energy poverty or more susceptible to the adverse impacts of energy poverty, taking into account gender, where relevant. Proposals are not expected to develop new IT tools, databases or platforms, unless their added value compared to existing ones is justified, and their potential scale-up beyond the project convincingly addressed.
For proposals addressing building renovation actions without a clear focus on energy poor households, please consider applying under the topic LIFE-2026-CET-BETTERRENO.
For proposals addressing One-Stop-Shops for renovation, please consider applying under the topic LIFE-2026-CET-OSS.
For proposals addressing support services for energy communities, please consider applying under the topic LIFE-2026-CET-ENERCOM.
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Eligibility Criteria
Regions / countries for funding
Moldova (Moldova), Iceland (Ísland), Montenegro (Црна Гора), North Macedonia (Северна Македонија), Ukraine (Україна)
eligible entities
Education and training institution, International organization, Non-Profit Organisation (NPO) / Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO), Other, Private institution, incl. private company (private for profit), Public Body (national, regional and local; incl. EGTCs), Research Institution incl. University, Small and medium-sized enterprise (SME)
Mandatory partnership
Yes
Project Partnership
In order to be eligible, the applicants (beneficiaries and affiliated entities) must:
- be legal entities (public or private bodies)
- be established in one of the eligible countries, i.e.:
- EU Member States (including overseas countries and territories (OCTs))
- non-EU countries:
- listed EEA countries and countries associated to the LIFE Programme (list of participating countries)
- the coordinator must be established in an eligible country
Proposals must be submitted by at least 3 applicants (beneficiaries; not affiliated entities) from 3 different eligible countries.
other eligibility criteria
Specific cases
Exceptional funding — Entities from other countries (not listed above) are exceptionally eligible, if the granting authority considers their participation essential for the implementation of the action (see work programme).
Natural persons — Natural persons are NOT eligible (with the exception of self-employed persons, i.e. sole traders, where the company does not have legal personality separate from that of the natural person).
International organisations — International organisations are eligible. The rules on eligible countries do not apply to them.
Entities without legal personality — Entities which do not have legal personality under their national law may exceptionally participate, provided that their representatives have the capacity to undertake legal obligations on their behalf, and offer guarantees for the protection of the EU financial interests equivalent to that offered by legal persons.
EU bodies — EU bodies (with the exception of the European Commission Joint Research Centre) can NOT be part of the consortium.
Associations and interest groupings — Entities composed of members may participate as ‘sole beneficiaries’ or ‘beneficiaries without legal personality’.
Countries currently negotiating association agreements — Beneficiaries from countries with ongoing negotiations for participating in the programme (see list of participating countries above) may participate in the call and can sign grants if the negotiations are concluded before grant signature and if the association covers the call (i.e. is retroactive and covers both the part of the programme and the year when the call was launched).
EU restrictive measures — Special rules apply for entities subject to EU restrictive measures under Article 29 of the Treaty on the European Union (TEU) and Article 215 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the EU (TFEU). Such entities are not eligible to participate in any capacity, including as beneficiaries, affiliated entities, associated partners, subcontractors or recipients of financial support to third parties (if any).
EU conditionality measures — Special rules apply for entities subject to measures adopted on the basis of EU Regulation 2020/2092. Such entities are not eligible to participate in any funded role (beneficiaries, affiliated entities, subcontractors, recipients of financial support to third parties, etc.). Currently such measures are in place for Hungarian public interest trusts established under the Hungarian Act IX of 2021 or any entity they maintain (see Council Implementing Decision (EU) 2022/2506, as of 16 December 2022).
Additional information
Topics
Relevance for EU Macro-Region
EUSAIR - EU Strategy for the Adriatic and Ionian Region, EUSALP - EU Strategy for the Alpine Space, EUSBSR - EU Strategy for the Baltic Sea Region, EUSDR - EU Strategy for the Danube Region
UN Sustainable Development Goals (UN-SDGs)
Additional Information
Proposals must be submitted electronically via the Funding & Tenders Portal Electronic Submission System (accessible via the Topic page in the Calls for proposals section). Paper submissions are NOT possible.
Proposals (including annexes and supporting documents) must be submitted using the forms provided inside the Submission System (NOT the documents available on the Topic page — they are only for information).
Proposals must be complete and contain all the requested information and all required annexes and supporting documents:
- Application Form Part A — contains administrative information about the participants (future coordinator, beneficiaries and affiliated entities) and the summarised budget for the project (to be filled in directly online)
- Application Form Part B — contains the technical description of the project (template to be downloaded from the Portal Submission System, completed, assembled and re-uploaded)
- Part C — contains additional project data and the project’s contribution to EU programme key performance indicators (to be filled in directly online)
- mandatory annexes and supporting documents (templates to be downloaded from the Portal Submission System, completed, assembled and re-uploaded):
- detailed budget table (mandatory Excel template available in the Submission System)
- participant information including previous projects, if any (mandatory Excel template available in the Submission System)
- optional annexes: letters of support
Proposals are limited to maximum 65 pages (Part B).
Call documents
Call Document LIFE-2026-CETCall Document LIFE-2026-CET(824kB)


