ExpectedOutcome:
This topic is for continuation of the Driving Urban Transition (DUT) co-funded partnership to enable it to roll out its full strategy and action plan and assist cities in their sustainability and climate neutrality transitions and by doing so enable the EU to achieve targets set out by the European Green Deal and fulfil its commitments related to the UN Agenda 2030, the Urban Agenda for the EU, the Habitat III New Urban Agenda and the Paris Agreement, European cities need to engage urgently in sustainability and climate-neutrality transitions.
The partnership is expected to contribute to all of the following expected outcomes:
- Enhanced multi-level cooperation and alignment on R&I on sustainable urban development across and within cities, regions and countries, including international outreach and cooperation with other networks and initiatives.
- Strengthen Europe as a role model for R&I on sustainable urban development.
- Innovative, cross-sectoral and inclusive urban governance, policy and decision-making harnessing the full potential of social science and citizens’ engagement in the city making process.
- Sustainable, climate-neutral, safe, resilient, socially inclusive, liveable and attractive neighbourhoods, towns and cities with reduced environmental footprint and enhanced well-being and quality of life for citizens.
- Local authorities, municipalities, business, social partners, civil society, knowledge institutions and citizens empowered with necessary capacity, knowledge, skills and tools to actively engage in sustainability and climate-neutrality transitions.
- Science and evidence-based implementation of the European Green Deal, the Urban Agenda for the EU and other European, national, regional and local urban-relevant policies and strategies.
Scope:
The objective of this action is to continue to provide support to the European “Driving Urban Transition” Co-funded Partnership identified in the Horizon Europe Strategic Plan 2021-2024 and first implemented under the topic HORIZON-CL5-2021-D2-01-16: Co-Funded Partnership: Driving Urban Transitions (DUT), and in particular to fund additional activities (which may also be undertaken by additional partners) in view of its intended scope and duration, and in accordance with Article 24(2) of the Horizon Europe Regulation.
The proposal should capitalise upon new collaboration opportunities offered by the Association Agreements to Horizon Europe, the “Climate neutral and smart cities” mission and the global Urban Transitions Mission (UTM) mission of Mission Innovation to enhance its expertise, capacities, critical mass and broaden its geographical coverage and outreach capacity. With respect to the latter, mutually benefitting international outreach, collaboration and cooperation with global and international cities and research funding networks should be pursued to align strategies and research agenda and promote scientific evidence and good practice for urban policy on international level.
Taking into account that the present action is a continuation of the topic HORIZON-CL5-2021-D2-01-16 and foresees an amendment to an existing grant agreement, the proposal should describe plans, activities and initiatives that would enable the DUT to ensure, as appropriate, a seamless pursuance of its strategy, objectives and actions to fill important gaps in knowledge, evidence, innovation, technology, data, capacity and skills, integrated approaches, foster inclusive and participatory governance structures and assist cities at European (and, as appropriate, global level) in designing and implementing their sustainability and climate neutrality transitions.
It should, in particular, describe in detail the additional activities (including additional partners) to be covered by the award, and justify their necessity and added value as compared to currently undertaken ones, whilst accounting for the state-of-progress and the evolution in relevant EU and international policy frameworks and urban initiatives. The proposed additional activities (including additional partners) to be covered by the award should also be presented in a separate document in terms of how they would be reflected in the existing grant agreement.
The proposal should elaborate on modalities to scale-up synergies with the works of the NetZeroCities mission platform and relevant projects such as the CapaCITIES networks, the CRAFT platform, the looming Global Knowledge Exchange Centre and, as appropriate, with the missions supporting TRAMI project, to underpin the implementation of the “Climate neutral and smart cities” mission and ensure coherence and complementarity of activities and leverage of knowledge and investment possibilities.
Furthermore, concrete actions should be envisaged to enhance collaboration and synergies with other Horizon Europe neighbouring European Partnerships such as Clean Energy Transitions (CET), Built environment and construction (Built4People), Rescuing biodiversity (Biodiversa+), Safe and Sustainable Food Systems, Towards Zero Emission Road Transport (2ZERO), Cooperative, Connected and Automated Mobility (CCAM), EIT Urban Mobility and Water4All.
Interfaces to public procurement and investment programmes and links with Urban Innovative Actions (UIA) under the Urban Agenda for the EU, European Urban Initiative (EUI) under cohesion policy, ESIF, private funds, etc. should be explored to support take-up and larger scale implementation of tested approaches and solutions.
The consortium which applied to and received funding under the topic HORIZON-CL5-2021-D2-01-16 is uniquely placed to submit a proposal to continue the envisioned partnership. Not only did this consortium submit the proposal leading to the identification of the partnership in the Horizon Europe strategic planning 2021-2024, it has so far been implementing the partnership through co-funded calls in the year 2022 based on this planning and further to the HE WP 21/22 topic. In this context, the current consortium has particular expertise in relation to the objectives of the Partnership, the activities to be implemented in particular 2022 and 2023 FSTP calls or other calls/scope of calls clearly required/envisioned pursuant to initial proposal/partnership, and other relevant aspects of the action. In practice, another consortium could not continue the activities of the Partnership underway without significant disruption to the ongoing activities, if at all.
While the award of a grant to continue the Partnership in accordance with this call should be based on a proposal submitted by the coordinator of the consortium funded under topic HORIZON-CL5-2021-D2-01-16 and the additional activities (which may include additional partners) to be funded by the grant should be subject to an evaluation, this evaluation should take into account the existing context and the scope of the initial evaluation as relevant, and related obligations enshrined in the grant agreement.
The Commission envisages to include new actions in its future work programmes to provide continued support to the partnership for the duration of Horizon Europe.
Specific Topic Conditions:
The total indicative budget for the co-funded European Partnership is EUR 130 million for the period 2021-2027.
