Call for Proposals: Environment and Climate Action (LIFE) Programme

Deadline: 28-Jan-2025

The European Commission (EC) is accepting proposals for the Environment and Climate Action (LIFE) Programme.

Program Details

• The LIFE Programme is the EU Programme for Environment and Climate Action
• As such, it is one of the key contributors to the European Green Deal which aims to:
  • transform the EU into a fair and prosperous society, with a modern, resource efficient and competitive economy where there are no net emissions of greenhouse gases in 2050 and where economic growth is decoupled from resource use and
  • protect, conserve and enhance the EU’s natural capital, and protect the health and well-being of citizens from environment and climate related risks and impacts.

Objectives

• Technical assistance projects for capacity building aim at supporting public bodies responsible for the implementation of the LIFE programme in improving the participation and increasing the quality of submitted proposals from those countries. Proposals are meant to increase participation of various types of organisations in the LIFE calls for proposals, particularly for standard action projects, coordination and support actions, strategic integrated projects and strategic nature projects. This call represents an opportunity for Member States and countries associated to the LIFE Programme to receive EU funding for improving their capacity to support potential beneficiaries in the LIFE calls.
• In line with this objective, only public bodies responsible for implementation of LIFE programme in an eligible Member State or associated country to the LIFE Programme may apply for a capacity-building project. Consortiums may include additional entities provided that their participation is justified by the project objectives and their role is clearly defined. In principle, the project should be coordinated by the public body responsible for implementation of LIFE. LIFE National Contact Points should be closely involved in the TA-CAP project.

Priorities

• The LIFE Programme will contribute to these priorities through its four subprogrammes in particular by:
  • boosting and integrating the implementation of the EU’s policy objectives for halting and reversing loss of wildlife habitats and species across all sectors
  • supporting the transition to a circular economy and protecting and improving the quality of EU’s natural resources, including air, soil and water among others
  • supporting implementation of the 2030 energy and climate policy framework, the EU’s climate neutrality objective by 2050, and the new EU strategy on adaptation to climate change and
  • building capacity, stimulating investments and supporting implementation of policies focused on energy efficiency and small-scale renewables.
• The LIFE Programme is structured in two fields and four sub-programmes
  • Environment
    • sub-programme Nature and Biodiversity
    • sub-programme Circular Economy and Quality of Life
  • Climate Action
    • sub-programme Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation
    • sub-programme Clean Energy Transition

Funding Information

• The available call budget is EUR 8.000.000
• Expected project duration: 36 months

Eligible Activities

• Activities may include:
  • targeted and tailor-made communication campaigns on the LIFE Programme addressed, among others, to public national and local authorities responsible for the implementation of environmental and climate action policies and plans at all levels and across the entire national territory (e.g. municipalities, provinces, environment protection agencies, ecological operational units responsible for the enforcement of national environmental laws, public research institutes, academia), as well as to private sector stakeholders which are relevant for the programme.
  • Trainings activities for the staff members of the National Contact Points and possible exchanges with more experienced staff members of National Contact Points of other countries.
  • Tailor-made workshops on writing solid proposals; helping applicants to build (transnational) consortia; trainings on the use and monitoring of key performance indicators, etc
  • Screening of national environmental and climate actions priorities to support, through LIFE projects, the development, implementation, monitoring and enforcement of relevant Union legislations,
  • Gap analysis and assessment of policy uptake of LIFE project results.

Expected Impact

• The expected impact is an increase of the participation and the quality of the proposals submitted under the LIFE calls by applicants from the Member State or associated country.
• This can cover all kinds of projects, with particular scope for standard action projects, coordination and support actions, strategic nature and strategic integrated projects.
• The technical assistance for capacity building aims at supporting the country in facilitating participation of relevant national entities to the EU programme. The impact in terms of higher participation or better scoring of proposals should, as far as possible, be estimated.

Eligibility Criteria

• Eligible participants (eligible countries)
  • 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
      • EU Member States
      • Non-EU countries
• Specific cases 
  • 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 not 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) cannot be part of the consortium.

For more information, visit EC.