Slovenian stakeholder meeting on the NECP implementation deficit

The meeting included a presentation of the main activities of the TogetherFor1.5 project and possibilities for further cooperation within the stakeholder group. Furthermore, the issue of monitoring of the implementation of the NECP (National Energy and Climate Plan) and the NECP’s implementation deficit were addressed.

After the presentation of the main activities of the TogetherFor1.5 project, Barbara Petelin Visočnik from Inštitut Jožef Stefan, presented a report on the monitoring of the implementation of the NECP and why it is important to monitor the implementation of policies and actions. The main conclusions were that Slovenia is mostly successful in implementing measures adopted before the NECP, but less successful in implementing additional measures adopted with the NECP. Additionally, there is a lack of human resources, especially in the ministries and a lack of proper inter-ministerial coordination of climate action. 

The second presentation was followed by a presentation of barriers and opportunities in the implementation of the NECP, by Taj Zavodnik (Focus), where findings of the stakeholder interviews on the barriers and opportunities of the NECP and recommendations from NGOs (and beyond) on how to address the implementation deficit were presented. The main conclusions were that it is important to ensure who is responsible for what and to show what progress is being made, that there is a need for a financial analysis on how many staff do we need to ensure better management. The electricity distribution network was identified as the main bottleneck, and there was a proposal for the preparation of an action plan. The NECP should also be complemented with a plan for accelerated reduction of the implementation deficit.

The presentations were followed by a debate, where Daniel Crnčec, representative of the Ministry of Infrastructure and the coordinator of preparation of the NECP, addressed the concerns that were raised in the presentations.