URBAN TRANSITIONS MISSION

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The Urban Transitions Mission (UTM) brokers solutions, approaches, and knowledge for net-zero transitions at each stage of a city climate action journey.

With the Support and in partnerships with the UTM Global Innovation Alliance (GIA), the UTM helps its city cohort to identify needs-based solutions and offers the opportunity to apply innovation, test, pilot and scale up solutions and approaches for urban transitions. Through collaborating with national governments, international institutions and global organizations, as well as with private sector and financial institutions, the UTM helps the city cohort to engage in pilot initiatives to address high-impact sectors, co-creating innovative approaches, sharing the most innovative need-based solutions and up to date knowledge available.

Counting already more than 25 trailblazing initiatives, UTM cities across the world:

  • Have started their journey to test, support and pilot the UN Climate Change Global Innovation Hub (UGIH). The cities are Chefchaouen, Kochi, Lappeenranta, Lujan de Cuyo, Puerto Montt, Renca, Vitoria-Gasteiz, Zhytomyr, Belo Horizonte, Miami-Dade and Greater Manchester. The UGIH aims to promote transformative innovations for a low-emission and climate-resilient future, as well as facilitate needs-based solutions addressing core human needs for food, shelter, mobility and access via alternative value chains, aligned with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Hosted by the UN Climate Change, the UGIH enables radical collaboration among governments at all levels, digital businesses, corporates, enablers, incubators and research, to accelerate technological, financial and regulatory solutions. In partnership with the UN Climate Change, a member of the UTM Global Innovation Alliance, the UTM and its city cohort will work together to spearhead the UGIH innovative approach. More information is available here.
  • Have joined forces with private sector partners to roll out  a number of pilot actions, supporting the development of digital twins, identifying potential for regulatory sandboxes to spearhead innovative PPPs, exploring the feasibility of hydrogen solutions and innovative lighting technologies, facilitating access to mobility data for informed local policy planning and much more. Among these, 8+ UTM cities in Finland, India, Norway and the United Kingdom will work within the framework of a newly launched cooperation between UTM and KPMG. Brought together with the aim to help spearhead and test an innovative private sector collaboration platform, this partnership will work with cities to strengthen collaborations with business, unlock funding, and accelerate market uptake of innovative climate solutions, focusing on key emission and impact sectors.

MISSION INNOVATION URBAN TRANSITIONS MISSION CALLS FOR PIONEER CITIES TO JOIN THE CITY COHORT AND DEMONSTRATE HOLISTIC PATHWAYS TO NET-ZERO

The Urban Transitions Mission (UTM) has launched a new open call for cities to join the cohort. Since December 2022, 48 cities from 24 countries are already engaging with UTM to demonstrate the integrated pathways towards holistic, people-centred urban transitions built around clean energy and innovative net-zero carbon solutions. The Mission is now looking for 250 new pioneering cities to join this ambitious journey by 2024. Cities are invited to apply online and express their interest to join the Mission’s cohort by the 21st of October by filling in a brief questionnaire, reflecting the assessment criteria, which can be found here.

A robust methodology in the selection process will ensure the readiness and commitment of cities to engage as frontrunners in innovation to support and accelerate the Mission’s goals. The expressions of interest received will be reviewed on a rolling basis.

The new cities engaging in the cohort are expected to start working with the Mission, testing, piloting and helping scale up solutions and adopt system-wide approaches to reach net-zero, starting from the end of this year.

Through the Urban Transitions Mission, cities will strengthen their existing climate and energy action plans to prioritize actions according to scientific data and evidence, and bridge implementation gaps to reach net-zero, based on innovation needs.

Further information on the value proposition for cities, and their expected commitment, an Info Pack on the selection process, and FAQs are available here.

Click here to apply!

URBAN TRANSITIONS MISSION CENTRE

The Urban Transitions Mission Centre (UTMC) is a global platform that promotes urban sustainability and facilitates climate-neutral transitions. The UTMC helps cities to bridge knowledge and capacity gaps by linking cities with policy, implementation, and funding solutions via exchanges that transcend national and world regions’ borders.

Building on the European Mission for Climate-Neutral and Smart Cities, the UTMC supports the activities of the Urban Transitions Mission (UTM), and it enables a wide international knowledge and practice network of cities and urban stakeholders that helps drive transitions globally. It will enable cities to build their capacity in a networking environment with access to knowledge and tools on urban systems integration, technology developments, successful policies, investment and funding opportunities, as well as the cobenefits, mistakes and trade-offs that cities encounter in the pathway towards a net-zero urban environment.

The UTMC makes available evidence-based solutions and good practices to accelerate urban transitions and promote financing and funding opportunities to implement integrated urban climate action. It offers advanced frameworks and moderated learning across governance levels to raise awareness of and capacities for climate neutrality policies. The UTMC also establishes a forum for international exchange and cooperation on climate-neutral and net-zero urban transitions by organizing global and regional events and comprehensive dissemination measures to raise the visibility of EU and international good practice and strengthen international cooperation. More information is available here.

The UTMC is funded by the European Union’s Horizon Europe. Since December 2022, a consortium of urban experts from organizations such as the Austrian Research Promotion Agency on behalf of JPI Urban Europe, the European Network of Living Labs (ENoLL), Eurocities, the Global Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy (GCoM), ICLEI – Local Governments for Sustainability, and LGI Sustainable Innovation, is facilitating the set-up and roll out of of the UTMC’s activities.

Join the UTMC platform here!

NEWS AND UPDATES 

  • [July 2023] The Urban Transitions Mission (UTM) has launched a new open call for cities to join the cohort. Cities are invited to apply online and express their interest to join the Mission’s cohort by the 21st of September! Cities are invited to apply online and express their interest to join the Mission’s cohort by the 21st of October through filling in a brief questionnaire, reflecting the assessment criteria, which can be found here.
  • [May 25, 2023] 11 cities part of the UTM city cohort start their journey to test, support and pilot the UN Climate Change Global Innovation Hub (UGIH)
  • [May 23, 2023] The Urban Transitions Mission launched it’s own website which takes a deep dive on all UTM relevant information and keeps users up to date on UTM related events. Find out more on urbantransitionsmission.org
  • [November 14, 2022] The Urban Transitions Mission announced the first city cohort during the event “Delivering on the urban transition to net-zero: multi-level partnerships and innovation to achieve systemic change”, which was livestreamed here. The event, consisting of a high-level panel of speakers from across level of government, aims to provide a platform to officially launch the cohorts of cities joining the Urban Transitions Mission. The session will offer an opportunity for both cities, countries and partners engaged in the UTM, to discuss vision, address challenges, and share both their expectations and existing solutions to reach net-zero through holistic transitions. The event is organized directly by the UTM and will be widely covered on social media. A press release announcing the cohort launched during the event will be shared on the same day. A press release announcing the cohort launched during the event was shared on the Global Covenant of Mayors website.

 

 

Find out more about the Urban Transitions Mission.

 

Co-leads:

  • European Commission, Directorate-General for Research & Innovation (DG RTD)
  • Global Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy (GCoM)
  • Joint Programming Initiative (JPI) Urban Europe

 

Core Group Members:

  • India, Ministry of Science and Technology
  • Austria, Federal Ministry for Climate Action, Environment, Energy, Mobility, Innovation and Technology
  • Saudi Arabia, Ministry of Energy
  • Spain, Ministry of Science and Innovation
  • Sweden, Swedish Energy Agency / Ministry of the Environment and Energy
  • MI Innovation Community on Affordable Heating and Cooling of Buildings (IC7)

 

 Support Group Members:

  • EIT Climate KIC
  • European Network of Living Labs (ENoLL)
  • ICLEI – Local Governments for Sustainability (ICLEI)
  • International Energy Agency (IEA)
  • International Renewable Energy Association (IRENA)
  • Student Energy
  • United Nations Climate Change (UNFCCC) Global Innovation Hub
  • World Economic Forum (WEF)