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Hundreds of mayors, councillors and regional leaders met in the European Parliament’s Hemicycle on Thursday, 16 October, for the 2025 Covenant of Mayors Ceremony, a showcase of municipal delivery against the EU’s climate and energy objectives.
The gathering, in Brussels, placed local implementation at the centre of discussions on clean, affordable energy and climate resilience.
The event was opened by Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission; Roberta Metsola, President of the European Parliament; and Kata Tüttő, President of the European Committee of the Regions. Their interventions framed municipalities and regions as pivotal to Europe’s transition pathways, from building renovation and clean heat to risk management and adaptation. The programme featured contributions from Executive Vice-President for Cohesion and Reforms, Raffaele Fitto; Commissioner for Energy and Housing, Dan Jørgensen; and Commissioner for Climate, Net Zero and Clean Growth, Wopke Hoekstra.
Organisers highlighted the scale of the Covenant network: launched in 2008, it now brings together more than 10,000 signatories committed to reducing emissions, improving energy efficiency and adapting to climate risk. City leaders underlined how local planning—zoning for heat networks, streamlining permits, and coordinating grid upgrades—can compress project timelines and de-risk investment. The Commission and the Committee of the Regions emphasised the need to align EU-level instruments with municipal delivery, including predictable funding and technical assistance.–
The 2025 Covenant of Mayors Awards recognised three cities for progress in decarbonising heating and cooling, in line with the network’s “Cities Heat Detox” campaign. Domokos (Greece), Lappeenranta (Finland) and Mechelen (Belgium) were named as winners for strategies that phase out fossil-fuel heat in favour of efficient, low-carbon alternatives. Case studies presented during the ceremony covered district-heating modernisation, geothermal deployment and large-scale heat-pump integration.
Energy security and affordability were recurrent themes. Speakers pointed to the role of distributed renewables, demand-side flexibility and building-level efficiency in lowering exposure to volatile fuel markets. Commissioner Jørgensen set out the Commission’s energy priorities mandate, including grid reinforcement and measures to ease energy costs for households and businesses, while Hoekstra addressed climate-risk management and the EU Missions framework for adaptation.
For the Commission, Fitto linked cohesion policy and reforms to city-level delivery, referencing EU instruments that blend grants, loans and advisory support. Municipal representatives described how multi-annual finance, revolving funds and standardised procurement can build investable pipelines for renovation and clean-heat projects. Regional energy agencies outlined technical-assistance platforms to aggregate smaller schemes to investment grade.
Adaptation ran alongside mitigation across the programme. Panels addressed urban heat-health planning, flood management and nature-based solutions, with examples of street redesign and storm-water systems integrated into wider regeneration schemes. The Committee of the Regions stressed multi-level governance and citizen engagement, noting that public participation can improve scheme design and uptake at neighbourhood scale.
The ceremony also served as a stocktake of the Covenant’s reach and a coordination point with other EU initiatives. Organisers pointed to peer-learning within the network and to standardised monitoring that allows signatories to track progress against local climate plans. Attention was given to capacity constraints—skills in the installer base, supply-chain bottlenecks and municipal staffing—which can slow delivery even where finance is available.
In closing messages, EU and local leaders restated that meeting the Union’s climate and energy targets will depend on municipal execution. The policy signals were clear: stable frameworks, streamlined access to EU funds and long-term mandates for local energy and climate agencies. The operational emphasis was equally direct: plan at district scale, package projects to bankable standards, and maintain citizen engagement to support roll-out. With award-winning examples from Domokos, Lappeenranta and Mechelen as reference points, the 2025 ceremony set out a practical agenda for the next phase of local delivery.
