Background
NetZeroCities, through Special Grant Agreement 2 (SGA2) Task 1.6, ‘Sub-European Peer-to-Peer Collaboration’, is actively working to provide tailored support in various national contexts. The aim is to provide additional support to cities, foster communities of practice between cities in each country, i.e. to strengthen city-to-city collaboration spaces at national level and thus help to reinforce national support structures for climate neutral cities (national platforms). To achieve this, NZC has developed a country-specific support framework tailored to the unique characteristics and needs of each context.
In practice, the subcontractor should deliver the following activities (find detailed description under Activities), building on what has already been achieved and delivered in the Polish context:
- External communication and outreach – Promote the EU Cities Mission in Poland.
- Internal communication, coordination, and knowledge management – Develop and maintain the Community of Practice amongst Polish cities, incl. capacity-building activities, policy advocacy processes, systematic communication.
- Alignment with national policy processes – Use national windows of opportunities to advocate for support for climate neutral cities in Poland (finance & funding; policy & regulation; technical and topical support, coordination across levels and stakeholders).
The Cities of Kraków, Łódź, Rzeszów, Warszawa, and Wrocław are the Mission Cities from Poland and were awarded the EU Mission Label for their Climate City Contracts in May 2025. As part of the Mission, cities have participated in the NetZeroCities Pilot programme, in which they focused on accelerating deep renovation and decarbonisation of residential buildings through integrated technical solutions, innovative financing models, and strengthened local stakeholder cooperation (NEEST – NetZero Emission and Environmentally Sustainable Territories). Additionally, two Polish cities – Poznań and Bydgoszcz – have been accepted into the NetZeroCities Twinning Learning programme, through which they work with allocated Mission Cities on priority climate transition topics and share methodologies and good practices.
At the national level, the Polish Ministry of Climate and Environment and Ministry of Funds and Regional Policy engage in Mission-related activities, including dialogues and events with municipalities aiming to advance climate neutrality. To strengthen national engagement and city-to-city collaboration, NetZeroCities has also contracted Union of Polish Metropolises for the period May 2025 to May 2026 to facilitate a capacity-building programme in Poland. This programme aims at supporting the development of a Community of Practice of Polish cities, promoting collaboration across municipal and national stakeholders, and addressing collective needs flagged by the cities. The local partner has delivered a few dedicated learning and capacity-building events for municipalities, addressing such relevant topics as funding and financing, sustainable energy management in cities, energy efficient buildings, and smart solutions. Targeted cities included Białystok, Bydgoszcz, Gdańsk, Katowice, Lublin, Poznań, Szczecin in addition to the five Mission Cities. NetZeroCities collaborates also with the Warsaw University of Technology that offers additional support in facilitating multilevel dialogue for climate neutral cities in Poland, focusing on the engagement of relevant ministries and representatives of regional authorities through the CapaCITIES programme.
To support these developments in Poland, and to build on services delivered by a Polish local partner between May 2025 and May 2026, the support services are planned to continue throughout 2026 and beyond until October 2027. These services, which will be contracted through this tender, are to be delivered by an individual or organisation with deep expertise in the Polish national context and experience in convening stakeholders from local, regional and national governments. This approach ensures targeted support that directly addresses the objectives outlined in this RfP.
Finally, as part of this specific support, each country has a NetZeroCities partner responsible for coordinating and monitoring the work. In the case of Poland this role is fulfilled by ICLEI.
About the request
In the context of the efforts of Polish cities within the EU Mission for 100 Climate-Neutral and Smart Cities, and specifically the opportunity identified to provide additional support to the community of cities working toward the Mission’s objectives within the Polish national ecosystem, NetZeroCities / Climate KIC is requesting a quotation for services from an organisation or individual able to operate within this national context. The role involves supporting teams from NetZeroCities, as relevant, to take charge of and facilitate the process described below.
The following is a general description of the services and actions to be provided by the awarded supplier, followed in subsequent sections with detailed information.
(1) Expert support aimed at fostering collaboration between cities with regards to financing climate transition in Polish cities, with specific focus on energy – both on the technical and policy aspects (four dialogue meetings and one Policy Brief), increasing their capacities and improving the cooperation of the community of practice of cities with national authorities, and different stakeholders in Poland. This support will be directed towards Polish cities that are already participating in the Mission activities (e.g. Mission and Twin Cities) as well as other interested cities wanting to achieve climate neutrality. Additionally, the learnings from this process will be disseminated with a wider group of cities via webinars.
(2) Coordination support aimed at establishing coherent collaboration processes for Polish cities, regular meetings, feedback loops, process documentation, meaningful links to national authorities and other relevant stakeholders (“secretariat” function).
(3) Organisation of two annual EU Cities’ Mission Events / Poland (one in 2026 and one in 2027) to promote the EU Cities Mission and its activities in Poland amongst wide group of cities as well as other relevant stakeholders.
Presentations and technical support will take place predominantly in Polish; therefore, presenters must be fluent in Polish. The collaboration and interaction with NetZeroCities partners will be in English and full professional proficiency in English of those engaged in the delivery is mandatory.
The general objective of the described support is to enhance collaboration between cities in the Polish context through the facilitation of the policy advocacy process on financing climate transition in cities, with specific focus on energy, as well as organising complementary capacity building activities that can support the process and/or communicate its progress to a wider community of cities. Specifically, it aims to strengthen the exchange between cities on climate neutrality (Community of Practice) and the national support for climate neutral cities (“National Platform”) in Poland. To this end, strong internal coordination skills (knowledge sharing and management, delivery of collaborative processes, maintaining long term collaboration) as well as external outreach and communication skills (multilevel and multi-stakeholder collaboration, awareness raising, promotion) are crucial
Additionally, this targeted support is intended as seed funding with the primary objective of maximising impact by strengthening collaborative networks within each country. Therefore, this initiative also aims to serve as kick-start and to encourage the continuity of funding once the support described in this RfP is completed.
Please find further information, scope, dates, etc in the document below.
Timeline and additional information
Interested parties are invited to submit their proposals by 19 May 2026 (23:59 CEST Time) to Luisa Carretti and Mateusz Hoffman [CESF@netzerocities.eu]. Proposals should include and address all specific requirements related to the request which can be found below.
