The meeting ‘Silesia after coal: a workshop on social climate policy in the region’, jointly organised by the Polish Green Network and the BoMiasto Association, took place in Katowice on 15 February.
The leading topic of the workshop was the Social Climate Fund (SFK) – a fund that Poland will be able to use from the beginning of 2026 due to the entry of a new system of greenhouse gas emission fees, the ETS2. This is a new iteration of the current ETS, which will cover two further sectors of the economy, namely transport and construction. The SFK will aim to mitigate the impact of this change, particularly for vulnerable consumers. This topic still needs to be discovered to most of the public, including the local government representatives who gathered for the workshop, so the campaigners from Polish Green Network focused on communicating the key assumptions and plans for the SFK. They discussed the EU climate policy, i.e., the context in which the Fund will be introduced and the process that Poland will have to follow to receive these funds (as this requires the comprehensive preparation of a so-called Social Climate Plan). We signalled what the national work on the Plan could and should look like. Representatives of local self-governments reflected on their potential participation and scope of interest in planning the use of the funds envisaged for Poland.
The second element we included in the event was a presentation of a representative of the BoMiasto Association, on the situation and potential of energy cooperatives in the context of the transformation of Silesia. The presenter talked about the concept of energy cooperatives, the prospects for further development and where and how interested parties can expand their knowledge in this area. The workshop authors unanimously highlighted the potential of cooperatives and other prosumer solutions in the context of developing the Social Climate Plan. The meeting was the third in a series of workshops and webinars on the Social Climate Fund of the Polish Green Network and Partners. The event gathered 30 participants.
