LIFE BUILD UP Skills national skills platforms
Grants for organisations bringing national partners together to plan workforce skills for energy-efficient buildings and attract people to energy-efficiency professions.
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BUILD UP Skills funds national initiatives that bring public authorities, industry, education and training providers, trade unions and researchers together. The main focus is the skills needed for construction and renovation, including renewable energy in buildings. The platform may also prioritise the professions named in the Energy Efficiency Directive: energy-service providers, energy auditors, energy managers, independent experts, installers of building elements and providers of integrated renovation work.
Your project should establish or renew a permanent national skills platform, analyse gaps in the workforce and qualifications, and prepare a national roadmap. The roadmap needs priority measures, a timetable, responsible actors, resources and financing, and arrangements for endorsement by national stakeholders, including public authorities. Build on existing national initiatives and cooperate closely with the BUILD UP Skills Community of Practice, BUSUnited.
A substantial national communication campaign should promote skilled professionals, encourage further training and attract new people to energy-efficiency careers. The call indicates at least 30% of project resources for this campaign, rather than setting a fixed minimum. Include online and in-person activities, with roadshows in selected cities, tailored to the identified gaps and audiences.
The 2026 rules reimburse eligible project costs at up to 95%. The Commission considers an EU contribution of €1–1.5 million appropriate, but permits other requested amounts. Infrastructure costs are excluded. Limited equipment costs may qualify only when indispensable for the action and depreciated over the project lifetime. Grants cannot produce a profit. This supports an organisation's national skills initiative; it does not provide individual course subsidies or household renovation rebates, and onward financial support to third parties is not allowed under this topic.
Explain the results and quantify the required skills, campaign and energy impacts for the end of the project and five years afterwards.
Eligibility
- The 2026 topic targets Belgium, Cyprus, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Luxembourg, Malta, Portugal, Slovenia, Sweden, Iceland, Moldova, North Macedonia, Montenegro and Ukraine. Your national platform and roadmap work must address one or more of these countries. Only one platform will be supported in each country.
- Applicants normally need to be public or private legal entities established in an eligible LIFE country: an EU Member State, including overseas countries and territories, or a participating non-EU country. The coordinator must be established in an eligible country. A single applicant is permitted; this topic does not require three applicants from three countries.
- Partners from eligible countries outside the target list may join if you explain their role in delivering the work in the target countries. Small exchanges with more advanced platforms in other eligible countries are allowed. Large-scale dissemination or replication to or from non-target countries is outside this topic's scope.
- Individuals are excluded except self-employed sole traders whose business has no separate legal personality. International organisations are eligible and exempt from the country-establishment rule. Entities without legal personality may participate exceptionally if their representatives can undertake legal obligations and provide equivalent protection of EU financial interests. Other-country entities can exceptionally receive funding when the granting authority considers them essential; this does not remove the eligible-country coordinator requirement.
- Applicants from countries negotiating association with LIFE may participate, but the association agreement must enter into force by the end of selection before a grant can be signed. It must cover the Clean Energy Transition part of LIFE and the year of this call, including retroactively where needed.
- An association or other membership organisation may apply as one beneficiary. If its members carry out the work, those members must also join as beneficiaries or affiliated entities; otherwise their costs are ineligible.
- EU bodies cannot join the project partnership, except the Commission's Joint Research Centre. Organisations subject to EU sanctions cannot participate in any role. Organisations covered by EU measures protecting its budget under Regulation 2020/2092 cannot hold funded roles. This includes Hungarian public-interest trusts established under Hungarian Act IX of 2021 and any entity they maintain.
- Demonstrate substantial initial interest through letters of support from relevant national stakeholders, including public authorities. You need sufficient finances to deliver the work and provide your contribution, and a team with the qualifications, experience and resources to implement a project of this size. CINEA assesses operational capacity through the proposal's resources criterion and team/participant information. The normal financial-capacity check for coordinators excludes public bodies, international organisations and requests of €60,000 or less.
- Completed projects are excluded. Projects already underway are assessed individually, and costs for activities before the project start or proposal submission cannot be reimbursed.
- Do not declare the same costs under two EU grants. Outside EU Synergies actions, one action may receive only one EU-budget grant. Combining an operating grant is possible only when this project sits outside its work programme and the costs remain separately accounted for.
How to apply
- Status
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- Åpner
- Søknadsfrist
- Vilkår for søknadsrunden
- Closed 2026 single-stage intake. Main work must address the countries targeted by BUILD UP Skills; at least one eligible-country applicant.
The 2026 single-stage intake is closed. Use CINEA's topic page and the 2026 call document to identify the funded work and conditions.
For the 2026 round, proposals had to be submitted electronically through the Funding & Tenders Portal under LIFE-2026-CET-BUILDSKILLS, using the forms in its submission system. Register beneficiaries, affiliated entities and associated partners in the Participant Register before submission to obtain their participant identification codes (PICs). Selected beneficiaries and affiliated entities undergo legal-status validation before the grant agreement is signed; associated partners participate without funding and do not need validation.
Include the topic-required stakeholder letters of support and explain your national platform, skills analysis, roadmap and campaign.