Implementing EU energy and climate governance: Germany and Sweden as frontrunners?

A core element in the EU’s Governance regulation (Regulation 2018/1999) is the regular production of National Energy and Climate Plans (NECPs). The process involves a dialog with the European Commission intended to lead to changed and improved plans. This new policy mechanism has been characterised as ‘harder soft governance’. Although member states are not obliged to specify binding targets for renewables and energy efficiency, they must report their contribution to fulfilling the overall European target. Furthermore, they must develop a plan for how to reach these contributions (the NECP). In this article we discuss NECP implementation in the first round of establishing NECPs in two traditional climate-policy frontrunners in the EU: Germany and Sweden. A key finding is that both countries did not perceive the NECP process as particularly important for national policy-making. Central targets and measures were mainly based on policies developed independently of the Governance Regulation. However, interaction with the Commission was more important for ‘reluctant’ Sweden than ‘Governance supporter’ Germany. Our study shows that both countries eventually produced the required contributions and plans, lending support to the argument that this new regulation has some ‘harder soft governance’ elements that will influence member states.