Setting targets for local energy planning: Critical assessment and a new approach

This paper begins with a critical assessment of existing targets set in the context of local energy planning, in order to understand how they were defined and the implications of different methodological choices. Here, the drawbacks found on current practices call for the need of a new methodology that answers to two fundamental requisites: being able to reflect local characteristics and past accountability, by taking into account the starting point; and being quantitatively coherent with existing long-term goals. The paper then presents an alternative approach for target setting that corresponds to the referred requisites, and illustrates the implications through the application to nine municipalities in the Metropolitan Area of Porto.