While sustainable energy is gaining popularity around the world, not all cities have sufficient funds to initiate sustainable energy or climate projects. Aside from using available local, regional and national budgets, public authorities can consider using one of the innovative financing schemes like citizen financing.
The "Citizen Financing" handbook is one of the learning resources created within the PROSPECT peer-to-peer learning programme for cities. The handbook gives practical guidance for local and regional stakeholders, providing valuable insights into the inner workings of this mechanism. Citizen Finance is a form of fundraising where citizens pool their financial resources that will be used to fund initiatives that create common goods. The two most common and relatively advanced forms of Citizen Finance are (1) Crowdfunding and (2) Financing through cooperatives. Both of the forms are thoroughly discussed in the handbook along with the step-by-step guidelines on how to execute the fundraising, barriers, tools and good case practices.
Citizen Finance is not a conventional way to raise funds, but there are successful examples where it has been used for adequately funding Sustainable Energy and Climate Action projects. Some of the best practices can be found in the handbook as well. You can download the handbook below.
