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SEI brief

Decarbonizing the EU’s road and construction sectors through green public procurement: the case of Estonia and Poland

Both Estonia and Poland have recognized the benefits of mandatory green public procurement (GPP) policies. While the countries have set goals to increase environmentally friendly procurement, they have not set any mandates to make these happen.

As part of a series on GPP in the EU, this policy brief compares the policies in Estonia and Poland, with a focus on the road and construction sectors, both of which can go a long way toward cutting the countries’ greenhouse gas emissions.

Kaidi Kaaret, Evelin Piirsalu, Magdalena Machlowska / Published on 14 September 2022
Citation

Kaaret, K., Piirsalu, E. and Machlowska, M. Decarbonizing the EU’s road and construction sectors through green public procurement: the case of Estonia and Poland. Policy brief. Stockholm Environment Institute, Stockholm. http://doi.org/10.51414/sei2022.031

Government spending on public works, goods and services accounts for about 14% of the EU’s GDP. Consequently, the EU and its Member States can help accelerate the development and adoption of low-carbon technologies through green public procurement (GPP).

Funded by Breakthrough Energy, this brief is part of a larger project comparing GPP uptake in different EU Member States and identifying key barriers to greater adoption, as well as opportunities ahead. Ultimately, the project’s goal is to contribute to greater policy coherence among Member States to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, as well as to increase policy support for GPP implementation and harmonized GPP target-setting. This brief studies the cases of Estonia and Poland.

Here, researchers highlight the construction and road transport sectors because of their high share of both GHG emissions and total government procurements. This highlights the large mitigation potential procurers can support by including environmental criteria in their purchasing.

Read the first brief in the series

SEI authors

Evelin Piirsalu

Senior Expert (Green and Circular Economic Transformations Unit)

SEI Tallinn

Magdalena Machlowska

Design and development by Soapbox.