DECO PROTESTE EDITORES LDA

Their core work

DECO PROTESTE is Portugal's leading consumer protection and product testing organization, part of the Euroconsumers group. In EU research projects, they serve as the bridge between energy technologies and real consumers — running engagement campaigns, testing products, organizing collective purchasing actions, and translating technical energy solutions into language and formats that households and buyers actually understand. Their role is to ensure that energy efficiency measures, renewable technologies, and labelling schemes reach and are adopted by the people they are designed for.

What they specialise in

How they've shifted over time

DECO PROTESTE's H2020 involvement began in 2017 with CLEAR 2.0, focused broadly on consumer adoption of renewable energy technologies. From 2019 onward, their work sharpened toward specific mechanisms — energy labelling uptake (BELT), collective purchasing schemes, and structured consumer actions (CLEAR-X). The progression shows a clear shift from general consumer awareness toward organized, action-oriented consumer mobilization for energy efficiency and renewables.

Moving from passive consumer information campaigns toward active consumer mobilization tools like group purchasing and collective energy actions — increasingly valuable as the EU pushes citizen-led energy transition.

How they like to work

DECO PROTESTE always joins as a partner or third party, never as coordinator — consistent with their role as a consumer voice within larger technical or policy consortia. With 40 unique partners across just 4 projects, they operate in large, diverse consortia (averaging 10+ partners per project). This makes them an accessible, low-friction partner: they slot into existing consortia to provide the consumer dimension without competing for project leadership.

Despite only 4 projects, they have collaborated with 40 partners across 19 countries — a remarkably wide European network reflecting the large multi-country consortia typical of consumer engagement projects. Their reach spans most of the EU, with no strong geographic bias beyond their Portuguese base.

What sets them apart

DECO PROTESTE brings something most technical consortia lack: direct access to millions of real consumers through their established media channels, product testing platforms, and member networks in Portugal. As part of the Euroconsumers group, they can mobilize consumer engagement at scale — not just study it. For any energy or sustainability project that needs genuine consumer adoption rather than just a dissemination checkbox, they are one of the few partners who can deliver measurable reach.

Highlights from their portfolio

• CLEAR-X
  Largest budget (EUR 443,530) and most recent project, representing the evolution toward collective consumer actions for energy — a continuation and expansion of the earlier CLEAR 2.0.
• BELT
  Targeted the specific challenge of EU energy label adoption, working across the full chain from manufacturers to retailers to consumers — a focused dissemination project with clear policy relevance.