A clash is raging between nature and finance. On the one hand, the EU is striving to improve the deteriorating state of nature across Europe, with initiatives like the Biodiversity Strategy 2030 and the European Green Deal. On the other, massive amounts of public money continue to flow to infrastructure projects with devastating impacts on the natural world. Our work where finance meets the natural world advocates for adequate protection and restoration projects to ensure a green future for all.
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Rivers and communities
The countries of the Energy Community Treaty have diverse energy mixes, but hydropower has traditionally played a strong role in many of them. Albania is almost completely reliant on dams for its domestic electricity generation, followed by Georgia with an average of 80 per cent of electricity generated by hydropower and Montenegro with an average of 55 per cent.
EU funds and biodiversity
In May 2020, EU leaders committed to an ambitious Biodiversity Strategy for 2030, outlining the clear need to act on biodiversity loss and address the failing health of nature.
The historic amount of EU funds now available represents a golden opportunity to increase biodiversity spending and fully realise the objectives of the biodiversity strategy.
As well as addressing the biodiversity crisis, strategically supporting nature through EU funds is also one of the most effective ways to tackle climate change, while providing jobs and improved health at the same time.
Yet, with many of the previous strategy’s objectives left unachieved, the pressure now mounts for this decade. Never before has there been so much potential – and urgency – to use EU funds and investments to address the biodiversity crisis.
Related projects
Dabrova Dolina hydropower plant, Croatia
A harmless-sounding mill conversion project on Croatia’s stunning river Mrežnica is a textbook example of how even small hydropower plants can damage protected areas. It also exemplifies the lack of transparency and oversight of investments that the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development channelled through commercial bank intermediaries.
Shuakhevi hydropower plant, Georgia
Georgia’s biggest and one of the most controversial hydropower plants is mostly famous for its failures. Two months after becoming operational in 2017 its tunnels collapsed. And after two years of repairs water is leaking from the dam. Shuakhevi hydropower plant (HPP) once promised to bring energy independence to Georgia. Instead it managed to collect an impressive ‘portfolio’ of problems in a wide range of areas: from biodiversity, to gender impacts, to community relations.
Nenskra hydropower plant, Georgia
The Nenskra dam is the largest of Georgia’s massive plans for hydropower installations in the Upper Svaneti region. If realized, it will deprive the local indigenous communities of their ancestral lands and traditional livelihoods, and cause an irreversible damage to the fragile river and mountain ecosystems.
Latest news
Why we’re taking legal action on renewables permitting
Blog entry | 22 September, 2023It might seem counterintuitive for organisations that promote a sustainable energy transition to challenge EU initiatives to speed up renewable energy deployment. But due to undemocratic decisions that undermine environmental safeguards and public participation, that’s what we’ve been compelled to do.
Read moreSkavica mega dam: Albanian court to scrutinise special law for U.S. contractor Bechtel
Press release | 21 September, 2023Nature conservation and human rights organisations have secured an important first milestone in the fight against the planned 210 MW Skavica hydropower plant in the Albanian municipalities of Kukës and Dibër.
Read moreRenewables boost much-needed, but weakening of environmental safeguards inexcusable
Press release | 12 September, 2023The European Parliament plenary today approved an updated Renewable Energy Directive setting a new renewable target of 42.5 per cent by 2030. The changes give a much-needed boost to small-scale solar and heat pumps, but undermine existing environmental legislation. Some renewables will be allowed to skip crucial environmental assessments and more damaging projects will be allowed in the EU’s protected natural areas.
Read moreRelated publications
Renewable energy permitting in Bosnia and Herzegovina: how to optimise the process while safeguarding the environment and public participation
Briefing | 25 July, 2023 | Download PDFThis analysis begins with an overview of the permits required for building renewable energy facilities in the two entities of Bosnia and Herzegovina: the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina (FBiH) and Republika Srpska (RS).
No recovery without citizens: why public involvement is key to Europe’s green transformation
Report | 20 June, 2023 | Download PDFThe report has been written in the frame of the Citizens Observatory for Green Deal Financing project. It brings together the direct experience of nine different civil society organisations and includes seven individual case studies providing information from the ground.
Position paper for EU Member States on applying Council Regulation (EU) 2022/2577 to accelerate the deployment of renewable energy
Position paper | 27 February, 2023 | Download PDFCouncil Regulation (EU) 2022/2577 of 22 December 2022 rightly aims to accelerate the deployment of renewable energy. But although it contains some useful provisions, it raises serious concerns about the legal basis used for its adoption, the extent to
