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
Upper Horizons hydropower scheme, Bosnia and Herzegovina
A series of dams, diversion tunnels, hydropower plants and channels will completely change the natural hydrology of eastern Herzegovina and have unpredictable impacts on wetlands, rivers and underground karst.
Ulog and Upper Neretva hydropower plants, Bosnia and Herzegovina
A 35 MW hydropower plant is currently under construction on a pristine section of the Neretva river at Ulog. Seven more plants are also planned further upstream.
Skavica hydropower plant, Albania
Instead of increasing its energy security, Albania is pushing the construction of yet more hydropower. The Skavica project may flood several villages, displace thousands of people and bring the Balkan lynx to extinction
Latest news
[Campaign update*] Georgian government and investors reject Ombudsman’s offer to mediate in controversy over Khudoni mega dam
Blog entry | 6 February, 2014The growing antagonism between promoters of the Khudoni hydropower plant project in Georgia and their local opponents from Kaishi is unlikely to ease when the investor and the Georgian Ministry of Energy boycott mediation by Georgia’s Ombudsman.
Read moreEBRD set to backtrack on environmental and social safeguards
Press release | 22 January, 2014A draft released yesterday of the Environmental and Social Policy of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development shows that, instead of strengthening the policy to provide for better implementation, the bank opens several loopholes which ensure that approval of financing is achievable for problematic projects.
Read moreEBRD environmental policy breaches on hydro plants confirmed by internal investigation
Press release | 13 January, 2014The EBRD has failed to properly assess 3 hydro projects it has approved for financing in Macedonia, Croatia and Georgia, according to bank internal investigations initiated after formal complaints by Bankwatch member groups. NGOs caution that, more than mere slips, these improper assessments are a symptom of what could be called bankers’ overconfidence – that is, a tendency to assume that all environmental damage can be ‘managed’, which from a business point of view is much more convenient than admitting that some projects simply should not go ahead.
Read moreRelated publications
Mapping the road to a just transition in central and eastern Europe: an analysis of Territorial Just Transition Plans in 7 countries. September 2023 update – part I
Briefing | 21 September, 2023 | Download PDFFollowing the brief introduction to the Just Transition Mechanism, this briefing provides an analysis of the approved Territorial Just Transition Plans and identifies what these countries actually intend to do to alleviate the impacts of the transition to carbon neutrality.
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.
