New opportunities for eastern Europe if the EU’s bank ramps up climate ambition and quits fossil fuels
Blog entry | 13 June, 2019Ahead of the European Investment Bank’s annual governors’ meeting, several EU’s finance ministers put forward a joint non-paper “Climate for the future of Europe” with an idea to transform the EIB: make green financing its top priority and promote investments in energy and climate transition. The right initiative risks failing if not supported by the majority of the bank’s shareholders, in particular by the eastern states that wrongfully fear that EIB’s increasing ambition in climate finance will unfavorably impact the bank’s presence in their countries.
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In Georgia, leaked contract shows Nenskra hydropower project to cost country USD 60 million a year
Press release | 10 June, 2019For immediate release. Prague, Tbilisi – A leaked contract between the Georgian government and the company behind the Nenskra hydropower project includes terms that indicate the project will incur massive losses for the state, according to a report broadcast on 8 June by the national television station Rustavi 2 [1].
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Taking the chill off Romania’s residential buildings
Blog entry | 4 June, 2019Energy efficiency is taking centre stage in the Energy Union. Last summer, after long negotiations between the Parliament and the Council, a new energy efficiency target was set at 32.5 per cent by 2030. To meet the target, Romania is channelling public funds into renovating its residential sector which accounts for as much as 86 per cent of the country’s built environment.
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Indigenous communities in Georgia threatened by a major hydropower project financed with European public money
Blog entry | 10 May, 2019There are many reasons why the Nenskra hydropower plant in Georgia should not be built at all. The project is set to have devastating environmental and social impacts, and its economics are particularly shoddy.
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Slovak aspects of the EIB Energy Lending Policy
Publication | 31 March, 2019One of the biggest challenges in Slovakia is to ensure systematic support for the development of decentralised, non-fossil and sustainable energy system. The European Investment Bank (EIB) already invested far too much into fossil gas (77 per cent of a
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A review of EIB’s Energy Lending Criteria
Publication | 28 March, 2019The review of Energy Lending Criteria gives the bank the opportunity to align its energy financing with the Paris Agreement and catch up with the rapid developments in the clean energy sector, in order to provide the necessary financial boost for the d
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When the EU’s bank can’t kick the fossil fuels habit
Blog entry | 27 March, 2019As the European Investment Bank (EIB) is nowadays preparing a new Energy Lending Policy to guide its investment in energy projects, it seems the world’s largest public lender is not willing to acknowledge its contribution to climate change, the biggest crisis currently facing humanity.
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New report highlights misuse of banking secrecy rules
Blog entry | 26 March, 2019BankTrack’s study finds that client confidentiality is not an absolute legal requirement in any of the world’s major banking centres. Banks can – and do – include the right to disclose information into their contracts. Will the EIB & EBRD acknowledge this in their policies on intermediated lending?
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EIB and Volkswagen keen to return to business as usual
Blog entry | 7 March, 2019Long overdue, and short on content, a compact version of the investigation report on the role of EIB money in the Dieselgate scandal affirms Bankwatch’s revelations that helped trigger this important inquiry. But in its aftermath, there is little to suggest that the EU’s bank has done anything to ensure that the public money it manages will not be misused.
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The EU’s bank downplayed climate risk in granting record loans to Europe’s largest fossil fuel project
Press release | 7 February, 2019Brussels – In a complaint lodged today with the European Investment Bank (EIB), civil society groups protest that the bank systematically underestimated the climate footprint of a fossil fuel mega project, the Southern Gas Corridor, which helped justify providing it with major financial support using EU public money.
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