Asleep at the wheel – Ford cuts jobs in Europe, the EU’s bank delivers for Ford in Turkey
Publication | 14 December, 2012The European Investment Bank (EIB) has come under fire in recent weeks thanks to a loan granted to Ford Europe. The EU’s bank signed off on a EUR 200 million loan to the car giant for the company’s relocation of production to Turkey not long after Ford Europe announced the shutdown of its production sites in Genk, Belgium, and Southampton in England.
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Never a dull moment in Slovene power plant soap opera
Publication | 14 December, 2012On November 30, the same day as the national government was under fire in the most heated protests Slovenia has seen in years, Slovenia’s ministers of finance and infrastructure added fuel to the flames by signing contracts with Simon Tot, director of the Sostanj lignite power plant for the controversial EUR 1.3 billion Sostanj Unit 6. These contracts prepare the ground for the signing of a state guarantee contract for a EUR 440 million loan from the European Investment Bank (EIB) for the project.
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Unsustainable energy future for EU neighbourhood region challenged
Publication | 14 December, 2012Europe’s neighbouring countries, from the Western Balkans to Ukraine, are intent on pursuing unsustainable energy futures that rely heavily on coal and nuclear. The draft energy strategy of the European Energy Community, recently open for public comments, is no big departure from the national plans, as Bankwatch found out when compiling comments to the draft – and, moreover, this reliance on coal and nuclear energy could end up receiving EU support and financing.
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Connecting Europe Facility – connecting who, and what, exactly?
Publication | 14 December, 2012The economic crisis has accelerated the development of new financial instruments for the next EU budget period in 2014-2020. The main intention behind these instruments is to deliver substantial levels of new investment money from increasingly limited public resources in order to plot a path towards Europe’s economic recovery.
Read moreBankwatch Mail 54
Publication | 14 December, 2012In the ‘aftergloom’ of two major inter-governmental get-togethers – the latest UN climate talks in Doha and the EU budget summit in Brussels – Bankwatch Mail 54 discusses the revision of the energy lending policies at both the EIB and the EBRD – an opportune moment for both banks to show real climate ambition and turn their backs on fossil fuels. In an interview the new EBRD president Sir Suma Chakrabarti shows that much is moving as the bank juggles such hot potatoes as potential support for Monsanto’s expansion into our region while trying to lay down new roots in post-Arab Spring north Africa.
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Financial alchemy in Slovenia’s energy sector still results in lignite, not gold
Blog entry | 11 December, 2012Even with the latest investment plan for unit 6 at the Sostanj lignite power plant (TES 6), the project’s economics are (surprise, surprise) still distinctly shaky as an independent analysis shows. Nonetheless, the project looks ever more likely to get a state guarantee from the Slovene government.
Read moreDirty coal gets closer to receiving almost half a billion euros from EU taxpayers
Press release | 3 December, 2012The European Investment Bank (EIB) is gearing up to pay 440 million euros to a new 600 MW lignite plant in Slovenia at a time when calls for an end to subsidies for fossil fuels are intensifying all over the world.
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First major project in Egypt reveals transparency oversight by European public banks
Blog entry | 13 November, 2012A $3.7 billion PPP oil refinery expansion in Cairo is accompanied by contradictory project documents, making a mockery of claims by the public banks involved to be committed to “good governance” or democracy. Despite being presented as merely translations of one document, the Arabic and English “versions” are entirely different – with the Arabic markedly cursory and superficial.
Read moreLetters to companies shortlisted to bid for the Plomin coal power plant
Publication | 8 November, 2012Four companies have been shortlisted and invited to submit binding bids for the construction of unit C at the Plomin coal power plant in Croatia. Croatian Bankwatch member group Zelena Akcija/Green Action sent letters to all four companies with information on the legal and economic challenges of the project and the local opposition against it.
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Public-private partnerships in the EU at lowest level for ten years, but more blood transfusions from project bonds coming soon
Blog entry | 7 November, 2012Although public-private partnerships appear to become increasingly untenable for public authorities, they are further being promoted by the European Commission and the European Investment Bank. An official in-depth evaluation of this financing model, however, is still nowhere to be seen.
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