January 17, 2014 | Read more Zelena akcija/Friends of the Earth Croatia has submitted a complaint to the Croatian Constitutional Court as part of its ongoing campaign to prevent the construction of the Plomin C power plant, which would be run on imported coal.
January 16, 2014 | Read more Banja Luka – Bosnia and Herzegovina is failing on its Energy Community obligations by allowing Stanari lignite plant to pollute 2-3 times more than EU standards, shows an official complaint submitted today by NGOs Center for Environment from Banja Luka and ClientEarth to the Vienna-based Energy Community Treaty secretariat.
January 13, 2014 | Read more The 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.
January 10, 2014 | Read more Six months after the Egyptian army deposed Egypt’s first freely elected president, the weak democratic signals by the authorities are overshadowed by widespread repression. How can the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development possibly help under these circumstances? Or put differently: Will the limited benefits to the country’s private sector from EBRD engagement really be enough to outweigh the harm done by the bank’s support for an undemocratic regime?
December 19, 2013 | Read more On December 18 the EBRD board of directors approved a loan of USD 50 million to finance a project aimed at the expansion of oil operations and reducing gas flaring in Egypt. Yet the tenuous political situation in the country continues to raise concerns about the bank’s ability to make a positive contribution towards the democratic process, and whether it should be investing there at all.
December 13, 2013 | Read more At a closer look the EBRD’s new energy strategy, complimented for the restrictions it places on coal lending, reveals a shocking lack of operational knowledge to implement the ambitions outlined in its executive summary.
December 10, 2013 | Read more The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) approved today during a vote of its Board of Directors a new Energy Strategy. The document is meant to give guidance on how to strategically use the bank’s resources over the next years to promote energy security and affordability and avoid dangerous climate change.
December 9, 2013 | Read more The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development has been approving financing for coal projects over which corruption allegations loom, and in some cases even while official corruption investigations were underway, according to an analysis published by CEE Bankwatch Network today.
December 6, 2013 | Read more With only a few weeks to go now until final crucial decisions are taken that will determine Hungary’s EU spending plans for the next seven years, Bankwatch’s Hungarian member group MTVSZ decided last week that it was about time the Hungarian government got its house in order when it comes to beneficial EU allocations for cutting domestic energy bills, stimulating the Hungarian economy and fighting climate change.
December 4, 2013 | Read more On November 28, the state nuclear regulator of Ukraine (SNRIU) allowed the continued operation of unit 1 of the South Ukrainian nuclear power plant (SUNPP-1) until December 2, 2023 – 10 years beyond its technically designed lifetime. The decision not only constitutes a breach of national regulation, but also disregards an unresolved case of non-compliance with the UN Espoo Convention. All this while Energoatom is in an increasingly tight financial situation.
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