December 7 (SeeNews) - The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), the European Investment Bank (EIB) and the E5P investment fund will provide 25 million euro ($26.8 million) in loans and grants to Moldova’s capital Chisinau to improve the energy efficiency of its public buildings, the EBRD said on Wednesday.
This is the first transaction under the EBRD’s new Green Cities Framework which supports governments, municipalities, municipal-owned and private companies to address environmental challenges in urban areas, the EBRD said in a press release. In Chisinau, municipal buildings such as kindergartens, schools and hospitals represent a source for considerable energy efficiency, it added.
The EBRD will provide 10 million euro of the total loan to finance the renovation of over 100 buildings. According to the bank’s estimates, investments in insulation and efficiency of building service equipment such as heating, ventilation and air conditioning systems can achieve energy savings of up to 50%.
Refurbishment of public buildings will be supported by another 10 million euro loan from the EIB. An additional 5 million euro will be provided by the E5P Fund as an investment grant. E5P fund is a multi-donor fund pooling contributions from the European Union.
“Chisinau is often called a green city due to its many beautiful parks. Our goal is to make Chisinau greener – more environmentally-friendly. This project represents an important milestone for the EBRD’s municipal business, given that it is the first project signed under our Green Cities Framework. We expect that many more such projects will follow,” EBRD deputy director for municipal and environmental infrastructure, Lin O'Grady said.
As part of the project, the EBRD, with grant funding from the government of Austria, will support the municipality of Chisinau to develop a Green City Action Plan to identify, prioritise and address environmental challenges, the bank said.
The EBRD is the largest institutional investor in Moldova with over 1.1 billion euro of cumulative investment in over 110 projects in agribusiness, energy, the financial sector, infrastructure and manufacturing.
($=0.9327 euro)