The new package of targeted financing is hoped to mobilise up to €115bn ($115.5bn) of new investments by 2027 in renewables, energy efficiency, grids and storage, electric vehicle charging infrastructure, and breakthrough technologies.
Coming as a bid to help the European Union to offset imports of Russian fossil fuels, the move from the EIB is anticipated to improve the continent’s energy security over the medium term to avert future supply shocks.
The REPowerEU plan, unveiled in May this year (2022), set the target of seeing Europe domestically produce 10 million tonnes of low-carbon hydrogen by 2030, while importing a further 10 million tonnes by the same deadline.
Read more: €200m for hydrogen research in REPowerEU Plan
According to the EIB, the package of support for some efficiency projects could result in lower gas demands in 2023.
Werner Hoyer, President of the EIB Group, said, “This horrible war and Russia’s blackmail over gas supplies affirmed that our dependency on fossil fuels is a critical security vulnerability.
“It’s about time we finally ended this dependency. The EIB is determined to mobilise the full scale of its financial resources in support of the joint effort, and work with the private sector to maximise the impact of our investment.”
The announcement from the EIB comes after European Commission President, Ursula von der Leyen, in May (2022) said Europe’s switch to renewables and hydrogen will make the region truly independent of Russia.
Additionally, on Tuesday (October 25), European Commission Executive Vice-President, Frans Timmermans told European Hydrogen Week that hydrogen is at the top of the European Green Deal agenda.
Read more: Hydrogen at the top of European Green Deal agenda, says European Commission Executive Vice-President
Furthering the EIB investments, the Group’s directors have introduced a temporary extension to exemptions to the EIB Group’s Paris Alignment for Counterparties (PATH) framework, which will be extended to all renewable energy projects inside the EU.
The exemption, set to run until 2027, subject to a climate bank roadmap, is hoped to allow EIB financing of a greater number of clean energy projects to contribute to the EU’s climate and energy security objectives.