In North Macedonia, assisting households to make investments in green technologies not only supports climate action, but also helps them save on energy costs and improves living standards.
To support this aim, UNECE, UNDP, and IOM organized a Capacity Building Workshop in Skopje on the design of bankable project proposals for energy efficiency and renewable energy by underserved households (27 May 2024). This workshop was a follow-up to two training sessions on design and verification of energy efficiency and renewable energy projects in November 2024. These activities support the implementation of the recently launched Green Finance Facility, a new financing mechanism, that provides access to affordable green financing for small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and seven target groups of creditworthy but underserved individuals/households for investments in renewable energy (RE) and energy efficiency (EE) solutions.
The project, which sets up and operationalizes this Green Finance Facility (GFF), is supported by the UN Joint SDG Fund and the Government of North Macedonia, and is being implemented through partnership between UNDP, IOM, UNECE, EBRD, and local partner financial institutions in the country. UNECE has provided technical assistance and capacity building on RE and EE technologies for SMEs and underserved households to the project and verification consultants and developed an updated list of eligible technologies to develop EE and RE projects and monitor and verify the projects’ performance.
Under GFF, EBRD has established lines of credit with three partner financial institutions in North Macedonia: Sparkasse Bank, ProCredit Bank, and Sparkasse Leasing. Six sub-loans for a total of EUR 1.7 million have been disbursed, and four sub-loans for a total of EUR 0.9 million approved. In less than three months, applications by SMEs for twenty sub-projects worth EUR 7.7 million were submitted to GFF. Several have been already approved with loans issued and activities on purchasing and installing EE and RE equipment started.
At the opening of the workshop, Ms. Rossana Dudziak, UN Resident Coordinator, Mr. Armen Grigoryan, UNDP Resident Representative, Ms. Sonja Bozinovska Petrushevska, IOM Head of Office, and Mr. Oleg Dzioubinski, UNECE Regional Adviser on Energy, emphasized the importance of cooperation supported by the Green Finance Facility for better energy security, achieving energy and fuel savings, and safeguarding the environment in North Macedonia.
The workshop discussed specific requirements for design and financing of RE and EE projects for individuals/households; experience of project design, financing, and verification of RE and EE projects for SMEs; and the review of the application format, screening questionnaire and documentary requirements for households of target groups. Project and energy consultants and representatives of the Silk Road Bank, which will be one of the financial institutions issuing loans to the consumers, also contributed to the discussions.
The adoption of RE and EE solutions enabled by Green Finance Facility is expected to result in more than 70,000 MWh of annual energy savings, over 80,500 tons of CO2-eq emissions avoided, and 10.7 MW in new renewable energy capacity installed and will strengthen the local ecosystem for RE and EE green finance in North Macedonia.