The EU Bank will finance with 250 million euros 15 wind farms that the company will build in northeastern Brazil. This is the first agreement signed between the entity and Neoenergia, a Brazilian subsidiary of Iberdrola. The 440 million euros allocated to Iberdrola distribution networks in Spain will strengthen these infrastructures and make them smarter to respond to the challenges of the energy transition
The EIB and Iberdrola announced today, at the Climate Summit (COP25) in Madrid, two new agreements to promote climate action through investments in renewable energy projects and electricity distribution networks. For this, the vice president of the EU bank, Emma Navarro, and the president of Iberdrola, Ignacio Galán, have signed two loans for a total volume of 690 million euros.
Emma Navarro, vice president of the EIB, responsible for the Bank’s climate action and its operations in Spain and Latin America, said: “We are pleased to sign these agreements at the climate summit in Madrid, because they are a great example of the efforts of the EIB to support climate action in and out of Europe. To meet the objectives of the Paris Agreement it is necessary to mobilize resources on an unprecedented scale, and the EIB wants to lead the response to this challenge. We are the EU Climate Bank and therefore we have reinforced our climate ambition. We work with the objective of mobilizing up to one billion euros in the next decade through projects that, like the ones we are supporting today, will contribute to the transition to a low carbon economy through the promotion of renewable energies. ”
Ignacio Galán has been satisfied to seal this agreement during the Climate Summit. “The motto of this COP is the need to take action and that is what we are doing today Iberdrola and the EIB: implement concrete actions that contribute to limit the increase in the temperature of the planet to 1.5oC,” he said . Galán has also recalled that Iberdrola “has already advanced to this transition 20 years ago, when we detected that the future was necessarily going through a decarbonised economy. Since then, we have invested 100,000 million euros in renewables, smart grids and efficient storage, and we have become one of the largest utilities in the world. ” Likewise, the president of Iberdrola congratulated the EU Bank for his decision to increase his climate ambition and stop financing fossil energy-based projects: “We must all be part of the solution. As leaders in sustainable financing, we believe that agreements such as those we sign today are essential to turn climate change into opportunity and leave a habitable planet for future generations. ”
Of the total amount of 690 million euros, 250 million euros will be used to finance the construction of 15 wind farms that Neoenergia, a subsidiary of Iberdrola in Brazil, will develop in the country. These new facilities will be located in three northeastern states: Paraíba, Bahía and Piauí. When they are operational, they will have a total installed capacity of 520 megawatts (MW) and will produce an annual average of 2,300 gigawatt hours of clean electricity. Its implementation will reduce CO2 emissions and increase the proportion of renewable energy in the production of electricity in the country. The investments that will be undertaken in these new parks will be executed over five years and will allow the creation of 2,300 jobs.
The EIB grants this funding under the Loan Mandate for Latin America 2014-2020, so the agreement is covered by the European Union budget guarantee. With its support for this project, the EU bank contributes to the fulfillment of the Sustainable Development Goals set by the United Nations. The EIB has been working in Latin America for nearly 30 years and one of its top priorities in the region is to promote action against climate change.
Smart power grids in Spain
The EU bank and Iberdrola have also joined forces to advance the digitization of a key infrastructure in the decarbonization of the economy: electricity distribution networks. To do this, they have signed a loan of 440 million euros to finance new investments in Spain for infrastructure that will contribute to improving the reliability of the network and the quality of the country’s supply.
Networks are a key element for the energy transition, as they favor the integration of more renewable energy, sustainable mobility, smart cities and decentralized consumption. The transformation of the networks towards an intelligent infrastructure, more reliable and secure, is putting consumers at the center of the activity, giving them greater capacity for decision and connectivity.
The EIB and climate change action
The EIB is one of the largest multilateral financing providers worldwide to fight climate change. The Bank’s objective is to lead the mobilization of the necessary financing to keep global warming below 2 ?C and limit the temperature increase to 1.5 ?C in order to meet the objectives of the Paris Agreement.
On November 14, the EIB Board of Directors approved its new climate objectives and the new energy lending policy: the Bank will gradually increase the funding for climate and environmental objectives up to 50% in 2025, in order to that the EIB Group mobilize, until 2030, at least 1 billion euros to favor investments that contribute to achieving these objectives. He also announced the purpose of aligning all the activities of the EIB Group with the Paris Agreement. To this end, the EIB will stop financing energy projects based on fossil fuels from the end of 2021.
The EIB is the largest issuer of green bonds in the world and was the first organization that carried out an issue in this market in 2007.
In 2018, the EIB provided nearly 1.3 billion euros in Spain to support climate action, financing projects aimed at the development of cleaner means of transport and the implementation of new production processes that are less polluting and more respectful of the environment. environment.
