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The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) has agreed to extend a €175 million facility to PrivatBank and €150 million to Ukrgasbank as part of a program to improve Ukraine's energy security, the European financial institution said.
The lenders will use the unfunded portfolio-risk-sharing facilities to support small businesses, medium-sized corporate clients, regional municipalities and private households seeking to improve energy efficiency or generate their own energy, the EBRD said.
The banks are the first in Ukraine to join the EBRD's Energy Security Support Facility (ESSF), which is expected to partially cover risks on a total of €700 million in sub-loans for decentralised energy generation and energy efficiency, the lender said.
The facility aims to promote resilience in Ukraine in the face of repeated Russian attacks on the energy grid. Since the full-scale invasion of 2022, Ukraine has lost about 9,000 MW of generating capacity, or about half its total.
The attacks and intermittent power supply have spurred Ukrainian malls, factories, hotels, warehouses, retailers and other large businesses to double the pace of construction of rooftop solar arrays and windmills for their own use in the first half, according to national data.
In the first half of 2024, businesses in Ukraine built 200 MW of renewable power generating capacity, more than twice as much in the same period of 2023, said Dr. Stanislav Ignatiev, chairman of the Council of the Ukrainian Association of Renewable Energy, told Ukraine Rebuild Newswire last month.
