The Facility

In Romania, GEFF provides finance and advice to help households to reduce residential energy costs using high-performance technologies and practices.

EBRD loaned €100 million to local participating financial institutions (PFIs) for energy efficiency and small-scale renewable energy investments, of which:

• €40 million for customers of Banca Transilvania (BT) for green home mortgages and green personal loans
• €35 million for customers of UniCredit Bank for green home mortgages
• €25 million for customers of UniCredit Consumer Financing for green personal loans

GEFF is a flexible facility. PFIs could choose to use GEFF to finance household customers or business customers, meaning:

• Household credits for high energy performance equipment and materials such as refrigerators, air conditioners, boilers, lighting, building insulation, ‘termopan’, solar panels and more;
• Home mortgages to buy low-energy new houses and apartments;
• Renovation financing to make older homes more energy-efficient;
• Business loans to help companies who supply energy efficiency or renewable energy products or services to households.

How GEFF works

There are two basic approaches:

1. Investments in high-performing, pre-approved technologies

Pre-approved technologies are eligible to be financed using GEFF without any further technical approval. All save energy, or save water, or use renewable energy. Items must meet or exceed high technical performance standards defined by GEFF engineers and set by EBRD as technical eligibility criteria for GEFF.

Eligible technologies for households include: Refrigerators and freezers; Air conditioners; LED lighting; Gas boilers; Biomass boilers; Hot water cylinders; Termopan windows and doors; Building insulation materials; Heat pumps; Solar collectors; Solar PV; Energy metering and control systems; and water-saving systems and technologies.

2. Assessed investments with free technical consultancy.

Some green investments too complicated for the simple ‘pre-approved’ approach described above. In these cases, EBRD provides free expert technical support to help identify the best solutions and ensure quality green economy projects are successfully financed.

The technical support is carried out by a local GEFF team from consultants Tractebel Engineering, working under contract to EBRD. The consultant also certifies that the investment proposal is technically eligible to be financed using GEFF.

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact the GEFF Help Desk. at Tractebel Engineering in Bucharest.