Vice-President Fayolle at 'Green Gateway – Climate finance in action'

Thank you, Lisa, and good afternoon to you, dear Kurt, distinguished guests and – above all – our partners from the financial sector.

It is a pleasure to welcome you to the first EIB Group Green Gateway Event, supported by the European Commission’s InvestEU Advisory Hub.

Today marks an important milestone in our joint effort to scale up green finance across Europe.

Setting the scene

We are bringing together a remarkable community – partner banks, fund managers, EU institutions, national promotional banks and many other stakeholders. We all share a common purpose: to expand green financing that delivers tangible results for Europe’s businesses and citizens.

SMEs and mid-caps are the backbone of our economy, representing 99% of all European businesses. They are also on the front line of the green transition. From family-owned farms investing in sustainable agriculture to fast-growing startups developing energy efficiency technologies, these companies shape Europe’s future competitiveness.

EIB Group

The EIB Group is fully committed to supporting European competitiveness, security and strategic autonomy. In 2025, we deployed a record €100 billion in financing, with historic level of support for the green transition.

Nearly 60% of our total financing in 2025 supported green projects. This is not only good for the planet – it's critical for Europe’s competitiveness, ensuring affordable low-carbon energy and reducing dependency on fossil fuel imports.

Last year alone, the EIB Group’s engagement with European financial institutions amounted to around €35 billion. We improved funding conditions for clients – especially SMEs – through funding, guarantees and other capital relief tools. We signed a record €6 billion in securitisation agreements and expanded equity co-investment programmes.

This includes the strong support we receive from the European Investment Fund (EIF) – our subsidiary within the EIB Group that specialises in providing guarantees and equity to improve access to finance for small and medium‑sized businesses, as well as startups across Europe.

In fact, just this Monday, the EIF and Deutsche Leasing announced that they will unlock more than €1 billion for green business investment across 14 European countries.

For more than a decade, the EIB Group (EIB and EIF) has partnered with intermediaries to finance the green transition. Through intermediated products, we have supported thousands of SMEs and mid-caps while increasing the share of green windows in our operations from just 7% in 2018 to nearly 50% in 2025. This transformation would not have been possible without you.

Our collective achievements

Ladies and gentlemen, our first panel will discuss progress under the EIB Group Energy Efficiency in SMEs initiative which is on track to surpass its targets. Working with lenders across Europe, the EIB Group has doubled financing for SME energy efficiency investments through this flagship initiative launched with the European Commission and Bertrand Piccard’s Solar Impulse Foundation. The initiative will provide €17.5 billion by 2027 and will help more than 350 000 SMEs cut their energy bills, reduce their carbon footprint and strengthen Europe’s competitiveness.

Today, we will announce new partnerships with Eiffel Investment Group and Solas Capital to finance business decarbonisation and pilot energy efficiency as a service models – allowing firms to shift from purchasing equipment to procuring energy saving performance services.

While today’s event focuses on SMEs and mid-caps, we also deeply value our collaboration with our banking partners – on larger scale projects, including:

• the Wind and Grid packages,
• Power Purchase Agreement financing,
• and cleantech guarantee programmes

All aligned with and in support of the European Commission’s Clean Industrial Deal.

Together, we have achieved a great deal. Europe remains a global leader in green finance. But leadership also brings responsibility. We must ensure European businesses stay on a sustainable and competitive trajectory for the long term.

And to do that, we must simplify.

Listening to You: The Need for Simplification

You have been clear in your feedback:

• simpler rules,
• clearer frameworks,
• and greater harmonisation across the EIB Group.

We know that ensuring EU Taxonomy compliance can be burdensome, especially for SMEs. We understand the challenge of managing eligibility project by project. And we recognise that differing requirements between the EIB and EIF products can sometimes cause confusion.

So let me be clear: we are acting.

Simplifying our frameworks

In the second phase of our Climate Bank Roadmap – approved unanimously by EU Member States last September – the EIB Group committed to simplifying implementation modalities and product design, while broadening scope and increasing flexibility.

Today you will hear more about our plans to harmonise our intermediated green finance frameworks across the EIB Group. We believe this will provide the clarity and confidence needed to accelerate green financing for SMEs and mid-caps.

With your support, we also aim to create a robust, pragmatic industry standard – one that can also inform the European Commission’s reflections on simplifying EU regulations for the next Multiannual Financial Framework.

Simplifying compliance and reporting

We also want to simplify eligibility assessments and reporting. That is where our advisory services – the “Green Gateway”– play a central role.

In the final session today, we will present this advisory programme, funded under the InvestEU Advisory Hub mandate and which strengthens support across the EIB Group green financing products by:

• delivering technical webinars on sector‑specific challenges,
• providing a fully operational helpdesk for eligibility questions,
• and expanding the functionality of the EIB Group’s award-winning Group Green Checker tool (Global Capital’s “2023 Best Tech Platform Provider”), which provides a simple and efficient method for assessing whether investment projects meet EIB Group green eligibility criteria for intermediated financing.

This tool, designed for financial intermediaries, already covers:

• SME energy efficiency,
• building renovation,
• agriculture,
• transport,
• and renewable energy.

We will continue expanding it to include climate adaptation, circular economy and emerging energy service models.

Working together with the commission

I am particularly grateful to be joined today by Director-General Kurt Vandenberghe, and later by Director-General Kerstin Jorna. Their presence reflects the strong partnership between the EIB Group and the European Commission – through policy leadership, guarantees and advisory funding. This partnership is essential as we scale up.

Conclusion

Today’s event is not only about presenting our work – it is about dialogue. I encourage you to share your views. Your experience on the ground is essential to shaping tools that truly work.

Thank you once again for joining us. I wish you a productive and inspiring event.