IRISH BUILDINGS ENERGY EFFICIENCY PLATFORM

The project consists of an investment platform supporting energy efficiency investments in privately owned housing (homeowners and non-commercial private landlords). The scheme will be supported by a guarantee structure benefiting from Irish budget funds as a first loss piece, a mezzanine tranche and a senior tranche provided by EIB, with the Irish NPB SBCI acting as implementing partner. The operation will be part of the Irish Climate Action Plan and as such will significantly contribute to EIB's Climate Action targets.

This project is a guarantee scheme for low-cost residential retrofit loans. It forms part of Ireland's Climate Action Plan and National Recovery and Resilience Plan. The Irish budget supported loan guarantee scheme will provide risk protection to credit institutions participating in the scheme. This will enable them to offer loans with reduced interest rates and longer tenors to make comprehensive home energy efficiency upgrades more affordable to households and non-corporate landlords.

This operation involves financing energy efficiency projects in residential buildings in Ireland and aims to significantly stimulate demand. As a result, the operation will contribute to Ireland's key priorities of the Climate Action Plan (CAP) of reducing energy consumption, curtailing greenhouse gas emissions, and improving both the reliability and security of energy supply in the country. In parallel, the operation will support job creation and economic growth, while also improving health and local air quality. Energy efficiency addresses multiple market failures, such as environmental externalities and imperfect information. The financing of this operation is in line with the Bank's Energy Lending Policy, where energy efficiency and building rehabilitation are seen as a priority.

The EIB Group supports the first dedicated Energy Efficiency retrofit scheme for private homeowners with an innovative financing scheme involving sophisticated risk sharing mechanisms between all involved stakeholders and complementing a government funded grant scheme. A long term EE retrofit loan product for a broad range of Irish home-owners has not been available at scale in the Irish market yet.

The guarantee scheme builds on the positive experience with SBCI in SME financings and supports the Irish NPB to launch for the first time a financing tool dedicated to private individuals and targeting 100% Climate Action.

The operation is of high quality in terms of its economic and ESG performance.

The EIB will require the intermediary bank (SBCI) to make sure that the final recipients comply with the relevant EU environment legislation, including the applicable national legislation, provided that it is in conformity with EU rules. The related investments in energy efficiency and building integrated renewable energy will be implemented in existing residential buildings without changing the pre-authorised scope. An Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) is therefore not required under the EIA Directive 2011/92/EU (amended by the EIA Directive 2014/52/EU). The EIB's services will nevertheless review during the project appraisal whether any of the investments fall under Annex II of the EIA Directive, as well as any other environmental aspects.

The EIB will require the intermediary bank (SBCI) to make sure that the final recipients comply with the relevant EU procurement legislation.

Civil engineering activities.