ELENA - European Local ENergy Assistance

The ELENA facility is provided within the framework of the IEE II programme (Intelligent Energy Europe) and supports local and regional authorities in contributing to the “20-20-20” initiative of the EU, i.e.

• reduce greenhouse gas emissions by at least 20%, and/or
• increase the share of renewable energies in energy consumption to at least 20% and/or
• improve energy efficiency by at least 20%, all by 2020.

The KfW-ELENA facility offers an approach in order to mobilize sustainable investments of small and medium sized municipalities and, where appropriate, Energy Service Companies (ESCOs).

KfW-ELENA consists of two elements:

• ELENA grant from the European Commission for Project Development Services
• global loans to local participating financial intermediaries (PFIs) in order to target smaller investments (volume up to EUR 50 million).

Eligible Participating Financial Intermediaries are banks operating in the eligible countries (EU member states, Norway, Iceland, Liechtenstein and Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia) motivated to expand their lending to municipalities for the financing of sustainable energy projects.

Eligible Final Beneficiaries for the ELENA grant are local or regional authorities and other public bodies within IEE participating countries including those under the Covenant of Mayors Initiative, or groupings of such bodies, mainly in the small and medium-sized range.

Participating Final beneficiaries apply to the ELENA grants directly via Partnering Financial Intermediaries (not direct via KfW). Application for ELENA grants is combined with application for financing of the Investment Project.

Currently KfW has signed agreements with BPCE in France, 'Erste Bank der österreichischen Sparkassen' in Austria, 'KommuneKredit' in Denmark, 'Cassa depositi e prestiti' in Italy and 'Bank Handlowy w Warszawie' in Poland. Since January 2016 no additional partnerbanks and countries can be included.

For more information on assistance for actors from the public sector and their advisers working on energy efficiency and renewable energy at the local and regional level, please consult the ManagEnergy platform. ManagEnergy is a technical support initiative of the Intelligent Energy - Europe (IEE) programme of the European Commission.