The INSPIRenov Project and Alliance

15.03.2025

Energy efficiency improvements to residential buildings can be costly, and homeowners might not have the funds to pay for them. In order to address this problem and close the financial and investment gaps, it is crucial to create new financial instruments, such as commercial bank loan products combined with public funding.

Did you know, that the INSPIRenov Project (FINancial Schemes for Providing Innovation in the Energy Renovation) that started in 2023 aims to develop financial instruments and commercial bank products for the renovation of residential buildings in Bulgaria, using the examples from Estonia and Hungary?

The Estonian Union of Co-operative Housing Associations is happy to contribute to the project by sharing the experience and providing the expertise on working with financial institutions and commercial banks for developing financial instruments for non-profit apartment associations in Estonia, and maximizing the effective usage of INSPIRenov results by financial stakeholders across Europe via a new international cooperation and mutual learning community – INSPIRenov Alliance.

INSPIRenov results will contribute to increased private sector investments and better use of public funding by developing, introducing and testing a blended financing scheme to be used in order to provide access to private financing of energy efficiency renovation.

The final blended financing scheme will be supported by a risk-sharing mechanism and secured by loan-guarantees and other financial instruments. The commercial loan component will be structured in a way to match the homeowners’ financial habits – taking into consideration optimal grant rate intensity from a public budgetary point of view and relevant business interests of commercial banks.

The project’s final results will be used in Bulgaria and will encourage the wave of renovations in other European countries with comparable housing stock and financial circumstances.

Find out more about the INSPIRenov project and INSPIRenov Alliance from the presentation of Adrian Balaci, Senior Expert at the Project INSPIRenov, speaking at the 11th Baltic Housing Conference in Tallinn, 10.09.2024.