In 2021, we focused on  Climate Bank Roadmap implementation, including new approaches to help hit climate targets

“The EIB is a true climate bank now,” said Frans Timmermans, First Vice President of the European Commission, during the launch of the European Investment Bank’s Adaptation Plan at COP26. “That happened in less than three years, and in the financial sector, that’s a revolution”. The European Investment Bank’s Climate Bank Roadmap is a five-year plan that details how the EU climate bank will meet its climate and environmental sustainability commitments. Publication of the Roadmap in 2020 was a milestone. The focus is now on its implementation and developing the array of new approaches foreseen in it.

This year, our Roadmap work focused on:

• Launch of the EIB Adaptation Plan, supporting the objectives of the European Union Adaptation Strategy inside and outside the EU. We pledged to increase the share of adaptation support to 15% of the bank’s overall finance for climate action by 2025. This represents an almost three-fold increase compared with adaptation finance over the past five years. Focus areas range from flood risk and coastal management, protecting cities and resilient infrastructure to research and development in innovation for adaptation. EU clients will have access to an advisory service platform to support planning and investment for adaptation. As for clients outside the EU, our support will focus on the most vulnerable countries, particularly in the least-developed countries and in small island developing states.
• Launch of the Paris Alignment for Counterparties framework, which makes the EIB Group the first multilateral bank to consider not just the climate impact of the projects it finances, but also the wider activity of borrowers. The framework will ensure that projects financed by the EIB are Paris aligned, and that the counterparty is taking steps towards decarbonising business activity and strengthening resilience to climate change. Under the new initiative, we will offer technical support to higher emitting corporate borrowers and financial intermediaries to help them meet the goals of the Paris Agreement.
• Adoption of the comprehensive proposal of the EIB Group in support of Just Transition Mechanism,  which demonstrates how our lending, our financial instruments, and also our technical assistance and advisory services can support the regions and people with furthest to go. Inside the European Union, the EIB Group will support all pillars of the Just Transition Mechanism. Outside the European Union, we will support the Just Transition in the context of a broader development mandate. 

We also made substantial progress on the following:

• Revision of the EIB Group Environmental and Social Sustainability Framework to ensure a stronger and more systematic integration of environmental, climate and social actions into our policies and standards, including monitoring and reporting on impact and development outcomes. A public consultation took place in 2021 and the new Framework is expected to be operational in the first quarter of 2022.
• Review of the Transport Lending Policy redefining priorities for EIB support within the Climate Bank Roadmap framework and strengthening the impact of its future transport investment. A public consultation took place between July and October 2021. The new policy is expected to be approved in the first quarter of 2022.