The Energy Savings Insurance (ESI) Europe 2.0 project aims to: (i) replicate the successful innovative financing scheme ESI (currently being implemented in Italy, Portugal and Spain with the ESI Europe funded by the EU’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme) in three high potential countries in Europe – Croatia, Greece & Slovakia; (ii) hold capacity building, and marketing and promotion activities targeting key market stakeholders to help them understand the model and facilitate access to EE finance; & (iii) to create tools to promote & enable the further replication of ESI across Europe. The ESI model consists of financial & non-financial mechanisms designed to work together to improve the risk-return profile of EE investments & overcome the associated barriers to stimulate the demand for EE projects. It consists of: (i) a standardised contract, which clearly establishes the setup to guarantee energy savings to the SME; (ii) a performance insurance that is used to compensate the SME in case the EE project does not reach the expected energy savings; & (iii) validation mechanisms that provides an independent assessment & verification of the project. These three mechanisms work together to create trust & credibility between actors, & convince SMEs to invest in EE. The model is supported by communications, dissemination & outreach activities, as well as capacity building & EE investment roundtables targeting key market stakeholders, including technology providers with EE solutions, financial institutions, SMEs & others, to create dialogue between the relevant stakeholders & facilitate access to EE finance. The ESI model presents a proven & unique, market based approach that makes use of distribution channels & products that are already available on the market. The ESI mechanisms is complementary to other schemes & available funding, such as green credit lines, credit guarantees, or energy audits.

The overall objective of the project is setting up the Roundtables to implement smart finance for smart buildings initiative (SF4SB) in Slovakia and the Czechia, working out with stakeholders roadmaps and action plans aimed at developing the three pillars that underpin the initiative and launch implementation of the roadmaps with implementing short-term measures agreed in the roadmaps and the action plans before end of the project. The Roundtables dedicated to energy efficiency investment will be permanent multilateral discussion forums gathering the relevant stakeholders such as government, regional authorities and municipalities, financial sector, ESCOs, homeowners, operators throughout the energy efficiency value chain and construction sector. The majority of operators in the construction sector in are SMEs (large proportion are micro enterprises). Moreover, many SMEs in the energy efficiency value chain, particularly in energy performance of buildings, are essential for market disruptive innovations that are making the energy transformation in building sector successful. Therefore, the project will put particular focus on SMEs. An essential aim of the renovation efforts in both countries will be organizing renovations into larger blocks to benefit from better financing conditions and economics of scale. Therefore, the roadmaps will underpin the necessary coordination and support for creating a large-scale pipeline of bankable projects through aggregation of large number of small projects to feed the financial schemes developed by the financial sector with investment packages of a critical size for making the use of the private sources of financing as efficient and effective as possible.

The Project will commence implementation of the Roadmap established and endorsed under Pillar I Build Up Skills project in the Czech Republic. Specifically, the project will implement measures 1, 2, 3, 5, 7 and 9 of the Roadmap. Moreover, the project will continue (as follow up to BUS StavEdu project) in implementing the Roadmap established and endorsed under Pillar I Build Up Skills project in Slovakia. Specifically, the project will focus on measures 1.2, 1.4, 1.6 and 2.6 of the Roadmap. The Project will set up in the Czech Republic the national qualification and training scheme for craftsmen and on-site workers in the field of energy efficiency and use of renewable energy sources in buildings. It will also develop the training offer delivered via Slovak national scheme STAVEDU. Capitalising on the language proximity, the project will facilitate transfer of know-how and experience from the STAVEDU and Train-to-NZEB (H2020 GA no. 649810), as well as Fit-to-NZEB (H2020, GA no. 754059 ) projects between Slovakia and the Czech Republic. Particularly the project will lead to: • Development of 7 training programmes for further education and training of craftsmen and on-site workers in the field energy efficiency and use of renewable energy sources of buildings. • Development of on-site training course based on the training course developed by CrossCraft project (IEE project BUS Pillar II); • Development of training courses for further education and training of craftsmen and on-site workers in the field energy efficiency and use of renewable energy sources of buildings; • Setting up permanent network of trainers delivering the programmes developed under the project; • Training of trainers for delivery of the programmes; • Development of e-learning programme for targeted craftsmen and construction professionals in Austria, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic and Slovakia; • Proposals to governments for incentives boosting demand for highly qualified workers.

The proposed project intends to support Member States in establishing or improving national and local schemes for SMEs to undergo energy audits and implement cost-effective recommended energy-saving measures. An initial work of policies and programmes mapping will be followed by an in-depth understanding of their strengths and weaknesses, with the aim of overcoming the current criticalities and bottlenecks. At the same time a work of characterisation of SMEs in terms of energy consumption, size and sector will be carried out to understand effective ways to properly address existing and innovative energy audit policies. Provided a continuous interaction (by means of workshops, questionnaires, meetings) with policy makers as well as SMEs and ESCOs/Energy Auditors associations, a set of policy proposals and recommendations will be then developed and diffused. The priorities guiding the policy and recommendation development will be: - Effectiveness and orientation to real market needs; - Integration with other points of the EED, particularly article 7 Energy Efficiency Obligation Schemes and alternative measures; - Replicability, at least for SMEs sector/size/region; A fundamental part of the project, with a relevant participation requested to each partner, will be a continuous action of capacity building and dissemination addressed to policy makers and relevant stakeholders at European, National and Regional level. In order to concentrate the efforts on new challenges and to valorise previous efforts, the Consortium is committed to take as much advantage as possible of results obtained in previous pertinent EU funded projects (such as ENSPOL, ODYSSEE-MURE, EPATEE) and relevant initiatives such as EEFIG and its related Sustainable Energy Investment Forums. On request of the European Institutions, the Consortium would also be very glad to contribute, through findings and results of the project, to the current debate on the SME definition.

MultEE aims to improve the ease and quality of energy efficiency (EE) policy planning and implementation in the project’s partner countries and beyond, addressing the challenges of evidence-based policy-making in a multi-level governance setting. It contributes to making EE and sustainable energy planning vertically consistent between the national, regional and local level, to facilitating horizontal coordination between policy levels and to improving the quality of monitoring energy efficiency. The project pursues a two-faceted, yet integrated, approach in order to reach this objective: (1) building on a mapping of European best practices and experience from a pilot project carried out by the lead partner, country-specific solutions for effective monitoring and verification (M&V) based on bottom-up data will be developed and their implementation supported; (2) the implementation of innovative M&V schemes will be facilitated via coordination mechanisms developed and introduced together with the partners, aimed at spurring on exchange and cooperation between policy levels. The project pays particular attention to providing opportunities for peer learning between old and new EU Members States and neighbouring countries from Southeast Europe to partner countries from the EU and its South-Eastern neighbourhood as well as to disseminating results beyond partner countries and to other policy areas. One of the specificities of multEE is that its activities target the interplay between administrative levels rather than focusing on a single one of them. Particular focus will be put on capacity-building for the entities and officials involved with EE planning in the partner countries. MultEE will be put in practice by experienced partners within a strong consortium led by GIZ, drawing upon solid experience and a well-established network of contacts to ensure dissemination and high impacts within and beyond the project.