About Us

Established on the eve of the 1992 Rio Earth Summit to help tackle our planet’s most pressing environmental problems, the Global Environment Facility (GEF) has provided over USD 17.9 billion in grants and mobilised an additional USD 93.2 billion in co-financing for more than 4500 projects in 170 countries. It has achieved this by providing additional grant and concessional funding to achieve global environmental benefits by covering the agreed incremental costs for environmentally sound development programs and projects, in accordance with national development priorities and requirements.

Today, the GEF is an international partnership of 183 countries, international institutions, civil society organizations and the private sector that addresses global environmental issues.

Recognising India’s efforts towards a low emission-economy and focusing on energy efficiency programmes, the Global Environment Facility (GEF) has partnered with Energy Efficiency Services Limited (EESL) for the project ‘Creating and Sustaining Markets for Energy Efficiency’, under its GEF-6 cycle

The project aims to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions through energy efficiency through scaling up and new technology applications. The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) are the implementing agencies for the project, and EESL is the executing agency. German state-owned development bank KfW will be a co-financing partner and will contribute to increasing EESL’s overall business operations.

This five-year project (2018-2022) involves a total funding of USD 453 million comprising of a GEF grant of USD 18.85 million and Co-financing of USD 434.2 million from ADB, UNEP, KfW and EESL. The project also includes the setting up of an Energy Efficiency Revolving Fund (EERF) for sustainable funding mechanism of energy efficiency projects. Out of the USD 18.85 million grant available under the project, USD 13 million has been earmarked for Energy Efficiency Revolving Fund (EERF). The main objective of the proposed ‘Energy Efficiency Revolving Fund’ (EERF) mechanism will be to support ‘proof of concept’ investments and scale up energy efficiency financing of identified EE projects and programs in India.

The project aims to achieve its targets through both investment and technical assistance by:

  • Expanding and sustaining investments in existing market sectors, and support a certain portion of EESL’s existing installation target
  • Building market diversification: development and implementation of new ESCO business models through installation of new technologies
  • Replication and scaling up: Developing a long-term growth strategy based on collected lessons, experiences and insights.

The project aims to achieve a cumulative energy savings of 38.3 million GJ by 2022, and 137.5 million GJ by 2032, which will mitigate around 60 million tons of CO2 equivalent by 2032.