The ELENA program of the European Investment Bank: an opportunity to take the sustainability of social housing a step further
10-01-2024Social housing companies are very often looking for financial resources to renovate their properties. This does not always involve money for the renovation of roofs or joinery, the installation of high-efficiency heating systems or cavity wall insulation. In many cases it concerns budgets required for doing research and set-up systems, procedures, methods, business models and legal constructions that should enable large-scale and efficient energetic renovations of a significant number of social rental properties.
The ELENA program of the European Investment Bank (EIB) offers many possibilities here. ELANA stands for European Local Energy Assistance. With ELENA, the EIB provides technical support for investments in energy efficiency and renewable energy for buildings. It is therefore not about financing the energetic renovation of the buildings themselves, but about a subsidy program that makes funds available to investigate how investments in energy efficiency and renewable energy for buildings can be made possible.
The European Investment Bank recently organized several webinars to make the ELENA program better known in the European Member States. During one of these webinars, the Dutch housing association Parteon (www.parteon.nl) and the Flemish cooperative society of social housing companies ASTER (www.aster.vlaanderen) had the opportunity to share their experiences with the ELENA program. You can watch this webinar again at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KStvUNnRv0I.
The conclusion of both organizations was clear: thanks to the financial resources made available for technical support through the ELENA program, ASTER and Parteon were able to start or further develop new initiatives for investments in energy efficiency and renewable energy for buildings. Wichard van der Veen, senior controller at Parteon, and Sven Van Elst, general manager of ASTER, fully agreed. Thanks to the ELENA program of the European Investment Bank, the sustainability of social housing in the Netherlands and Flanders can be taken a step further.