An investment concept is a document which translates an investment project idea into financial language in order to mobilise financing for its realisation. It aims to bridge the process path between the project idea and the business/financing plan.
The purpose of an investment concept is to provide investors and financial institutions with the preliminary information necessary to assess an investment project in a simple and fast manner. It converts climate and energy plans or part of its measures into sound investment packages and thus, facilitates the access to funding for municipalities/local authorities and local public entities aggregating municipalities/local authorities.
So far, many municipalities/local authorities, groupings of municipalities/local authorities and local public entities aggregating municipalities/local authorities have developed ambitious climate and energy action plans but had difficulties to access appropriate funding. In turn, financial institutions are more and more interested in financing sustainable energy projects but have problems in finding investment projects that fulfil their requirements in terms of maturity. This document shall help in bridging this gap.
The investment concepts are developed by the beneficiary municipalities/local authorities, groupings of municipalities/local authorities or local public entities aggregating municipalities/local authorities either completely in-house if enough internal capacities are available or they can engage external experts for support. Country Experts assist beneficiaries in their respective countries in this process, but cannot be sub-contracted to develop investment concepts, as well as EUCF National Hubs.
EUCF beneficiaries have up to twelve months to develop their investment concept as from the date of the Grant Agreement signature.
The final investment concept encompasses:
The investment concept template can be developed by EUCF beneficiaries in national language and will be available for download in different languages in the EUCF website.
The EUCF provides different means of support for beneficiaries both throughout the development of the investment concept and after they have been developed and validated. Support to beneficiaries for the development of the investment concept includes:
Standard tools and documents, such as available in the knowledge hub on the EUCF website as well as the investment concept template, are provided to facilitate the development of the investment concept.
The investment concept template will be available for download in different languages in the EUCF website.
Yes. EUCF beneficiaries can develop their investment concepts in national language, if preferred. The investment concept template will be made available in the EUCF website in all languages of eligible countries. EUCF beneficiaries must fill in English a summary of the investment concept in the EUCF website user zone.
EUCF beneficiaries are highly encouraged to seek funding from investors and financial institutions and implement their investment concepts. Beneficiaries are able to share their experiences and hurdles by participating in matchmaking events, expert trainings, and other capacity building events that are organised by the EUCF. They can further benefit from the EUCF Helpdesk to address the EUCF team in case of questions regarding the implementation of the investment concept, the procedures for monitoring and reporting and the potential aggregation/joint procurement of projects.
The beneficiaries selected for EUCF support in previous calls are listed per country in the EUCF website, including a description of their investment projects. Moreover, the projects of the beneficiaries from Cascais, Girona and Leeuwarden are described more in detail in the Beneficiaries’ stories section.