The Trust fund for the Argentine Network of Municipalities against Climate Change (RAMCC) announced that for the first time it will hold a collective tender for solar panels and electric vehicles.
This is one of the many results now emerging from a new approach with bundling of investments in energy efficiency at local level throughout the country. Earlier this year, municipalities were successful in procuring LED street lighting at favourable costs through the trust fund in two separate bundled investments.
Innovative finance model deemed “highly favourable”
The establishment of the trust fund and bundling of energy efficiency projects are a direct outcome of the “project bundling”, approach that the Copenhagen Centre on Energy Efficiency, an integral part of UNEP DTU Partnership, has developed to scale up energy efficiency project implementation.
Solar panels
The tender for solar panels covers panels between 90-150W for stations or solar posts, 275-345W for on-grid installations and also includes the option for larger solar parks.
At the moment the RAMCC trust is assisting municipalities in sizing the procurement, according to the needs and energy demand of each municipality. Once this is completed, the investment with average market costs is evaluated and the technical specifications required according to the solar panels to be tendered are formulated.
Electric vehicles
Based on the experience from previous bundling, and from the ongoing tendering on solar power, RAMCC also plans to do a joint procurement of electric vehicles.
The objective is that 23 interested municipalities will make a bundled purchase through the trust fund to increase the number of vehicles and lower the costs through economies of scale.
The tendering includes both electric scooters, bicycles and cars.
A survey will be carried out in July to find out the electric mobility plans of each municipality and their current levels of experience. This survey will also include quotes for the units to estimate the amount that can be purchased through the trust fund.
Award winning thinking
Recently the law firm helping the Argentinian Network of Municipalities facing Climate Change set up a Trust for energy efficiency investments based on a UNEP DTU Partnership finance model, Beccar Varela, won the Grunin Prize for Law and Social Entrepreneurship, for their work with our partner Argentinian Network of Municipalities facing Climate Change (RAMCC) on their Trust Fund.
The prize rewards the innovation, replicability and/or scalability, and potential impact of projects and solutions developed by lawyers to advance the fields of social entrepreneurship and impact investing. UNEP DTU Partnership was proud to learn that the innovative thinking on climate change and green finance was picked up by Forbes http://bit.ly/RAMCCForbes
