Energy Transition Partnership (ETP) - Energy Efficiency Innovation Window Round 2

Description

The Energy Transition Partnership (ETP) is a multi-stakeholder platform that aims to accelerate the energy transition in Southeast Asia and deliver the Paris Agreement targets on climate change by bringing together government donors, philanthropies and partner governments. ETP aims to empower its partner countries to transition towards an energy system that simultaneously ensures environmental sustainability, economic growth and energy security. To achieve this goal, ETP will mobilize and coordinate the necessary technical and financial resources to create an enabling environment for renewable energy, energy efficiency and sustainable infrastructure in the region.

ETP aims to deliver joint action, improved coordination and dialogue to accelerate the energy transition in the region by addressing impediments to renewable energy, energy efficiency and sustainable infrastructure. ETP Members have come together to fund ETP to (1) support an improved delivery environment to accelerate the energy transition in Southeast Asia; (2) improve coordination between other relevant initiatives in the region, including capital investments and technical assistance; and (3) where possible and appropriate, to promote communication and knowledge-sharing among stakeholders in the region on the energy transition.

With an initial focus on Indonesia, the Philippines and Vietnam, ETP has a mandate to mobilise resources and coordinate the necessary technical assistance to create an enabling environment for the energy transition. This includes high-level technical advisory support, grant-making and capital investment programmes, capacity and skills development programs, and convening of cross-sectoral dialogues with decision- makers and broader sets of stakeholders.

The Energy Efficiency Innovation Window Round 2 will focus on the following:

Objectives: The proposed ETP Energy Efficiency (EE) Innovation Window can provide an effective pathway through which ETP can provide early-stage grant financing for innovative approaches to address the systemic problem of under-investment into energy efficiency in Southeast Asia. This will allow for a consistent, rapid, and non-duplicative assessment of the many small solicitations for EE funding that are currently being received by ETP on an ad hoc basis. If well-targeted and efficiently implemented, this EE Innovation Window can have a material impact on some of the barriers to EE investment in the target countries mentioned above, and thereby significantly improve the uptake of energy efficiency in the region.

Expected Outputs and Outcomes: ETP seeks to increase the flow of public and private investments to energy efficiency projects in the energy and end-use sectors. Overall, it is expected that the initial investment of grants through the EE Innovation Window can provide grant support for somewhere in the range of 6-12 EE projects in Southeast Asia. Grant recipients are expected to provide cost share, through co-funding of the grant at a minimum rate of 1:1 (including direct and in-kind resources), but the catalytic effect is expected to be much larger. The grant investments will act as catalysts for expanded and increased investment in the marketplace. Each $1.0 of grant funding is expected to unlock and leverage at least $10 of investment into energy-efficiency projects, products, or initiatives in Southeast Asia. These figures are based on conservative expectations for the ability of catalytic investment in energy efficiency barriers to unlock significant additional investments that can be made at positive and attractive rates of return.

Beneficiaries: The key target beneficiary group(s) of the EE Innovation Window comprise EE project developers and owners, their technical advisors, and potential investors in energy efficiency projects and businesses. EE project developers and owners may include private companies, civil society organizations, non-profit entities, sub-national governments, or energy sector institutions such as utilities and other market intermediaries. Entities are eligible as long as the grant project does not have the purpose of directly producing a financial profit. Grants to eligible entities can allow for a reasonable recovery of a grantee's overhead or operational costs up to a limit of 10% of the total project amount. The award of a grant to a private sector entity will require an additional pre-award due diligence review according to UNOPS guidelines.

Specific activities to be funded: The EE Innovation Window will seek proposals for funding focused on innovations (in either technologies, business models or engagement approaches) that address one or more of the following three categories

1. Category 1: Project Development Support
2. Category 2: Access to Energy Efficiency Finance
3. Category 3: Facilitation of Public Policy Implementation for Energy Efficiency

The EE Innovation Window will accept proposals for funding in any of these three categories, either for direct funding, or for referral to its partner organisations for consideration for input and support (see Part 3 below, on Window Mechanics and Main Activities).

Applications from or with a focus on Viet Nam are strongly encouraged.

Interested entities should return the completed forms (Annexes A, B and C) to markuss@unops.org, sirpaj@unops.org and yuchongn@unops.org by 31 January 2022.