OPIC Loan Links Micro Borrowers to Clean Energy Products Through Carbon Markets
December 2, 2011
(OPIC)
DURBAN, South Africa – Low-income populations’ access to clean energy products
such as clean stoves for cooking and heating, water purifiers and solar lighting
will be made easier and more affordable through a $10 million loan from the
Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC) to a financial intermediary which
links the purchase of those products to carbon markets.
MicroEnergy Credits (MEC), based in Seattle, will use the OPIC loan to pay for
the development of carbon credit programs with MEC’s partner microfinance
institutions, which will offer clean energy products to low-income micro
borrowers around the world. OPIC will be repaid by income generated through
MEC’s sale of carbon credits in carbon markets using Emissions Reductions
Purchase Agreements.
Micro borrowers will benefit from affordable access to new clean energy
technologies which are not readily available in the market place. Those products
will in turn reduce borrowers’ energy costs, improve their household health –
for example, by reducing smoke inhalation caused by less efficient cook stoves –
and enhance their productivity by extending their hours of business operation
through the use of solar lighting.
“Making clean energy technology available to individual micro borrowers and
micro entrepreneurs on a widespread basis is an important – and often overlooked
– part of the international effort to reverse climate change,” said OPIC
President and CEO Elizabeth Littlefield. “This landmark project has the
potential to transform low-income populations’ access to affordable clean energy
products, and in the process improve both their health and prospects for
economic growth. Partnering with MicroEnergy Credits to deliver innovative
financing through the use of carbon credits only makes the project more
remarkable.”
April Allderdice, CEO of MicroEnergy Credits, said “we believe microfinance
institutions, with their enormous market reach, have an important role to play
in providing access to clean energy products and services to people at the
bottom of the economic pyramid. OPIC’s investment will help MicroEnergy Credits
accelerate our growth in high potential markets with significant unmet demand
for affordable clean energy products.”
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