 Good afternoon everybody, welcome back for the, by far, the most important and interesting session of the day, the one that we're doing, and it is kind of the centre of everything because it's finance, and in every discussion we've had through the morning panels, through the side conversations, in some of the events we had yesterday, finance keeps coming up around energy efficiency in terms of just the need you'll have seen in the analysis that we put out today that if we're to achieve our targets, if energy efficiency is to do what it's capable of in getting us towards net zero as well as building greater resilience, reducing bills and all the other benefits that we've been talking about, global investment in energy efficiency has to triple this decade. That's quite a bit of extra investment. On the other hand, energy efficiency compared to some of the things on our menu for decarbonisation tends to rely on relatively mature technologies and also technologies and solutions that pay for themselves through energy savings, through carbon savings, through wider benefits such as health, reduced pollution, better lifestyles, and yet it is, as we all know, difficult to finance energy efficiency and distant to unlock finance for energy efficiency and we've all seen cases where at a project level or a wider level energy efficiency opportunities go untapped even though the business case is extremely strong because the upfront capital isn't available or the business model isn't in place to really deliver that and we're here to discuss about getting finance moving and we have some excellent speakers who know how to do this, have done it themselves and are going to share some experiences and lessons with us and as I've said to the speakers here, our entire team for this conference is action. Everybody leaves here tomorrow a little better fed, a little sunned up from the weather outside, but with concrete things they can do when they go back to their industries, their governments, their workplaces, concrete ideas that they've learned from each other and from other people in terms of what works in this case to get finance moving. So I'm going to introduce all of our illustrious speakers as we go through. Colleagues, we have a lot to talk about in a limited time, so as succinct as you can be it means we can extend the conversation. But I do want to make sure everybody gets to share their wisdom and we'll do it in turn. So I'm going to turn first to someone who really does know about this topic and he knows about it in a key area which is Africa. As you know, we will be in Africa this time next year for the first time we've held our global conference in Africa in Nairobi which we're delighted about. And so some of these issues were starting a discussion today that will continue for the next year and beyond. And Dr. Kevin Kariyuki is the Vice President of the African Development Bank, a leading institution in this area and Kevin is a leading individual, a leading actor in this area. So Kevin, thank you for joining us and maybe I could just start by asking you to tell us a bit about what the African Development Bank does in energy efficiency and the kind of solutions it offers, please. Thank you very much, Brian. I think let me start by saying that the situation in Africa regarding energy efficiency in the electricity sector in particular is very somewhat different from other parts of the world. And I say this because you have about 600 million people without access to electricity and this amounts to about 43 percent of the population in Africa. Additionally, the per capita energy usage on the sub-Saharan is about 500 kilowatt hours per year which is broadly equivalent to about what a fridge would consume in the U.S. As most African countries have an electricity deficit, the factors that influence their energy efficiency considerations vary based on national and regional context. For instance, in countries such as Morocco and Tunisia where there's universal access to electricity, the motivating factor may be the management of the summer peak. While in countries such as Kenya, Senegal and Rwanda, while electricity connections have risen significantly in the recent past, load balancing and strengthening of the power systems would probably be the priority. But at the same time, African countries are increasingly referencing energy efficiency in their national determined contributions and policy frameworks often emphasize clean cooking, which we spoke about at lunch, which is only right because about one billion people in Africa do not have access to clean cooking. So that's on the one side. However, the readiness of African countries in establishing sustainable energy for efficiency markets is low. And in my view, I'll say this is largely attributed to the lack of incentives on the part of utilities as well as unavailability of financing mechanisms. As I said, the energy basis is quite low, so efficiency probably has not been a priority. However, there is need to address the barriers and gaps based on country and customer category in terms of residential, commercial, industrial or public specificities. Furthermore, considering the relatively new energy efficiency market on the continent, African government should facilitate the creation of sustainable energy efficiency markets by investing energy efficiency retrofit programs in public facilities and creating enabling environment. This is very important for super energy service companies. This is because energy service companies have the potential to address the barriers to large scale implementation of energy efficiency. And ESCO projects, for example, just like the large scale renewable energy programs have done. So coming to financing, public financing remains important for the attainment of the SDG7 targets across Africa. But it is the private sector that potends the most promise by its capacity to provide innovative, rapid, cost-effective and scalable solutions for universal energy access and energy efficiency. With the foregoing in mind, I want to give you examples of what the African Development Bank is doing to spearhead several initiatives and blended finance approaches. I'm looking at somebody who was asking me about it, to scale up energy efficiency. And this includes, for example, in Morocco and Kenya, we have provided technical assistance to develop ESCOs. In Morocco, this is a dedicated standalone entity, while in Kenya, it's a utility-based one, super ESCO. This is also critical. We have approved $5 million Africa Super ESCO Acceleration Program using resources from one of our bank funds called Sustainable Energy Fund for Africa. And the first phase of the program will be to support up to three countries to develop super ESCOs on the continent. We also approved financing to the Government of Egypt to support an electricity and green growth support program, which included energy efficiency related to policy measures leading to the approval of the Second National Energy Efficiency Action Plan. We are also working with the Government of Senegal on a project to replace about 5 million inefficient lights in households, shops and public administrative settings. It is anticipated that this project will stimulate demand for efficient lighting. And we actually hope that a similar project should apply to air conditioning and refrigeration as well. And I'll explain maybe later if I get a chance. Moreover, in 2022, the bank approved equity investment in what we call the African Gold Green Fund, which focuses on renewable energy and energy efficiency and covers green appliances, industrial efficiency, immobility, and green housing. Finally, the bank is currently exploring the provision of tail-eyed financing to commercial banks and other financial intermediaries to complemented by technical assistance and institutional support to unlock increased local currency financing in the energy efficiency industry. For instance, we are in an advanced discussion with the National Development Bank in East Africa to consider how we could best support energy efficiency investments in agribusiness and in transport sector. Let me stop there, Brian. Thank you very much, Kevin. And congratulations. It's an impressive range of activities. And I notice you mentioned during your remarks, Kevin, about the roles of public versus private funding. And so from your perspective as an international financial institute, what's the respective role do you think about an IFI like yourselves versus the commercial banks? I think the one thing, and let me talk for the African Development Bank in this particular case, we have very strong, we are owned by the African governments. So by virtue of the fact that we are owned by African governments, we are considered to be trusted partners. And we can use that positioning in a very strong way to inform and advocate for policy changes in particular that will enhance the creation of an enabling environment for private sector participation in particular to energy efficiency programs. That's number one. And number two, we can actually work with the governments to enable them to roll out large programs that, for example, the one I've mentioned in Senegal, in Egypt, even in Kenya, to try and provide a mechanism in which the governments crowd in the private sector. When it comes to commercial banks, like in a lot of cases, not everybody is aware or the potential for energy efficiency as a business. So for them to be able to finance these mechanisms, they need to be able to, we can provide financing through lines of credit to these banks so that they can be able to on land these facilities to commercial enterprises that are involved in this. But also we can work with governments themselves to create large programs that actually evidence, in which case the government actually provides or the governments lead by example as to the potential impact of energy efficiency. Thank you very much, Kevin. Thank you indeed. Let me turn now to Attila Steiner, who is the State Secretary for Energy and Climate in Hungary. Secretary Steiner, thank you for joining us and I'm really keen to get your perspective because I remember you were with us in Sonderberg last year at the last conference and I was really impressed by the range of things that Hungary is doing. And in the context of the question about how to unlock more investment, as a policymaker, what are the key actions you are focused on to try to stimulate more investment in energy efficiency? Thank you very much. And yes, Hungary is a landlock country. And in Central Eastern Europe, usually we have very cold winters and very hot summers. So that means that in our countries, the heating has a significant share in energy usage. And actually cooling is getting more and more important topic also in Hungary. What is quite special in Hungary and in neighboring countries that if we talk about heating sector, it's mostly based on natural gas. And actually that means that if we talk about energy efficiency, that means also how we can reduce our dependency on fossils. So it's very much coupled. The two issues in Hungary, more than 80% of the households are connected to the natural gas system in Hungary. But we have also districting systems, which is of course efficient. But here 70% is based on natural gas. So that means that we should reduce that share. And how we can reduce that? One obvious solution is of course to use more renewables. And actually with solar, we are progressing very well. We increased by 300% the deployment of solar since 2020. So we have almost five gigawatts of solar already. And we will reach our 2030 target also already next year. So I think this is very impressive deployment. It's much quicker than we expected. But we have still some untapped potential. And what was not mentioned this day, I think, and still important where it is available is geothermal. We have huge geothermal potential, but it's mostly for the heating sector. And the government's aim is to reduce this 70% gas exposure in heating sector 250. And that's why we already introduced some significant changes in the regulation. And we made much easier the exploration and production part of geothermal. However, here financing plays also an important role because it's a very risky business. And we also established a special fund where basically you compensate the drillings which were not successful and that encourages market operators to invest. So I think this is an important part. Secondly, of course, the consumption. And unfortunately, we have a historical heritage where the buildings are quite inefficient in Hungary. Majority of the buildings were built before 2000 without any energy efficiency schemes. And of course, this is the big potential which we have to have to exploit. I think here, of course, governmental support, support schemes could help. We used to have a support scheme where more than 300,000 houses were renovated. So I think that was a good track. However, we want to also mobilize private funds, not only the governmental support. And that's why we also introduced an so-called energy efficiency obligation scheme where the energy service providers are obliged to reach a consumption cut by their consumers. So I think this is a very good tool. We are quite at the start after two pilot years. And now we will increase the ambition and we will have much more ambitious targets. And the last point which I would like to highlight, I think, of course, governments and regulators can impact the market by standards and certificates. And we have just introduced some reforms in the performance certification. And actually from this year, November on, we will have completely new certification system in Hungary. And there will be also proposals for normal citizens. What to do? If you get a certificate, then you will get also proposals how you can improve the energy efficiency of your home or your building. Thank you very much. And again, it's very impressive, the range of policies. And you mentioned different policies, types there, incentives, market obligations, regulatory type measures. So when you're trying to unlock this private investment, how much do you see it as a question of spending a certain amount of state money that leverages more versus, let's say, non-spend instruments at your disposal that then just drive the market to invest? I think if you would like to use more market forces and market private operators potential, then you need to create transparency. And that's why it's also our plan that we will create a secondary market for those certificates for companies to be able to trade with that. And that will be like an exchange with very transparent circumstances. So I think transparency is very important. And also the trajectory that they have to do that. And actually, what I realize now, if I talk to companies that firstly, they acknowledged this system as a burden. But now they see it as a more as a market potential and market business case. And I think this is the right approach. And I think in our region, what is crucial that, of course, the individual houses, there is a big potential. And however, the families are quite poor. And for them to conclude the deep renovation, it's not feasible alone. And even if we provide support, like 50% 60% they still have to pay the remaining investment. And this is too much. So I think the key question how we can use innovative financial tools to bridge this funding gap, but also from a citizen's point of view. And here, I think energy service operators could provide very good offers to citizens because they have the portfolio effect. And that shall be somehow unlocked. Thank you very much, Secretary Stein. Very interesting. So we spoke a little bit about different types of finance a minute ago. And let's talk about another type of finance, which is philanthropy finance, which is becoming much more important, I think, in the climate and energy space. And maturing, I think, to a certain degree in the energy efficiency space, which maybe wasn't the case even just a couple of years ago. And one actor driving that trend very much is Sequoia Climate Foundation. And so we're very fortunate to have Yasmin Rosinia with us, who's a program director in Sequoia. Did I get close to your name? Oh, good. Thank you. So thank you for joining us. And yeah, let me just start there. How do you see what's the particular role do you think of philanthropic foundation funding in this phase? Please, Yasmin. Thanks, Brian. And so nice to be here. Let me just make one word of clarification before I go into my remarks, because the front page of the FT today had Sequoia Capital all over and I just want to be very clear for the audience as well as my panel co members that Sequoia Climate Foundation is not related to Sequoia Capital in any way, shape or form apart from sharing clearly a love for the for the tree that is in California. So that might help clarify and be helpful context for for the remarks I'm going to give. First of all, and before I get into that, I just want to thank IEA for your leadership, not just in carving out the space to have the discussion about energy, energy efficiency and the importance of it, but also carving out the the pathway forward with the one and a half degree scenario. Putting this front and center of your work has set a new baseline of ambition for the planet and the implication of no new money for new fossil fuel expansion. It's bold, it's brave, and it speaks to truth. I hope you expected that I'd be shaking some things up on this panel, Brian. So sitting here with many of the distinguished colleagues of mine on this panel who are representatives of their government and have direct levers of state to implement change, I think it's important to distinguish what the role of philanthropy is. It is to fill in the gaps. It's to serve the public good. It's to use our capital to make catalytic interventions with the aim of accelerating actions and change that people who sit in positions of power need to take. And so with the small amount of money that we have collectively in the scheme of the numbers that we're talking about, which I'll get into in a minute, impact is incredibly important. At Sequoia, our at Sequoia Climate Foundation, our philosophy is about speed, scale, leverage and probability of success, and we are entirely focused on action and outcomes this decade. So for us, energy efficiency is a way to accelerate real world change. It's just so incredibly central. I said I'd come back to talk about numbers. So when we're thinking about the overall investment needs to meet the one and a half degree scenario by the end of this decade, we know we're looking at an investment gap just for the energy sector of $4.2 trillion a year. We know that for energy efficiency, thanks in part to the IEA's analysis of that, we're looking at about $1.8 trillion of investment a year. That's nearly half, which I assume is why we're focusing on this topic at this conference. And just to remind you of that collective philanthropic dollar number of $2 billion, you'll understand why my friend Kevin and I are going to have a conversation about blended finance and the different pools of capital that can feed into what those sorts of capital structure looks like. So we at Sequoia look at two different intervention points. One is at the country level and the other is at the financial system level, which is what my focus is. We are at the country level focused on a various sort of a whole range of intervention types. We can think about supporting the analysis that identifies the opportunities in transition. So looking at investment, looking at scaling up clean. We can support national energy efficiency visions and targets and really support early, clear, smart policymaking, which I'm excited to hear about from the rest of our colleagues in government and thank you for sharing what Hungary is doing on this. In emerging and developing markets, this sort of action and policy has a co-benefit of acting as a trigger to accelerate inclusive growth as well and development finance, which is a whole nother area of finance and investment where energy efficiency can bring massive benefits and contribute to SDG7 goals. The other thing that we think about is capacity building. So making sure that countries, whether it's at the federal level or regional state level, have the people who have the climate expertise, who understand what it is, who care about it and who know what to do about it, are there in the right positions to be able to then sort of take on localized aligned targets and deliver on them. That's probably one of the biggest areas of philanthropic sort of activity and work at the moment. And I hope we'll hear from some of our colleagues in discussion that this is something that at the country level actually is, and even at the IFI or MDB level, is incredibly empowering and enabling. At the financial system level, we are thinking about things like what Secretary Steiner just talked about, so standard setting. How do you look at systemic changes that really create new boundaries for how to embed and mainstream climate action in the way that everything across the economy runs already. And some of those are voluntary initiatives that look for philanthropic funding to seed them, to grow them, to incubate them. Eventually the idea is these things become embedded in the toolkit of governments who are the right national authorities to be owning such initiatives. But really the role of government in catalyzing wider finance is so important. I was really struck in your report, Brian, about the sort of for every dollar that comes from public finance into energy efficiency. Three is mobilized from private and other public finance sources. That's good. It shows that most of the money is not coming from fiscal pools of capital. I think it could be better. And one of the things that Philanthropy has focused on is how to increase that ratio and really find what the other barriers are to unlock a much bigger leverage. But clearly fiscal capital is a big point of leverage. I can go on, I can go on and on, but I think I will pause there. It's very interesting and thank you. So when you have a menu of options in front of you to fund in the energy efficiency space, what are you looking for? This isn't a personal plea from me. Well, so look, we look at things at a case-by-case basis. I set out what Sequoia's mission and sort of guiding philosophy is and each Philanthropy will have its own version of that. For us it's about impact this decade and it's about having such a high degree of leverage that we really play in the systems place. So systems change space. So working with partners who can work with governments and influence, you know, help, support, influence, train up, build capacity and power enable. That's a very interesting type of an intervention. Looking at the international standard setters who are really going to, who really are the pioneers and are going to be the holders of what a transition plan looks like and how, you know, what data you need to disclose against that and how you need to disclose and help investors actually allocate capital towards climate-positive economic activity. These are the kind of systems interventions that we are interested in. I like to say we're trying to fish with a net, not with poles. And Sequoia is impressively active in energy efficiency, but not all Philanthropy foundations are by any means. So without asking you to speak for others, do you think that it's kind of a harder sell for among Philanthropy funders that efficiency feels more complex or less exciting or something? I don't want to speak for others, like you said, and I should disclose that I am a recently converted long-time finance ministry official from the UK who's just recently joined Philanthropy. But what I think that shows is that the field of Philanthropy is actually changing and philanthropic strategies, the level of expertise and technical knowledge in new areas is growing. What I've found is that there have been a lot of successes in and therefore a lot of resources been put into campaign and advocacy activities, mobilizing sort of from a grassroots level and very focused on the fossil fuel sector. My perspective is that that is of course entirely critical and, you know, according to the numbers with your one and a half degree scenario, I mentioned the $4.2 trillion per annum by 2030 we need going into clean. On the fossil fuels side we're trying to half the $800 billion to around $400 or $450 billion. So when you're even looking at the scale of number, the importance of interventions to unlock and redirect investment to clean efficiency savings, these are all part of the same thing is just so it's three times more important. And sorry, just to kind of the last number is to close the gap on the 4.2 we're looking still at about $3 trillion. So it's even more important for us to focus on that side than the ante and, you know, hopefully we'll see those priorities or the reality shifting the priorities of how philanthropy thinks about intervention. Yeah, indeed. Thank you. Thank you very much, Eswin. Our next speaker is known to many people here, of course, Minister Claude Termes, Minister of Energy and Special Planning in Luxembourg has been a champion, I could even say doyen, of energy efficiency over many years. So Minister, thank you for joining us and maybe just ask you to reflect a bit on this question because both at the European level and the national level, you spent many years thinking about what are the key policy actions to unlock energy efficient investment? What are the key learnings you have? You could share with us, please. Thank you for the flowers. I think to be clear, the most important is standard setting. In Europe, 50% of all efficiency is triggered by eco design legislation. If you cannot sell any fridge, any deep freezer, any TV, any what any other or a lot of the energy intensive consumer goods, if you can only sell efficient, the money will go there. So that is the most important. And because that is the most important, Luxembourg has from 1st of January on only fossil-free new buildings. So reference technology is a heat pump, it is impossible to build a fossil heating system in Luxembourg. So all the finance for new buildings goes where it should go. So standard setting is the most important. Then the other instrument which we are using is an instrument which we have discussed very long at the EU level, which is the energy efficiency obligation and which I'm pleased to see that Hungary is also taking this up. What is an energy efficiency obligation? You have gas and electricity retailers. This is not poor companies. This is people sitting on millions and in bigger countries on billions. So in Luxembourg, you get only a license to be an electricity or gas retailer if you save away every year 1.5% of your overall sales. You have to save some away by doing joint investments with industry, joint investments with office buildings, joint investments with citizens. And this is a huge part of our energy efficiency, especially in the industrial, improving the industrial operators. We have now we are on the way to add to this the risk instrument because sometimes when you have a third party coming into the game, you can ensure everything in a contract, but not the default of the one or of the other. And for that, we are now taking some government money to organize everything. But it's this energy efficiency obligation. That's one law you pass and then you have a huge machine which is triggering energy efficiency. And Luxembourg is a small country. It takes me one civil servant, one civil servant to manage this. It triggers millions of investments and it triggers 50, 70, 80, 90 energy experts on the ground in the gas and the electricity companies. So one law, one civil servant, a fantastic leverage. So energy efficiency obligation is, I would say, the second most important instrument, at least in our national energy efficiency policy in Luxembourg. And then the third issue is, of course, we are quite a wealthy country. So we throw a lot of grants, especially at individuals. This year, we even go to very exceptional because of the energy crisis. If you invest into a solar, into a heat pump, into a renovation in Luxembourg this year, if you contract this year, you get a 62.5% grant. That we will not be able to sustain very long, but it has triggered a fantastic tsunami of solar, of heat pumps, and we are also getting higher in renovation. But when I come to renovation, we have, because of the interest rates, went up, we have now a gigantic problem in Europe. Banks are no more lending money. And the combination of high interest rates and the taxonomy, where banks, taxonomy is a fantastic tool because it forces also on the financing sector that they have to integrate into their general risk strategies, the carbon risk. So what does that mean? I have a bad insulated building. I come to the bank. The bank is today refusing to give me a credit because they don't want to have another bad asset in their reporting to the central bank. And this is a complete drama in Europe and we have to change this. And there we have a concrete idea how we can change this. We have to introduce two instruments at EU level. The first instrument is what we technically call a mortgage portfolio standard. In Europe, the car manufacturers have, over their fleet, they have to improve their performance. That is the so-called CO2 and cash legislation. So what we need is the banks, the portfolio of existing buildings of the banks has to be graded, let's say, in 24. And from there on, the banks will have to improve their rating. This is one law, one institution. It's the European Central Bank which can take care of that. And with this one law, with this one institution, all banks, and I speak here about 7 trillion. 7 trillion is the amount of money which credit European banks have handed out on housing. 7 trillion. And with one legislation, I can regulate 7 trillion and I can flex the money so that the banks have an interest to start to upgrade their building stock. And then there is a second instrument which should be combined with it, which is what we technically call a European renovation loan. What is that? It is an instrument which will basically help also the EU countries which have at least good credit rating to be part of a European pool, take profit of the AAA countries. It is a loan which will be attached not to the owner of a building, but to the building itself. And that is very, very important also to prevent speculation. So the loan is attached to the building itself and it will remain with the building. It will be a 30-year, at least loan. So which means if you sell the building after 15 years, the loan will still continue another 15 years. And so instrument one, giving a standard, a performance standard to the financial industry in Europe when it comes to housing and then second, helping with a low interest rate, 30 years and maybe plus loan to basically get cheap money to the houses which are not well insulated. Buying a new house is not a performance. It's easy. And in Luxembourg you buy a new house. So you have a good house. Renovating a house is a real challenge. And I think we can only win the climate, the run against climate change if somebody who buys an existing house and takes the time, the energy to upgrade this house, that he or she should be financially rewarded. And that's exactly why we need this, also beneath grounds we need this European loan. And then at the end, I give you one example on where the money goes completely into the wrong today. And that is data centers. Do you know what the data center is today? So I want this bottle to be cold at five degree or six. In order to putting it in a little fridge, what is the data center today? We will cool the whole building, the whole room where we are sitting in. That is data centers today. It is such a nonsense, such a nonsense, an efficiency nonsense. We have technology which is called immersion cooling, which would basically be I put my server, my rack into a liquid and that liquid will cool the data center, the rig. That technology is existing, nobody is investing into it because of one single thing. The guarantee that the server will function when I have it immersed. And why? Because all servers are sold with a little fan in order to allow the air condition, the air cooling, which is very inefficient and nobody is ensuring a server without a fan. So one decision in Europe or better, one decision I would say EU, US, Japan, South Korea, probably that is the critical mass, that servers will be now labeled to function in a liquid that will diminish the energy efficiency or that will raise the energy efficiency by a factor 8 or 10. And very important to understand all existing data centers can put five to eight times more IT into their bunker because when you cool it liquid, you need less space because today in these nonsense bunkers you have to get a lot of space between the servers because otherwise the air is not flowing. So it is a perfect business opportunity but nobody is doing it because there is no standard for servers without ventilators. And we can talk for hours here. If we don't get data centers more efficient and I say this to the Googles and others of this world, it's not about having a long term renewable power purchase agreement for inefficient data centers. Data centers will eat up amounts of green electricity which is completely unsustainable. So we need a standard now for liquid energy. We need a standard for this immersion cooling data centers. Europe has a door opener since one and a half year in its legislation. I hope that EU Commission is now working on the regulation which is behind but this is a worldwide problem. Have you understood that Netflix plus gaming is exploding which nothing else I think even aviation is not as bad in climate basically negative than Netflix plus all the gaming which goes now from a console which I had myself to get to the internet. So I think it's important to understand the dimension of this and I don't know how I can regulate Netflix or gaming but I know how we can at least make data centers more efficient. Thank you very much. Thank you very much Clara and several interesting points there and in fact that last point I think we'll come up in the next session. So we'll hear from that but I better keep moving if we're to let the next session on. So let me turn a little east now to Moldova where we're joined by Victor Parlikov, the Minister for Energy Minister. We're delighted you're here with us. So please you tell us a bit about your perspective on how to drive energy efficiency investment in Moldova. Thank you. Thank you very much and I'm actually glad and yeah honored to be speaking immediately after Luxembourg because we have in many ways similar approaches and solutions in a totally different context. In a country which is much more let's say vulnerable to in terms of climate change in an area which has much more temperature differences are much higher. In a country where we don't have a financial market at all, we're fully relying on banks, the country is not even listed, it's not even ranked as a country sovereign. In the same time and I'm also going to focus and that's why I liked speaking after Luxembourg because basically what you mentioned is the role of the government. Let's not talk about the other stuff but let's focus on what we can do as governments in that respect. And definitely the role of government is key, is critical in all this respect and for many reasons. I would like to touch on several and I'll try to go just bullet points. First, why did the statistics show in the last period that investments in energy efficiency are booming? What happened? Did the technologies change? Not really. It's actually the prices. It's actually the prices which are one of the key drivers and here the governments actually have a big role particularly in terms of taxation. And here I'm coming from a country which is a relatively poor country and that's why we are still collecting the negative consequences of the populist decisions related to okay, let's keep prices for energy low. Let's do no taxation for household electricity consumption. Let's cancel the VET on or reduce subsidize the VET for gas because people are using it for heating. As a result, most of your energy efficiency investments lose in their attractiveness. Secondly, your budgetary envelope is actually reducing a lot. And third and foremost, it's simply not fair because the biggest beneficiaries of this fiscal subsidies are actually the rich ones who consume a lot. It's not the poor ones. So in our case, on the other side, it's extremely unpopular when you are in a governance. And as an expert, it's easy to speak how we should do that. When you're in governance and you have to assume a political decision to raise the taxes and therefore the end user prices, it's difficult to find a good moment. And I personally think that now is about the good moment. One probably one about the best moments, particularly in Europe, I mean, after the drop of the prices for gas, to start to reshuffle and start to rebalance and eliminate the fiscal subsidies that are still there. So one thing I would like to mention is particularly this. End user prices for energy affect a lot the visibility of your investment. And also the ability of the government both to support the vulnerable and to incentivize and compensate and subsidize investment in energy efficiency. That's point one. Point two, by the way, in this respect in Moldova we introduced similarly to Luxembourg. We call it a fiscal obligation, financial obligation on all companies that are distributing energy, distributing gas, petroleum products, it's basically meant to be a per kilowatt hour consumption payment that is not directly fiscal, that is going to energy efficiency agency. So to enable them to actually act on the subsidizing and implementing energy efficiency projects. Second, we have such things in the post-Soviet area. We have such things as post-Soviet multilevel residential blocks which were built during Soviet times. When it was important to have them cheap fast, energy efficiency was definitely not the strong point. They're basically radiators. And the energy efficiency potential in these buildings is enormous. That's why it's not by surprise that in Moldova priority number one in terms of decarbonization and our agenda is decarbonization is let's say we're trying to be more ambitious and achieve decarbonization ahead of 2050 timeline proposed by EU. And energy efficiency is number one priority because when you have 50% of your energy consumed in your buildings and about 50% reserve in terms of reduction of your energy consumption in these buildings, it's not surprise that this becomes priority number one. And here we have the, let's say the difficulties with condominiums because in a condominium you always have different types of people. You have people who have the money and can make a profit. And you have people who have the money and can make profit. And you have people who have the money and they are prompt, but if there is a financial instrument, they can get it and participate. And there's always people who don't have money and won't have it. Who can simply not do it. That's why in our country it's so far let's say a piloting, a testing period, but when the energy vulnerability fund where vulnerable consumers are subsidized with energy efficiency investments and create products that rather than the government spending money to vulnerable households by basically compensating their losses to make that to contribute it to something that over a longer period of time will reduce their exposure and improve their energy efficiency. Again, these are so far at pilot stages. It's early to kind of boast about the results, but the logic of it is in this direction. Because energy poverty is different to general poverty by the fact that a lot is depending on their energy efficiency. And sometimes their energy efficiency is actually energy inefficiency is actually due to the poverty because they cannot afford a better type of equipment or an investment that would actually reduce their consumption. And on the we actually think that the liberalization of energy markets and penetration of new suppliers of energy would actually facilitate also investment in energy efficiency because they will be in order to keep and retain clients. They would actually be interested to help with proposals also on the energy efficiency dimension not only, okay, we'll supply to you electricity or gas and that's it. Then when it comes to financial markets, there's two things I would like to mention. First, definitely banks are not the most innovative institutions on the world. And when you're financing for energy efficiency is relying on banks there's no way you can actually how do you call it, get the finance moving without the state and that's why I fully agree that de-risking the investment in Moldova, and Moldova is not the first country in the world where we installed solar panels as you probably know but still it took about three to four years to the banks to learn how to work with solar panels which are basically a standardized commodity now. It took several years for the banks to learn how to work and how to land against this product. Of course, anything more sophisticated than that heat pumps or something of, I don't know yeah it's even more difficult. That's why what we are envisaging again, we're doing two things. First, we're willing to use the energy efficiency agency basically as a super ESCO for public buildings so that they actually can invest money in public buildings and pay them back with the savings that they're getting from, that the beneficiary is getting from it. And second, launch a subsidy program that would facilitate and leverage private financing for investment in energy efficiency in the residential sector. At first, we'll start with the rural grant component matching grant component but eventually we hope to grow to develop to the level of financial more financial maturity to do more sophisticated products like interest rate subsidies like loan guarantees and other forms of de-risking so that we actually can put higher ratio to one dollar of government funds to mobilization of private funds. So far there's a lot as we call it news from the future but this is where we're heading and some of the things we've already started. Thank you. Thank you. It really is impressive and I agree with you the importance of this moment so thank you minister for sharing that and I do apologize colleagues I'm running a bit over time which is entirely my fault but we have two interesting panelists to turn to before we close and Rosanna sorry if I could ask you to be a little brief but I do definitely want to hear your perspective because you bring a very interesting perspective our next panelist is Rosanna Santos who's executive director of the E plus energy transition institute so you come from a different part of the world a different sector if you like but do you please tell us from the Brazilian or the regional perspective and from the think tank perspective how are you focusing on mobilizing energy efficiency please? I'll try to be as brief as possible so yeah actually I come from another part of the world so in a panel called Getting Finance Moving I would say that it's not only about finance but it's what are you financing do you understand what do you want to push because I just one example when I was doing my PhD thesis back in the beginning of the two thousands we had a little money from the World Bank to finance a rural electrification program with solar panels so we went to the field and asked the people what do you want how much do you want to pay for that and he said I don't want this I want a grid and actually they weren't wrong because the grid was like 10 kilometers from them why on earth they would have to pay for something that they don't want so this taught me a lesson and this turned to be when I got to the government turned to be the biggest rural electrification program in Brazil like 16 million people was attended so we tried to solve financing for the right program problem not for the wrong one or for the one that we sitting on our chairs thought was the right one so this had Brazil has been involved in energy efficiency programs since 1985 there was the first one with us more or less labeling and certificate of appliances then in 2001 there is a national conservation energy conservation plan what is basically about buildings and in 2008 with the regulator we do pay a part of our tariff to foster energy efficiency program in Brazil all those programs were okay but they tackled only more the electricity part of it when you have to go to the thermal part of it which is now the way to go air conditioning or even thermal processes doing industrial processes you have to have another way of financing or pushing the society to go that direction so what I see and to be really brief here is that it's a mix of capacity building and capacity building of all the stakeholders the energy efficiency supply chain including banks because many many times when they want to finance something they don't really understand so they spread of financing is really high so capacity building all over the supply chain including the energy services companies that they are much used to do with electricity and when they have to deal with something different they say no this is not my business I'm not going there so it's also a matter of capacity building there and we recently put together with some philanthropy money and some money from the government with the Brazilian Development Bank which is the equivalent of the Africa Development Bank there a fund like a guarantee fund meaning the industries can take the financing off balance and use this fund as a guarantee so this is something that we are testing just to see if we can go towards energy efficiency in the industrial sector and I want to be brief I said I was brief I appreciate it and thank you that was really interesting and I do hope we can go further but let me move now to Singapore we are delighted that we are joined by Tansi Leng who is the minister for Manpower and second minister for trade and industry in Singapore minister we are delighted you are here with us and I wanted to focus on a specific scheme that caught my eye in Singapore which is the grants you have to support energy efficiency investments in SMEs and in business industry in Singapore please thank you Brian there is a commonality if this is the end the summary of the dialogue that we have today and that is the same amount of limitation in terms of time for me to deliver this address is exactly the same constraint that we face as a country in Singapore so we have just the same amount of limited resources as I have the limited amount of time very quickly broadly given the fact that we are the void of natural resources we import all of our needs universally from all over the world and we rely on about 95% for the generation of our energy needs through the use of natural gas and you can imagine that we are now rapidly transforming and pivoting towards renewables and because energy is a very precious resource as of the outset where we became independent five and a half, six decades ago we made the conscious decision as a government, as a people to move towards the most efficient way of conserving energy so the first thing ostensibly was in terms of how do you right price the energy so we don't subsidise energy because we import the energy from all over the world the natural gas from all over the world and what we do to help the lower income group 80% of Singaporeans live in public housing so we use the public housing as a proxy so for about a vast number of people who live in certain housing room types, we actually offer them rebates so a huge segment 80% of the population that live in these public housing only pay between four months to six months of electricity and tariffs a year so the other amount we give it in the form of rebates so we right price the energy the second thing obviously was to offer financial incentives so for the big enterprises the industries and so on we use the energy efficient fund and for the smaller enterprises we use the energy efficiency grant so once a fund once a grant and obviously to sum it up to incentivise them not only do we use the financial incentives we also then enact regulations to nudge them first we start with moral situation and then eventually we nudge them to adopting these financial incentives to go green and to become more efficient so that sort of summarises our broad overall strategy thank you very much something about your skill to summarise is obviously built on this resource constraint mentality because you captured so much so briefly and I do apologise to our later speakers that we were constrained for time and I have more questions for all of you so I'm just going to have to buy your drink later and probe it because we are out of time we're going straight into our next session which is on modernising energy efficiency a really interesting set of panellists for the next session which will replace us straight away but before we leave I think we've heard really fascinating perspectives from everybody here a great range of perspectives as well so ladies and gentlemen do please help me thank our excellent panellists in this session thank you very much