1. UNDP GEF Success Stories on renewable and
energy efficiency in the Western Balkans
Region
Sub-Regional Conference on Sustainable Energy in
South Eastern Europe , 9-10 December 2013
John O’Brien, Regional Technical Advisor
Climate Change Mitigation
UNDP Bratislava Regional Centre
Slovakia

2. Presentation Structure
1. Why what we do is important?
2. General Observations – What constitutes a successful
Project?
3. Specific Case Studies – Albania SWH & Croatia EE
- Adaptive Management
- Strong Regulatory & Legal Framework
- Scaling Up & Market Transformation
4. Concluding Remarks – Lessons Learned
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3. IPCC predicts a rise in average temperature up to 6 degrees celcius by 2100
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4. Successful projects do a
lot more than just
organizing a few
workshops and
seminars and
distributing some
materials …
I give projects high
marks if they implement
highly or reasonably
transformational
activities …
Outputs
Transformational
New Policies,
Legislation, Regulations
Energy-Efficiency Laws,
Building Codes,
Renewable Energy Laws,
Green Tarriffs
Highly
Transformational
(provided there is
enforcement)
Action Plans & Strategies
Sustainable Energy
Action Plans, Municipal
Energy Plans,
Sustainable Transport
Plans
Reasonably
transformational (if
investment funds
available)
Demonstration Projects
Revolving Funds,
Investment Funds &
Financial Support
Mechanisms
Reasonably
transformational (if
funds replenished)
Demonstrations Projects
Grant Funded DemoProjects
Moderately
transformational
Training Materials
What makes a
project
transformational
and highly
successful?
Outcome
Capacity Building
materials
Moderately
transformational
Workshops & Seminars
Capacity Building Events
with Key Stakeholders
Moderately
transformational
Information & Awareness
Materials including
websites …
Moderately
trensformational
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5. Case Studies: Two Successful UNDP GEF Projects …
Albania Solar Water Heating
Project (2009 – 2014)
Croatia EE in Residential &
Service Sectors (2003 -2013)
Rating: HS (highly satisfactory)
Rating: HS (highly satisfactory)
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6. Case Study Number 1 – Albania Solar Water Heating
Albania – Solar Water Heating Project – UNDP GEF - $1 million
Target of 75,000 m2 of new installed collector area over the
duration of the project as well as annual sales of over 20,000
m2 with expected continued growth to 520,000 m2 of installed
capacity by the year 2020. This is over 300MW of avoided
fossil fuel installed capacity. GHG reduction potential of over
800,000 tonnes of CO2e. Ends in mid-2015
Key Achievements
(i) At mid-term nearly 40,000 m2 of new SWH capacity was
installed, over 50% of the final impact;
(ii) Adoption of national product standards for SWH;
(iii) A national action plan on renewable energy
(iv) A new renewable energy law was passed in Albania, with the
assistance of the project, providing preferential tarriffs for RE
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7. Case Study Number 2 – Croatia Energy-Efficiency in Residential & Service
Sectors – ran from 2003 - 2013
Key Achievements
(i) National EE Master-plan with the
Programme of Implementation 2008-2016
(ii) Energy Charter: signed by all towns and
counties in the Republic of Croatia
(iii)National database of energy-efficiency
measures created, updated, and
maintained
(iv)All municipalities in Croatia implementing
energy management information systems
(v) 63% of households in Croatia switched to
the use of CFL bulbs
(vi)Ownership by local and national authorities
was a key success factor
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8. Both Albania & Croatia projects undertook adaptive management
Albania project was supposed to benefit from UNEP assistance for
capacity building & training activities but it never really came so the
project took it upon itself to develop training materials and deliver
training sessions on SWH;
Croatia project entitled ‘Removing Barriers to Energy-Efficiency in
the Residential & Service Sectors’ and ended up with a main focus
on the public & municipal sectors. Initial focus on CFL distribution &
loan guarantee mechanism was replaced with a focus on energy
management information systems for public sector. Ran for 10 yrs.
The initial project design of the Croatia EE project was not suited to
the circumstances that the project found itself in when it started …
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9. Adaptive Management
In particular, the Croatia EE project developed and implemented a
web based energy management information system (EMIS) to
allow for continuous data collection of energy usage in buildings …
Enables easy analysis and interpretation of energy and water
usage data on local, regional or national level from one central
place.
The EMIS can be accessed by any computer with an internet connection
The EMIS is in the process of being transferred from Croatia to Serbia …
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10. Albania SWH & Croatia EE projects helped introduce new legislation
& plans …
Albania Renewable Energy Law (April 2013)
- national binding objective for RE by the year 2020
- incentives to facilitate grid connections for Albanian companies
- guaranteed long term power purchase agreements for 15 years
- streamlined licensing and permitting procedures
- preferential feed-in tarriffs for renewable energy
Croatia EE Project (2006-2013) contributed to
- Energy Efficiency master plan 2008-2016
- Energy strategy of Croatia
- First National Energy Efficiency action plan (2008-2010)
- Second National Energy Efficiency Action Plan (up to 2013)
- Law on Efficient end use of Energy (2012)
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11. Demonstrations on their own are not enough unless they involve
scaling up ….
Both projects involve scaling up & market transformation
Albania SWH project supported several muncipal sector
demonstration projects and envisages scaling up through an
investment grant mechanism before end of the project;
Croatia EE project started with a pilot project on ‘introduction of
Systematic Energy management system in city of Sisak in 2006 and
this was used to launch a national EMIS project in December 2007
The Croatia EE project led to significant leveraging of additional
funds, leveraging over $40 million USD in additional public funding
for energy-efficiency;
The Albania SWH project envisages at least $15 million in
leveraging from the financial support mechanism (investment grant
mechanism)
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12. Key UNDP/GEF rules for Adaptive Management …
Project objective and outcomes are difficult to change…once that prodoc is
signed you are “locked in” as regards expected achievements (unless you
want to go back to GEF)
…but project outputs, activities and sub-activities can be adjusted; a prodoc is a
living document and not “cast in stone.” Adaptive management should start
from project inception. Not wait until the mid-term evaluation.
In fact, the Project Manager should constantly monitor them and adapt as
necessary, after consultations with key partners. A reason why Albania &
Croatia projects have been successful is continual adaptive management
Adaptive management is a strategy emphasizing the need to change with the
environment and to learn from doing, even from failures.
Unfortunately, UNDP’s M&E culture is one where “failures” are seen as a
weakness and not as an opportunity for adaptation and improvement. I have
never ever seen a Project Manager give a Project a ‘U’ rating.
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13. Why are Mid-Term Evaluations Important?
Mid-Term evaluations are important because they provide a
stock-taking of all that the project has achieved so far and can
provide concrete recommendations to improve the project over
the second half of the project lifetime … Recommendations
should be clear, specific, well defined and measurable …
Example of poor MTE (based on one recent example):
-The project needs one person in charge and not two;
-The project should not follow exactly what is in Prodoc/RCE;
-The project needs to do adaptive management;
The same evaluator excused a project that did nothing for two
years with the following comment
- The project did not know they could do adaptive management
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14. We also learn lessons from projects that were
less successful?
Russia Greening Sochi – Poor project design & short time-frame
makes it very hard for a project to be sucessful. $1 million dollars
and two years and six components to transform the Sochi
Olympics was not enough. (project will finish in early 2014)
Ukraine ESCO Rivne – To succesfully achieve ESCO you need to
focus on financing arrangements and this is very challenging in
some countries. Establishing ESCO markets is not easy and ESCO
Rivne was never an ESCO (started in 2000 and finished in 2012)
Serbia Sustainable Transport - $1 million USD to transform the
transportation system of the city of Belgrade is not enough for a
transformational impact and project held MTE 3 ¼ years into a 4
year project & with almost no funds left (project will finish in early
2014 with very low global environmental benefits)
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15. Lessons learnt: Working Well and Areas for Improvement
UNDP general works well when it comes to
 working at a local level (municipalities, local governments)
 changes in policies, legislation, regulation
 awareness raising activities
 guidebooks, training materials
 demonstration activities
Where UNDP can sometimes impprove
 Coordination with other Agencies
 Financial Support Mechanisms
 Finding Investors/Engaging Private Sector
& getting them to invest …
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16. ‘Instead of trying to change the world, lets try to change ourself
…’ (Nelson Mandela 1918 – 2013)
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