Accelerating the Financing of Low Carbon Assets

To download 'Green Opportunity: Accelerating the Financing of Low Carbon Assets' click here.


Introduction

UKSIF's 'Accelerating' project examined the feasibility of accelerating the use of low carbon asset finance by business and the voluntary sector in the UK. The project was completed in March 2007 with the publication of the final report.

Working with providers of lending and asset finance, the project assessed current commercial activities and explored future business opportunities – and the drivers and barriers to them – as we move to the low-carbon economy.

These opportunities, drivers and barriers are presented in the final report together with a series of recommendations for accelerating low carbon asset finance.

The project was funded by the Carbon Trust through its Networks Initiative (www.carbontrust.co.uk.)

UKSIF hopes the project and the final report contribute to accelerating low carbon finance by raising the issue higher up the asset finance agenda. The genesis of the project came from discussions with some of our banking members, including the Co-operative Bank, about how our knowledge could be applied to the asset finance industry.

Throughout the project UKSIF has worked closely with asset finance companies and other stakeholders in the industry, most notably the Finance & Leasing Association (www.fla.org.uk) whose expertise and support we have benefited from.



About the project

The project identified a range of drivers for asset finance companies for financing low carbon assets. These included:

 

  • The opportunity to capture a greater share of companies' energy-related spending
  • Establishing first mover advantage
  • Helping equipment suppliers to make the case to clients for new or upgraded equipment
  • Benefitting from increasing government focus on the shift to a low carbon economy

These drivers and the opportunities and barriers were identified through a series of expert interviews and are presented in the final report. The interviewees are listed in Appendix B of the report.

The project was supported by a working expert seminar which raised awareness of the issues identified, allowed participants to share practice and confirmed the initial findings and recommendations. The speakers at the seminar were:

 

  • Rod Barthet (Siemens Financial Services)
  • Sam Geneen (Five Arrows Leasing and Chairman of FLA)
  • Adam Ognall (UKSIF)
  • Peter Stones (Carbon Trust)

Details of the working seminar are provided in Appendix C of the final report.

The project benefited from an Advisory Group who generously gave of their time and expertise. The Advisory Group members were:

 

  • Chris Matthews (Co-operative Bank)
  • Craig Pickering (FLA)
  • Karen Germain (Carbon Trust – observer)
  • Matthew Clayton (Triodos Bank)
  • Paula Kirk (London Energy Partnership)
  • Penny Shepherd (UKSIF)
  • Richard Nuttall (Barclays Corporate)
  • Richard Simon-Lewis (Lloyds TSB)

 

For more details contact adam.ognall@uksif.org.



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