On 19.04.2022 there was a round table initiative at Grand Hotel Millennium, held under the auspices of the Bulgarian Stock Exchange and concerning sustainable finance and power engineering topics - Accelerate Green.

Representatives of businesses, the government, the Financial Supervision Committee, the Fund of Funds, NGOs and the industrial associations, as well as leading global consulting companies discussed the access to and exchange of leading know-how policies and practices.

The Vice Prime Ministers Asen Vasilev and Borislav Sandov defined jointly with the participants large-scale representation of all interested parties in the process of Bulgaria’s green economic transformation.

Teodor Marinov, Executive Director at UBB and leader of the Sustainable Finance programme shared the plans, approved by KBC Group in Bulgaria for reducing the intensity of financed carbon emissions from the production of electricity, mortgage loans and the vehicles, financed under lease, as the objectives will be set in the overall plan of KBC Group for reducing the impact on the environment by Y2050. In his statement he emphasized on the needed prerequisites for the realization of these and similar objectives in Bulgaria’s entire financial sector. It is of particular importance that banks, jointly with state administration, should find workable solutions for incentivizing the conclusion of long-term off-take agreements for the produced energy, energy certification of old buildings and effective solutions to promote the replacement of outdated vehicles.

Among the discussed topics were such for the green financing in the context of the approved Plan for Bulgaria’s recovery and sustainability. Other discussed topics involved the embedded in the Plan research of new technologies, relating to storage of electric energy and its production from geothermal sources. In conclusion the event organizers announced that the first green index for the Bulgarian capital market will be ready by the end of Y2022.