EIB provides €150M to Lusatia's green transformation in lignite mining

The EIB financing can be used for local and regional development, public transport, health, energy and training.

The European Investment Bank (EIB) is contributing €150 million to the 2038 Lusatia programme, which aims to minimise the social and economic impact of the phase-out of lignite and the transition to climate neutrality in the region. The EIB is cooperating closely on this with the regional promotional bank Investitionsbank des Landes Brandenburg (ILB).

The federal state of Brandenburg’s 2038 Lusatia programme, financed by the European Union and the federal government, coordinates and promotes municipal activities in the region. It follows a bottom-up approach in which local people propose and develop individual projects for the transition from a carbon-intensive to a carbon-neutral economy.

One example of this is the efficient and sustainable conversion of the port of Königs Wusterhausen into a nationally important logistics hub. Between 1986 and 2017, the port was used for lignite transshipment, running four trains a day and handling 2 million tonnes of lignite a year. After a series of investments, most recently in 2023 with an additional 740 metres of loading track, all areas have now been marketed. The site hosts 35 companies with 447 employees and operates from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. 2022 was its most successful year ever — and all without any handling of fossil fuels.

Lusatia is a lignite mining area in the eastern part of Brandenburg on the border with Poland. Lignite provides 13 000 specialised and well-paid jobs in the region. Two-thirds of these jobs will disappear with the phase-out of coal by 2030 when the last two open-cast mines close.

Lusatia is one of the last cohesion regions in Germany. These are regions with a gross domestic product per capita below the EU average. The plan for Lusatia is to create a carbon-neutral energy supply and to renature the landscape with the aim to create a climate-friendly economy that offers highly qualified follow-on job opportunities. The EIB has previously supported the rehabilitation of former lignite and coal-mining sites, also in Germany.

Lusatia’s green transformation is supported by the European Union through the European Regional Development Fund, the European Social Fund and the Just Transition programme. The region also receives funds from the federal government through the Coal Regions Structural Development Act and the Coal Phase-out Act, as well as from the federal state of Brandenburg.

The EIB financing can be used for local and regional development, public transport, health, energy and training.

EIB Vice-President Nicola Beer, who is responsible for financing in Germany, said: “Green transformation is a major challenge, especially in the European coal regions. Our goal at the EIB is to make this transition from a carbon-intensive economy to carbon-neutrality economically successful and socially just. We are therefore pleased to support the efforts of the federal state of Brandenburg together with our long-standing partner ILB.”

ILB chief executive officer Tillmann Stenger said: “Making Lusatia into a European model region with a broadly carbon-neutral economy will require a considerable financial commitment. The loan from the EIB, our European partner institution, can really help to overcome the financial challenges this entails.”