The European Commission presented a new initiative to help achieve energy access for an additional 500 million people in developing countries by 2030. The proposal includes a new EU Technical Assistance Facility worth €50 million over the next two years, which will support those developing partners that "opt in" to the initiative by providing EU expertise in the field.

Speaking at the EU Sustainable Energy for All Summit in Brussels, the President of the European Commission, José Manuel Barroso unveiled a proposal to help achieve energy access for all by 2030, in the framework of the Sustainable Energy for All Initiative (SE4All) launched by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon last year. A survey recently published showed that 95% of Europeans think that access to energy is an important precondition for overcoming poverty in developing countries.

The new EU "Energising Development" initiative will look to mobilise additional support of up to several hundred million euros to support concrete new investments in sustainable energy for developing countries – working with banks and the private sector to create a leverage effect to multiply this amount many times over. It also focuses on expanding and improving EU innovative financial instruments to make sure that the billions of Euros that they leverage result in real change on the ground. This could include, for example, support to develop public-private partnerships on energy access in developing countries or setting up risk guarantee schemes in developing countries with a bank. This could potentially result in substantial investments, as it would provide investors with some assurance that their money is secure.

The EU is fully committed to achieving the inspiring objectives of the UN Secretary General on the 2012 which is the UN's International Year of Sustainable Energy for All. By 2030, the EU wants to ensure universal access to modern energy services, double the global rate of improvement in energy efficiency and double the share of renewable energy in the global energy mix, starting with the new EU "Energising Development" initiative.