The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) will provide a loan of up to USD 12 million to a subsidiary of Astarta, one of the major agribusiness groups in Ukraine, for the construction of a bio-gas plant, the bank's press service has reported.

"A senior loan of up to USD 12 million to Astarta's subsidiary LLC APO Tsukrovyk Poltavshchyny (Poltava region, central Ukraine) will be provided under the EBRD's Agribusiness Sustainable Investment Facility," reads the statement.

The fifth EBRD transaction with Astarta will focus on the increased use of renewable energy in the production cycle, an important development in sugar production, which is a particularly energy-intensive industry.

A newly-built bio-gas plant at Tsukrovyk Poltavshchyny will process 120,000 tons of beet pulp every year and yield around 14.4 million cubic meters of bio-gas, which will lower Astarta's annual gas consumption by 7.7 million cubic meters.

Once the project is implemented, it will allow Astarta's main sugar plant to decrease natural gas consumption by 46%, water consumption by 10% and to achieve a reduction of green house gas (GHG) emissions of around 15,000 tons of CO2 per year. It is also expected that further GHG emission reductions will reach up to 35,000 tons per year.

A strategic assessment of the optimization of biomass residues from the production process was undertaken within the Regional Energy Audit Program for the Corporate Sector funded by the Neighborhood Investment Facility.

The EBRD has placed a high priority on supporting environmentally sustainable initiatives at Astarta enterprises. As a result of the bank's involvement, Astarta signed two carbon credit agreements with the Multilateral Carbon Credits Fund based on the Joint Implementation mechanism under the Kyoto Protocol.

The EBRD is the largest financial investor in Ukraine. As of the end of August 2012, the bank had committed over EUR 8 billion (USD 10 billion) through 320 projects.

Ukrinform