How Green Finance is Cleaning the Air and Cutting Emissions in North Macedonia

Cleaner air in winter.

Lower energy bills at home.

Solar panels on small businesses.

In North Macedonia, affordable green finance is helping households and entrepreneurs make changes that improve daily life while reducing the country’s climate footprint.

When families in Skopje swap out their old wood-burning stoves for modern heat pumps, or when a small factory in Tetovo installs solar panels on its roof, the effects ripple outward. Communities breathe cleaner air, households spend less on energy and the country moves measurably closer to its climate commitments. These are exactly the kinds of transformations the UN Joint SDG Fund was designed to catalyse.

The Green Finance Facility (GFF) is a joint programme funded by the UN Joint SDG Fund. Under the leadership of the UN Resident Coordinator and implemented by the UN Development Programme (UNDP) with the International Organization for Migration (IOM) and UN Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE), the programme partners with the Government, European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) and local financial institutions to support small businesses and underserved households. By providing access to affordable green financing, the GFF enables investments in renewable energy and energy efficiency that might otherwise remain out of reach.

Why this matters now

For many households and small businesses, the barrier to cleaner energy is not lack of interest. It is cost. Heat pumps, rooftop solar panels and energy efficiency upgrades can reduce bills and pollution, but the upfront investment is often too high. The Green Finance Facility is helping close that gap by making cleaner choices more affordable.

Now, a new study published by UNECE puts hard numbers behind the programme's early results, and they tell a compelling story.

Between 2023 and 2025, the programme supported 84 small and medium enterprises and 212 households, delivering verified annual energy savings of 65,345 MWh, enough to power roughly 17,000 homes for a year. Over the same period, it reduced CO₂ emissions by more than 50,700 tonnes annually, the equivalent of taking 11,500 cars off the road.

Perhaps most strikingly, the programme is delivering health benefits that were never formally targeted. North Macedonia regularly ranks among the most air-polluted countries in Europe, with cities like Skopje and Tetovo blanketed in winter smog. By replacing solid-fuel heating with high-efficiency heat pumps and modern biomass systems, GFF-supported investments are reducing fine particulate matter (PM2.5 and PM10), pollutants directly linked to respiratory disease, cardiovascular illness and premature death. These air quality co-benefits, now formally quantified for the first time, add a powerful public health dimension to what began as a climate and energy programme.

The validation also shows that market momentum is building. Heat pumps now account for nearly half of all household investments under the programme, reflecting a genuine shift in consumer preference towards electrification. With updated targets and an expanded monitoring framework now in place, the GFF is on course to deliver 9,500 MWh of household energy savings and reduce nearly 7,500 kg of PM2.5 annually by 2027.

Cleaner energy, cleaner air

The programme’s results matter because they connect climate action to daily life. Energy efficiency is not only about emissions targets. It can mean a warmer home, a lower electricity bill, cleaner winter air and fewer health risks for children, older people and people living with respiratory illness.

This is what SDG-aligned finance looks like in practice. Affordable capital flows to where it is needed most, generating returns not just for individual borrowers, but for communities, public health systems and the climate. The GFF model and the results it is producing offer a replicable blueprint for the Western Balkans and beyond.

Note:

All joint programmes of the Joint SDG Fund are led by UN Resident Coordinators and implemented by the agencies, funds and programmes of the United Nations development system. With sincere appreciation for the contributions from the European Union and Governments of Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Monaco, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, the Republic of Korea, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland for a transformative movement towards achieving the SDGs by 2030.

This story was originally published by the Joint SDG Fund. Please visit the UN team's website for more information about the UN's work in North Macedonia.