The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) is organizing $548 million in financing for the Mirny wind power plant in Kazakhstan’s Zhambyl region — the country’s largest onshore wind development and its first industrial-scale wind farm with battery storage, according to an EBRD press release.
The EBRD is providing a $250 million loan from its own account, with a further $298 million syndicated to China Construction Bank, Qatar National Bank, Société Générale, and Standard Chartered. The plant, developed by Aktas Energy — a joint venture between TotalEnergies, sovereign wealth fund Samruk-Kazyna, and national energy company KazMunayGas — will have 1 GW of installed capacity paired with a 300 MW/600 MWh battery energy storage system and is expected to generate 100 TWh of renewable electricity over 25 years, enough to supply around one million people in Kazakhstan.
The battery storage component is what makes this project genuinely significant. Kazakhstan currently relies on coal for the bulk of its 25 GW electricity system, and one of the key barriers to scaling up renewables has been grid instability from intermittent power sources. By combining large-scale wind generation with battery storage, the Mirny plant will help stabilize the national grid, strengthen energy security, and cut approximately 2.5 million tonnes of CO₂ emissions per year. The project is the result of an intergovernmental agreement between Kazakhstan and France, and will also receive co-financing from Proparco, DEG, and the Development Bank of Kazakhstan. Total project investment amounts to $1.2 billion, with around 75% externally financed under a 25-year Power Purchase Agreement with the Kazakh government.
Kazakhstan has committed to achieving net-zero emissions by 2060 and is targeting 10 GW of new renewable capacity by 2035 — an ambitious goal for an economy still heavily tied to coal and hydrocarbons. The Mirny project moves that target meaningfully forward and sends a clear market signal that large-scale private renewable investment in Central Asia is commercially viable. The EBRD has invested nearly $12 billion across 345 projects in Kazakhstan to date, making it the Bank’s largest and longest-running investment partner in the region.
For the development and humanitarian community, the energy transition in countries like Kazakhstan matters beyond climate targets alone. Reliable, affordable, and cleaner electricity underpins health systems, water infrastructure, food security, and economic resilience — the very foundations that allow communities to withstand shocks. A project of this scale, backed by a diverse coalition of international lenders, demonstrates what is possible when development finance and private capital align around a shared strategic objective.
