The European Union's investment arm on Friday unveiled a major increase in lending for renewable energy, taking available credits for solar, wind, geothermal and other sources of clean power to as much as 700 million euros (840 million dollars) ayearby2010.

The lending will be made available to electricity producers and other enterprises to help meet a target by which renewables will account for 22 percent of the EU's electricity generation by 2010.

The announcement was made by the European Investment Bank (EIB) at the Bonn conference on renewable energies, which ended here Friday.

A spokesman for the EIB said the bank lent 1.9 billion euros (2.28 billion dollars) for energy generation in the EU 2003.

Lending for renewable sources of energy within this mix would increase by "up to 50 percent" according to demand, she said.