The selected projects are located in 15 EU Member States: Austria, Belgium, Croatia, Czechia, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, and Sweden; as well as Norway. The supported projects will all enter into operation before 2030 and have the potential to avoid 221 million tonnes of CO2 emissions in their first 10 years of operation.
The 41 projects were selected following the third call for large-scale projects, covering four topics: “general” decarbonization; “industry electrification and hydrogen”; “clean tech manufacturing”; and “mid-sized pilots”.
Projects in brief:
- In “general” decarbonization topic: 8 projects worth €1.4 billion. They include 3 projects from refineries and 5 projects in the cement and lime sector and are located in Belgium, Croatia, Germany, Greece, the Netherlands, Portugal, and Sweden.
- In “industry electrification and hydrogen” topic: 13 projects worth almost €1.2 billion. They include 6 projects on renewable hydrogen production as well as 7 projects on hydrogen use in different sectors: chemical industry, refineries, and steel. The projects are in Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, and Norway.
- In “clean tech manufacturing” topic: 11 projects worth almost €800 million. They include 4 projects on electrolyzer manufacturing, 4 projects on batteries (including recycling), and 3 projects on photovoltaic panels and modules, located in Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Finland, Spain, Sweden, and Norway.
- In “mid-sized pilots” topic: 9 projects worth €250 million. They include 2 projects on wind energy, 2 on ocean energy, 2 on chemicals, and projects in the glass sector, on carbon capture and on e-fuels. The projects are in Czechia, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, and Norway.
The selected projects were evaluated by independent experts against five award criteria: the ability to reduce greenhouse gas emissions compared to traditional technologies; level of innovation; operational, financial, and technical maturity; scalability; and cost-effectiveness. In addition to the 41 projects selected for funding today, other promising but insufficiently mature projects will receive project development assistance from the European Investment Bank. These will be announced in the fourth quarter of 2023.
At the end of the year, the Commission will launch the next call for proposals for large-scale projects under the Innovation Fund, with an increased budget of €4 billion.
“Today, the European Union is making an unprecedented investment of € 3.6 billion in 41 cleantech projects across the continent. With investments in innovative solutions like these, we deliver on Europe's green transition goals, support our industry, and bring energy security, safety, and prosperity to future generations. Because we have put a price on carbon emissions, Europe is getting the additional financial firepower that enables these transformative investments”, says Frans Timmermans, Executive Vice-President for the European Green Deal.
The EU ETS Innovation Fund is one of the world's largest funding programs for the deployment of net-zero and innovative technologies. It is one of the key tools of the European Green Deal Industrial Plan. Financed by revenues from the auctioning of allowances from the EU Emissions Trading System (EU ETS), it has already held two large-scale calls awarding €1.1 billion and €1.8 billion in grants to 7 and 16 projects respectively.
With an estimated revenue of approximately €40 billion until 2030, the Innovation Fund aims to help businesses invest in clean energy and bring technologies to market that can decarbonize European industry while fostering its competitiveness. Grants are awarded to cover the cost gap between such innovative technologies and conventional ones. The Innovation Fund awards grants through regular calls for proposals and in the future through competitive bidding procedures (auctions).
In 2023, the revision of the EU Emissions Trading System Directive strengthened the Innovation Fund to lead the way in clean tech and set the example on a global stage to contribute to the goals of the European Green Deal by increasing its budget and introducing new auctioning tools. As announced in the REPowerEU Plan, the projects under this call will provide further support for the EU's phasing out of Russian fossil fuel imports.
The Innovation Fund is implemented by the European Climate, Infrastructure, and Environment Executive Agency (CINEA). At the same time, the European Investment Bank (EIB) provides project development assistance to promising projects that are not sufficiently mature for Innovation Fund grants.
This call for projects attracted 239 applications. About 196 were eligible and admissible for evaluation. Over 40% of the eligible projects passed all the evaluation thresholds and could be considered for the ‘Sovereignty Seal', the EU's new quality label to be awarded to high-quality projects contributing to the objectives of the Strategic Technologies for Europe Platform (STEP).
