Innovation Fund: Zabala presents 5% of submitted projects across Europe

The programme is already assessing two applications for small and large-scale projects. New calls for proposals for a total of €10 billion in grants are expected to be launched successively until 2030. The next calls are expected by the end of 2021.

March 18, 2021
European project funding

Innovation Fund

To meet its climate targets, the EU is implementing more ambitious actions and budgets than ever before. The Innovation Fund programme with a budget of 10 billion euros in grants aims to bring innovative clean, i.e. low-carbon, technology projects to the market.

Innovation Fund is a DG CLIMA programme funded by the EU Emissions Trading Scheme (EU ETS). It is one of the key elements in achieving a climate-neutral Europe by 2050, one of the Commission’s strategies.

The Innovation Fund is already evaluating more than 500 projects submitted to the first two calls for proposals. The first is for large-scale projects with a CAPEX of more than €7.5 million; the second is for smaller-scale projects with a CAPEX of between €2.5 million and €7.5 million. The aim of this aid is to subsidise up to 60% of the costs involved in the commercial deployment of the first commercial installations for clean and innovative technologies.

Zabala Innovation has contributed to the presentation of almost 5% of all the projects presented at the European level (25 in total), carrying out tasks such as analysis of the suitability of the projects in the call for proposals (based on the mandatory conditions and the five evaluation criteria), analysis of the reduction of CO2 emissions, identification and calculation of the relevant costs and preparation of the proposal.

Small-scale projects

The first and only phase of this call for proposals ended in March. A total of 232 projects participated, of which around 5% were presented by Zabala Innovation. The call will distribute a total of 100 million euros.

With regard to the different sectors, the number of applications was as follows:

About 125 for energy-intensive industries.
Around 60 for renewable electricity and heat
Around 50 for energy storage

The results are expected to be announced in August and those selected will receive grants by the end of the year.

Large-scale projects

This call for proposals, worth 1 billion euros, consists of two phases. The first ended last October with a total of 311 proposals, 5% of which were submitted by Zabala Innovation. The second phase is about to begin. Only 70 of the 311 projects will go through to the final phase.

The projects come from 25 different countries, with Spain in second place. These are the projects by sector:

204 are in energy-intensive industries
58 are focused on renewable energies
35 analyse energy storage techniques
14 deal with carbon use and storage

According to official sources, these two calls will be launched again this year, one for large-scale projects and one for small-scale projects. Based on the projects submitted in the first two calls, the funding ratio for these projects will be less than 10%. Therefore, it is always advisable to plan your application well in advance and to have the best tools to be able to compete in this process.

If your company is going to carry out the commercial deployment of a new technology that will revolutionise the sector in the coming years, do not hesitate to contact us to analyse the fit with the Innovation Fund call. You can send us your idea through the following link. Our technicians, experts in Innovation Fund, will advise you on how to carry out your proposal.