What can the European Innovation Fund do for you?

The European Innovation Fund is a financing fund of the European Commission for projects that bring industrial solutions to the market which help make Europe carbon neutral. This fund is mainly financed by the proceeds of the auctioning of emission rights.

The fund was launched in 2020 and will run until 2030. During this period, several calls will be launched. The calls that were launched at the end of last year focus on investments in innovative low-carbon technologies and have a budget of 4.6 billion euros.

• Projects are selected on the basis of their merits, regardless of their country of origin. This implies that the fund is not distributed equally between the Member States.
• Projects are assessed on five criteria: greenhouse gas emissions avoided; degree of innovation; project maturity; scalability; and cost-efficiency;
• Projects are divided into 5 categories. Each category has a minimum investment amount (see also the figure below);
• The deadline for the current open calls is 24 April 2025. In addition, submitted projects must be completed financially within 1 to 2 years. Timing is therefore very important.

• Interesting ideas that may be eligible for European support are pilots for offshore floating solar and projects around repowering;
• In the last call, 6 projects linked to wind energy were selected (new rotor designs, XXL towers, etc.). However, there were no Belgian projects among those;
• Selected projects in other sectors did involve Belgian companies. These included ArcelorMittal, Electrabel, and Bekaert.

In Belgium, the Flemish Energy and Climate Agency (VEKA) offers support to Flemish companies that want to respond to one of the calls of the European Innovation Fund.

Do you want to make use of this offer? Please contact VEKA.