EU Innovation Fund

The EU Innovation Fund is the European Union’s programme for demonstrating innovative climate-friendly technologies. Its official name is the Innovation Fund. The European Commission manages it directly; operational delivery lies with the CINEA agency. The legal basis is Delegated Regulation (EU) 2019/856, which has applied since 17 June 2019. You receive a non-repayable grant. No call is currently open.

Unlike most funding programmes, the EU Innovation Fund does not finance research but demonstration and market entry. Funding goes to projects that show a technology at scale: energy-intensive industry, renewable energy, energy storage, hydrogen, the capture and use of CO2 as well as emission-free mobility and buildings.

What stands out is the size of the funding. The fund covers up to 60% of the relevant costs. This makes projects financeable that would otherwise not go ahead because of their technical and financial risk. That is exactly what the EU Innovation Fund is made for: large, capital-intensive climate projects.

Legal entities are eligible to apply, both public and private. The location of your project is decisive. It must lie in a country admitted under the call. For the regular calls these are the EU member states as well as Iceland, Norway and Liechtenstein.

There is no classification by company size. The EU Innovation Fund does not distinguish between small and large companies but by project size and technology field. A young company applies under the same procedure as a corporate group, only in a different project category.

Which countries and which project categories apply to you is set out in the call notice on the EU Funding & Tenders Portal. Check these two points first, because they determine your eligibility above all else.

Funding goes to the demonstration of innovative technologies that cut greenhouse gases. This includes energy-intensive industries, renewable energy, energy storage, the capture, use and storage of CO2, hydrogen as well as emission-free mobility and buildings.

Eligible items are the project costs under the cost methodology of the respective call. These include the costs of demonstration and implementation, the costs of pilot projects and the costs of projects manufacturing clean technologies. The calls distinguish between large, medium and small projects, and each category has its own conditions.

Your project must be mature. Planning, business model and the financial and legal structure must be in place. An idea alone is not enough. What is required is a project that can be built.

You receive a non-repayable grant. It amounts to up to 60% of the relevant costs of your project. This rate applies across the entire programme area, regardless of country and company size.

Alongside the grant, other forms are possible, such as prizes or procurement. Which form is used is set by the call.

The size of your funding follows from two figures: your relevant costs and the ceiling per project. Under the IF25 call for net-zero technologies, this ceiling was €40 million of funding per project. That amount belongs to that call and may be different in the next one.