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Funding for chemicals and materials

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Chemicals and materials companies face investments that are often hard to justify on a conventional calculation: electrifying processes, adopting hydrogen, keeping residual streams in the loop, cutting CO2 and moving new materials from the lab into the plant. These projects are capital-intensive, run over several years and frequently carry technical or commercial risk. That is exactly where public funding applies. It can support development, demonstration, scale-up and investment where companies advance new processes, materials or production methods. This page covers which projects typically qualify and what matters in the application.

3D Spark
Heineken
UltiMaker
2R
Coolblue
ABN AMRO
Folienwelt
KPN
qlero
Vattenfall
PostNL
mm lab
ProRail
NS
Deutsche Firmenkredit Partner
Jumbo
ANWB
ENTIAC
Bynder
selecta one
Universiteit Utrecht
Nedap
DC Smarter
VDL
Gasunie
ZWF
Fugro
Unit4
Unternehmensgruppe Albert Weil
Zeeman
Basic-Fit
fierythings

The pressures shaping your investments

Four developments currently drive investment decisions in this sector. They apply across Europe alike. Decarbonising energy-intensive processes. Emissions targets and carbon pricing make converting high-temperature processes, steam generation and reaction control a necessity. Electrification and hydrogen are the obvious routes, and both demand substantial upfront work. Circularity instead of linear value chains. Raw material prices, supply chain risk and regulation shift the focus to recovering substances from residues and end-of-life products.

Chemical recycling and processing methods are not yet mature. New materials with defined properties. Lightweight construction, coatings, catalysts and battery materials are increasingly designed rather than discovered. The route from lab to plant is where most projects stall. Substituting critical substances. Regulatory restrictions and raw material dependencies force the replacement of established substances without losing product properties. That is development work with an open outcome.

Decarbonisation and electrification

Converting energy-intensive processes to electricity-based or hydrogen-based methods, including the underlying process development.

Circular processes and raw material recovery

Chemical and mechanical recycling, processing of residual streams and recovery of valuable materials from waste.

Development of new materials and catalysts

Materials with defined properties whose manufacturability and scalability still have to be proven.

Demonstration and pilot plants

The step between laboratory scale and industrial production, where technical and commercial risk peak.

Energy and resource efficiency in production

Waste heat recovery, process optimisation and reducing specific consumption where the effect cannot be derived from known methods.

What this means for your funding

work on a process, material or method whose technical performance is not established at the outset. The second funds investment: building, converting or extending plant where a technology is already sufficiently defined. A third logic addresses the ongoing additional cost of lower-emission processes, where low-carbon production is more expensive to run than the existing method.

demonstration and pilot plants. They are neither pure laboratory development nor regular investment. They exist to validate technology at relevant scale, reduce process risk and prove scalability. Dedicated instruments exist for this stage, and it has to be structured differently from the outset than a classic R&D project or a straight capital investment.

the balance between these logics differs by country. In Germany, investment and transformation instruments carry a large share of this sector. In the Netherlands the emphasis sits more strongly on research and development, with demonstration and pilot work often addressed through energy-sector programmes rather than chemicals-specific ones.

The programmes behind it

  • Horizon Europe: for collaborative research and development, usually in multi-country consortia.
  • EUREKA Eurostars: for international R&D projects by smaller companies.
  • EU Innovation Fund: for technologies that substantially reduce greenhouse gas emissions, including demonstration and industrial scale-up.

  • Forschungszulage, ZIM and kmu-innovativ: for development work, where the technical outcome is not yet established.
  • EEW, GRW and regional programmes: for investment in plant, energy and resource efficiency.
  • Carbon contracts for difference: for lower-emission processes with permanently higher operating cost.

  • WBSO: the base instrument for development work, reducing payroll tax for staff working on research and development.
  • MIT R&D: for collaborative development projects between SMEs, opened regionally with differing windows and themes.
  • Topsector Energie schemes: a substantial share of Dutch funding for demonstration and pilot work in this field sits within the energy top sector rather than under chemicals.

What to watch in this sector

In chemicals and materials, funding risk frequently arises where technical development, capital investment and climate impact interlock. Three points are particularly critical.

01

Process development and plant construction get mixed

A new material or process can contain R&D elements, piloting and investment in plant. These parts follow different funding logics. If it is not separated cleanly which costs belong to development, demonstration or construction, reductions or exclusions follow.

02

Emissions reduction not robustly calculated

In climate and decarbonisation programmes the demonstrable CO2 or greenhouse gas reduction frequently decides the outcome. That requires a clear baseline, robust assumptions, comparison scenarios and a traceable calculation of the expected effect.

03

Scale-up risks underestimated

Many projects work in the laboratory but fail at pilot or demonstration scale on process stability, quality, energy demand, raw material variation or permitting. Applications therefore have to show which technical risks exist at scale and how the project reduces them.

What this means for your funding

Work on a process, material or method whose technical performance is not established at the outset. The second funds investment: building, converting or extending plant where a technology is already sufficiently defined. A third logic addresses the ongoing additional cost of lower-emission processes, where low-carbon production is more expensive to run than the existing method.

The balance between these logics differs by country. In Germany, investment and transformation instruments carry a large share of this sector. In the Netherlands the emphasis sits more strongly on research and development, with demonstration and pilot work often addressed through energy-sector programmes rather than chemicals-specific ones.

How we work

We do not start with the application but with the question of which parts of your work qualify and which funding logic they follow. Our specialists know the programmes and the evaluation practice in this sector.

STEP 1

Review the roadmap.

We go through your plans and separate what qualifies from what does not.

STEP 2

Match the programmes.

We map the qualifying work to instruments at regional, national and European level.

STEP 3

Build the application.

We write against the actual evaluation criteria rather than the project description.

STEP 4

Protect what is awarded.

We keep documentation audit-ready throughout the funded period.

Numbers you can hold us to

95%

Success rate

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Resources & Insights

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I only need to supply the necessary documents and Ignite Group takes care of the rest. It gives us the freedom to focus on developing our technology and selling our products.

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FAQs about funding advisory

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Usually a plant that tests and proves a new or substantially improved process at relevant scale for the first time, without yet being full series or routine production. The exact delimitation between R&D, demonstration and investment decides which programme applies and is settled before the application.

Because funding programmes want to know whether a process or material holds up outside the laboratory. What matters are scalability, process stability, raw material availability, quality, safety and viability at relevant scale. We help make those open points visible and structure them into an eligible development or demonstration project.

Yes, many programmes allow multi-year projects, but with fixed durations, milestones and reporting duties. In long development or demonstration projects it also has to be checked how costs, drawdowns and changes are handled across several financial years.

Yes, where the substitution creates technical uncertainty, for example because material properties, process stability, quality, safety or scalability first have to be tested. A pure change of supplier or the use of a known substitute through an established method is generally not eligible development.