EU Innovation Fund 2026 — Financiering, voorwaarden en hoe aan te vragen

Funding available

€1,8mGrant covering up to 60% of additional capital and operating costs (plus separate competitive auctions)

Success rate~17% (61 geselecteerd uit 359 aanvragen, IF24)

TRL band6–9

2026 budget€2.9bn

On this page · 18 sections→

01Overview
02Is this for you?
03Funding strands
04Success rates
05Eligibility
06Readiness (TRL)
07Funding detail
08How to apply
09Evaluation criteria
10Documents needed
11Budget breakdown
12Deadlines
13After you're funded
14Practical notes
15Who's been funded
16Key features
17Official links
18FAQ

The programme

Overview

Het EU Innovation Fund is een van de grootste financieringsprogramma's ter wereld voor het demonstreren van innovatieve koolstofarme technologieën. Het kanaliseert tussen 2020 en 2030 ongeveer €38 miljard rechtstreeks uit de opbrengsten van de Europese CO2-markt, het emissiehandelssysteem (ETS) — de regeling waardoor vervuilers betalen voor hun broeikasgasemissies. Het ondersteunt geen laboratoriumonderzoek of vroege prototypes; het betaalt om de eerste commerciële installaties op grote schaal te bouwen die de zware industrie, energie, waterstof, koolstofafvang en cleantech-productie koolstofvrij maken. Subsidies dekken tot 60% van de extra investerings- en exploitatiekosten van een project, en individuele toekenningen in de laatste ronde liepen uiteen van €1,8 miljoen tot €216 miljoen. De vlaggenschip-call van 2025 voor Net-Zero Technologies (NZT) legde €2,9 miljard op tafel verdeeld over vijf onderwerpen; deze sloot op 23 april 2026 met 358 aanvragen die €17,5 miljard aanvroegen — zes keer het budget — en de resultaten worden verwacht tegen oktober 2026. Aparte veilingen (de Hydrogen Bank en een veiling voor industriële warmte) betalen een vaste premie per eenheid schone output in plaats van een subsidie.

2026 Budget€2.9bn (IF25 Net-Zero Technologies call)

Average GrantGemiddeld ~€50 mln (€2,7 mld verdeeld over 54 ondertekende IF24-projecten)

De cijfers zijn ontnuchterend.

Fit

Is this for you?

Dit is gemaakt voor een bedrijf — alleen of in een consortium — dat klaar is om beton te storten voor de eerste commerciële schone industriële installatie op grote schaal in Europa: een groene-staallijn, een e-fuelsreactor, een retrofit voor koolstofafvang, een gigafabriek voor warmtepompen of elektrolysers. Als u een technologie heeft die al werkt op pilotschaal, een locatie, een technisch ontwerp, een kostenraming en een gekwantificeerd verhaal over vermeden ton CO2, dan is dit iets voor u. Als u een onderzoeksidee heeft, een prototype op TRL 4, of een softwareproduct zonder fysieke decarbonisatievoetafdruk, kijk dan elders — Horizon Europe, de EIC Pathfinder of de EIC Accelerator passen veel beter. Het Innovation Fund betaalt om bewezen chemie op te schalen naar een werkende fabriek, niet om die uit te vinden.

A good fit if

Capital project cutting CO₂, located in the EU, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein
Single applicant or consortium — both fine; company size irrelevant
Technology proven and ready for first-of-a-kind commercial scale (a separate pilots topic takes less mature tech)
Capex from €2.5M (small-scale) up to €100M+ (large-scale), plus cleantech manufacturing plants
Energy-intensive industry, renewables, storage, hydrogen, CCUS (carbon capture, use and storage), net-zero mobility and buildings

Probably not if

Pre-revenue startup needing money to develop the tech itself → EIC Accelerator
Lab or research-stage idea → Horizon Europe / EIC Pathfinder
Roll-out of off-the-shelf kit (a standard wind or solar farm) — not innovative enough → national support schemes or EIB lending
Renewable hydrogen or industrial heat producer wanting a fixed premium per unit → the Innovation Fund's own auctions (European Hydrogen Bank, heat auction), a separate door with separate deadlines

Eligibility follows the project's location, not the applicant's size or sector. The EEA (European Economic Area) members Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein are in because they are in the EU's Emissions Trading System; the UK and Switzerland are out.

Focus areas

Funding strands

Large-scale general decarbonisation

The Fund's flagship strand, backing first-of-a-kind plants that cut emissions in heavy industry, energy and CO2 management. These are the cement, steel, refinery and carbon-capture megaprojects that the smaller strands cannot reach. The IF25 NZT call allocates €1.2 billion to this topic.

Projects with capital expenditure (CAPEX) above €100 million

Medium-scale general decarbonisation

A middle tier for innovative decarbonisation projects too large for the small-scale window but below the megaproject threshold. It lets industrial sites and clean-energy developers scale promising technology without competing head-on with billion-euro CCS schemes. The IF25 NZT call raised this band to €300 million — up 50% from €200 million in IF24.

Projects with CAPEX between €20 million and €100 million

Small-scale general decarbonisation

The entry rung for smaller, capital-light decarbonisation projects, lowering the barrier for SMEs and first deployments. Applications use a lighter template than the large-scale topic. The IF25 NZT call allocates €100 million to this band.

Projects with CAPEX between €2.5 million and €20 million

Cleantech manufacturing

A dedicated strand for building factories that make the components of the clean transition: electrolysers, wind-turbine parts, heat pumps, batteries and the equipment to recycle them. It is the Fund's answer to the Net-Zero Industry Act, keeping clean-tech supply chains on European soil. The IF25 NZT call allocates €1 billion here — a 43% increase over IF24's €700 million.

Manufacturing of renewable-energy, storage, heat-pump and hydrogen components; CAPEX above €2.5 million

Pilots

For deeply innovative, higher-risk projects that demonstrate breakthrough decarbonisation rather than mature deployment. Pilots must show at least a 75% relative cut in greenhouse-gas emissions against a conventional reference. The IF25 NZT call allocates €300 million — up 50% from €200 million in IF24.

Deep-decarbonisation demonstrators achieving at least 75% relative GHG reduction; CAPEX above €2.5 million

European Hydrogen Bank auctions

A separate competitive-bidding instrument under the Fund that pays renewable-hydrogen producers a fixed premium per kilogram for up to ten years, rather than an upfront grant. The 2024 auction offered up to €1.2 billion; six winners signed grant agreements worth €270.6 million in total. The 2025 (IF25) auction, launched in December 2025, offered up to €1.3 billion and for the first time included electrolytic low-carbon hydrogen alongside renewable hydrogen.

Renewable (and, from 2025, low-carbon) hydrogen production, paid as a fixed premium per kg over 10 years

The odds

Success rates — the honest picture

De cijfers zijn ontnuchterend. De call van 2024 trok 359 aanvragen en selecteerde er 61 voor de subsidievoorbereiding — een reëel succespercentage van ongeveer 17%, en uiteindelijk tekenden er slechts 54. De call van 2025 sloot nog feller af: 358 aanvragen die €17,5 miljard aanvroegen tegenover een budget van €2,9 miljard — de vraag overtrof het aanbod ongeveer zes-op-een, en de resultaten worden verwacht tegen oktober 2026. Bekijk de opvallende subsidieomvang dus met realisme: de meeste aanvragers gaan met lege handen naar huis. De lat ligt meedogenloos hoog maar is specifiek. Winnaars doen drie dingen genadeloos goed — ze tonen aan dat er een groot, geloofwaardig volume aan vermeden broeikasgasemissies per euro publiek geld wordt gerealiseerd; ze laten echte technologische innovatie zien die verder gaat dan wat al commercieel is; en ze tonen aan dat het project echt bouwklaar is (vergunningen, financiering, afname, een doorgerekend technisch ontwerp). De meeste afwijzingen zijn geen slechte ideeën — het zijn goede installaties die als onderzoeksprojecten worden beschreven, met vage CO2-berekeningen en een rijpheidsverhaal dat tijdens de due diligence uiteenvalt. Als uw relatieve vermeden broeikasgasuitstoot per euro zwak is, zal geen enkele afwerking u redden.

End-to-end success rate~17% (61 geselecteerd uit 359 aanvragen, IF24)

Roughly 1 in 6 applications gets funded. A sharp, evidence-backed proposal is what separates the funded from the rejected.

Call history — demand versus budget

Call	Budget	Applications	Funding requested	Outcome
IF23 (deadline Apr 2024)	€4.0B	337 from 27 countries	€24.6B (>6× budget)	85 selected, €4.8B awarded; 83 signed (~25% success)
IF24 (deadline Apr 2025)	€2.4B	359 from 28 countries	€21.7B (9× budget)	61 selected; 54 signed for €2.7B; 12 reserve projects invited in two waves (March + April 2026) (~17% success)
IF25 (deadline Apr 2026)	€2.9B	358 from 27 countries	€17.5B (6× budget)	Results due by October 2026

There is no resubmission limit — rejected projects routinely sharpen the business case and reapply to the next annual call, and reserve lists do get called: twelve IF24 reserve projects were invited to grant preparation across two waves (March 24 and April 20, 2026) after withdrawals freed up budget.

Who qualifies

Eligibility

1Open voor elke rechtspersoon — een afzonderlijk bedrijf of een consortium — gevestigd in een EU-lidstaat, IJsland of Noorwegen (de EER-EVA-staten die deelnemen aan het ETS).
2Het project moet uiterst innovatieve koolstofarme technologieën inzetten die nog niet commercieel beschikbaar zijn maar rijp genoeg om op schaal te worden gebouwd: commerciële demonstratie, geen onderzoek.
3De rijpheid beslaat ruwweg TRL 6-9 — pilots op TRL 6-7, en de onderwerpen klein/middelgroot/groot/cleantech-productie op het niveau van commerciële demonstratie (TRL 8+).
4Tot de in aanmerking komende sectoren behoren energie-intensieve industrieën, hernieuwbare energie, energieopslag, koolstofafvang/-gebruik/-opslag (CCS/CCU) en cleantech-productie voor hernieuwbare energie, opslag, warmtepompen en waterstof.
5Het project moet een aanzienlijke, kwantificeerbare vermindering van broeikasgasemissies opleveren ten opzichte van een geloofwaardige conventionele referentie — het zwaarst onderzochte cijfer in de hele aanvraag.
6De investeringsuitgaven moeten voldoen aan de drempel van het onderwerp: meer dan €100 mln (grootschalig), €20 mln-100 mln (middelgroot), €2,5 mln-20 mln (kleinschalig) en meer dan €2,5 mln (cleantech-productie en pilots).
7Voorstellen worden beoordeeld op vijf gunningscriteria: doeltreffendheid van de vermeden broeikasgasuitstoot, mate van innovatie, projectrijpheid, repliceerbaarheid en kostenefficiëntie.

The fine print

It is the project, not the company, that must be European

Applicants can be legal entities — public or private — established in any country in the world, including the UK, Switzerland or the US. The hard gate is geography of deployment: the funded project must be located in an EU member state or an EEA (European Economic Area) country — Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein. For maritime projects, vessels must fly an EU/EEA flag and call at EU/EEA ports; ship or aircraft building outside the EU/EEA is excluded. Natural persons cannot apply, except sole traders whose business has no separate legal personality.

Reached financial close? You are already out

Only projects that have not reached financial close at the proposal submission date can be funded — the Innovation Fund backs first-of-a-kind deployment, not refinancing. After award the clock reverses: financial close must come within four years of grant signature, and the plant must operate for at least five years after entry into operation (three for pilots and small-scale projects) to satisfy the greenhouse-gas monitoring period.

The financial capacity check has real teeth

Every private beneficiary requesting more than €60,000 is screened by the Central Validation Service on its latest closed accounts (profit-and-loss, balance sheet, external audit report), including dependency on EU funding and past deficits. An unsatisfactory verdict can trigger joint-and-several liability across the consortium, forced replacement of the entity — or rejection of the entire proposal. A risk worth pricing in for newly created project companies (SPVs) without trading history.

Sanctions and rule-of-law exclusions apply in every role

Entities under EU restrictive measures (Article 29 TEU / Article 215 TFEU sanctions) are barred in any capacity — beneficiary, affiliated entity, associated partner or subcontractor. Entities caught by the EU budget-conditionality regime are likewise excluded; currently that covers Hungarian public-interest trusts. Standard exclusion grounds (bankruptcy, unpaid tax or social security, fraud, grave professional misconduct) extend to beneficial owners and persons with decision-making power. EU bodies, except the Joint Research Centre, cannot join the consortium.

60% of 'relevant costs' is not 60% of your capex — and it gets re-audited

The grant is capped at 60% of relevant costs, a net figure computed with the Commission's mandatory calculator (broadly the extra cost of the innovative route versus a conventional reference plant, netting off operating benefits). Shortly before entry into operation an independent auditor re-certifies the calculation; if relevant costs have fallen, the grant is cut. And the full amount is only paid if the project delivers at least 75% of its planned greenhouse-gas avoidance — fail to enter operation and everything paid after financial close is recovered.

Consortia are optional; mandates are not

Single applicants are welcome — there is no consortium-composition requirement, a rarity among EU programmes. But the submitting party must hold a written mandate from all applicants at submission; proposals without full mandate are rejected outright. All beneficiaries and affiliated entities must be registered and validated in the Participant Register before submitting.

Technology readiness

Where you need to be

Your project should sit at TRL 6–9 when you apply. The eligible band is highlighted below.

1
Basic principles observedThe core scientific idea is written down, but nothing has been built or tested.
2
Technology concept formulatedA practical application for the idea is proposed, still purely on paper.
3
Experimental proof of conceptEarly lab experiments show the key principle can actually work.
4
Technology validated in labThe pieces are assembled and shown to work together under lab conditions.
5
Technology validated in relevant environmentThe technology is tested in conditions close to the real world.
6
Technology demonstrated in relevant environmentA working prototype is demonstrated in a realistic setting.
7
System prototype demonstration in operational environmentA near-final system runs in the actual operating environment.
8
System complete and qualifiedThe technology is finished, tested and proven to work as intended.
9
Actual system proven in operational environmentThe technology is fully commercial and running at scale day to day.

The money

The money — ETS-funded grants up to 60%

Grant rate60% of relevant costsIF24 awards ranged from €1.8M to €216M per project

Latest call budget€2.9BIF25 Net-Zero Technologies call, closed 23 April 2026

Project bands€2.5M → €100M+small €2.5–20M, medium €20–100M, large >€100M capex, plus pilots and cleantech manufacturing

Programme size~€40BEmissions Trading System allowance revenues, 2020–2030, at €75/tonne CO₂

Good to know

It is a grant, not equity — but it never covers everything.

The Innovation Fund is financed by auctioning EU Emissions Trading System (ETS) allowances — polluters pay for it, not the EU budget. Winners get a pure grant: no dilution, no repayment if the project performs. But the grant covers at most 60% of 'relevant costs', so you must bring the other 40-plus per cent — and everything outside the relevant-cost perimeter — from your balance sheet, banks or investors, and prove you can reach financial close within four years of signing.

'Relevant costs' are not total costs.

For large projects, relevant costs are the additional capital expenditure compared with a conventional reference plant, plus the net present value of operating cost differences over ten years of operation (set out in Delegated Regulation 2019/856). A €300M plant whose conventional rival would cost €200M has far less than €300M of relevant costs. For small-scale projects the rule is kinder: relevant costs equal total capital expenditure.

Disbursement is tied to performance.

Up to 40% of the grant can be paid out before the plant is running, against pre-defined milestones including financial close. The remaining 60% is released only against greenhouse-gas emission avoidance verified through annual reports for three to ten years after entry into operation. Deliver less CO₂ avoidance than promised and the performance-linked portion is clawed back pro-rata.

There are two doors: grant calls and auctions.

Alongside the annual Net-Zero Technologies grant call, the Fund runs competitive auctions — the European Hydrogen Bank for renewable hydrogen and, since 2025, a heat auction — which pay a fixed premium per unit produced to the lowest bidders. The 2025 auctions attracted almost €10 billion in bids. Auctions have tighter deadlines to financial close (around two to two-and-a-half years) than grant projects.

The process

How to apply — step by step

1
Register your organisation and prepare the proposal3-6 months to prepare
Create an EU Login account and register your organisation in the Participant Register to obtain a 9-digit Participant Identification Code (PIC). In parallel, model your project against the official GHG emission avoidance calculator and relevant-cost methodology, and assemble the business plan and financial documentation that prove the project is mature. No one scores this step; it is the gate to submission.
2
Submit a single-stage proposal on the Funding & Tenders PortalIF25 NZT closed 23 Apr 2026 — IF26 regular grants expected ~Dec 2026
Submit one proposal per topic entirely online (paper is not accepted) in four parts: Part A (administrative + summarised budget, filled online), Part B (the technical description, a mandatory Word template uploaded as PDF), Part C (additional project data online), and annexes including the GHG calculator and business plan. The Innovation Fund uses one-stage submission with one-step evaluation. The 2025 Net-Zero Technologies call closed on 23 April 2026 and attracted 358 applications requesting a combined €17.5 billion against an available budget of €2.9 billion — confirming very high oversubscription. Results are expected October 2026, with grant agreements following in Q1 2027. No IF26 regular grants call is open as of July 2026. Based on the annual pattern (IF24 launched December 2024, IF25 launched December 2025) and a Commission stakeholder consultation on IF26 call design held in June 2026, IF26 is expected to open around December 2026. Check the Innovation Fund calls page for the confirmed date before preparing a submission.
3
Admissibility, eligibility and capacity checkspart of Apr-Sep 2026 evaluation
CINEA screens each proposal for formal admissibility and eligibility (page limits, mandatory documents, eligible participants and activities) and checks financial and operational capacity plus exclusion grounds. Proposals that fail these formal checks are rejected before scoring and never reach the expert evaluation.
4
Expert evaluation against the award criteria (cascade)Apr-Sep 2026
An evaluation committee composed entirely of independent outside experts scores admissible proposals against five award criteria, applied as a cascade: Degree of innovation first (fail and scoring stops), then GHG emission avoidance potential and Project maturity, then Cost efficiency, then Replicability and bonus points. Proposals are ranked by total score within their topic; ties are broken by geographic spread and sector priority rules.
5
Grant preparation and signatureresults Oct-Nov 2026; GA signature Nov 2026-Mar 2027 (time-to-grant ~11 months)
Top-ranked proposals within budget receive an invitation to grant preparation — a dialogue with CINEA to fine-tune technical and financial aspects and address committee recommendations — but this is not yet a funding commitment; legal-entity validation, financial-capacity and exclusion checks still apply. Proposals above threshold but outside budget go on a reserve list or receive the STEP Seal; many are offered EIB Project Development Assistance. Grant agreement signature follows.

Evaluation

What evaluators look for

Degree of innovation

Threshold ≥9/15 (cascade gate)

How far the project goes beyond incremental innovation, from intermediate to breakthrough, against the European state of the art. Evaluated first — score below threshold and the rest of the proposal is not scored at all.

Innovation relative to the state of the art (15 pts)

GHG emission avoidance potential

Threshold Quality sub-criterion ≥3/5 (gate); total up to 12

How much greenhouse gas the project avoids over 10 years of operation, in absolute and relative terms, plus the credibility of the calculation. Minimum requirements include relative avoidance of at least 50% (75% for pilots) and process emissions below the applicable EU ETS benchmark.

Absolute GHG emission avoidance (2 pts)
Relative GHG emission avoidance (5 pts)
Quality of the GHG calculation and minimum requirements (≥3/5)

Project maturity

Threshold Each sub-criterion ≥3/5 (gate); total up to 15

Whether the project is sufficiently ready in technical, financial and operational terms — planning, business model, financing structure and permitting. Failing any one of the three sub-criteria stops the evaluation.

Technical maturity (≥3/5)
Financial maturity (≥3/5)
Operational maturity (≥3/5)

Cost efficiency

Threshold Quality sub-criterion ≥1.5/3 (gate); total up to 15

Grant requested per tonne of CO2 avoided (the cost-efficiency ratio, up to 12 points) plus the soundness of the relevant-cost calculation. A weak cost calculation halts the cascade.

Cost efficiency ratio (12 pts)
Quality of the cost calculation and minimum requirements (≥1.5/3)

Replicability

Threshold Industrial-leadership sub-criterion ≥4/10; total up to 15

Potential for efficiency gains and multiple environmental impacts beyond the project, plus — newly weighted — the project's contribution to Europe's industrial leadership and competitiveness (European value creation, knowledge retention, research collaboration, supply-chain diversification).

Replicability in efficiency gains and multiple environmental impacts (5 pts)
Contribution to Europe's industrial leadership and competitiveness (≥4/10)

Paperwork

Documents you'll need

Innovation Fund 2025 Net-Zero Technologies Call document (call fiche)PDF · ~55 pages

The master call document: objectives, topics, budget, timetable, admissibility, eligibility, the full evaluation and award procedure, and the scored award criteria — read this first and cover to cover.

View document

Innovation Fund overview (DG CLIMA)Web

Official European Commission overview of the Innovation Fund, its ETS funding source and links to all current calls and the project portfolio.

View document

Innovation Fund 2025 NZT call page (CINEA)Web

The managing agency's call page with the deadline, budget, info-day materials, FAQ/Q&A document, tutorials and the link into the Funding & Tenders Portal submission system.

View document

Guidance on the GHG emission avoidance methodologyPDF · ~60 pages

The mandatory methodology behind the GHG calculator; the relative-avoidance and quality sub-criteria are pass/fail gates, so model your numbers strictly to this.

View document

Funding & Tenders Portal Online ManualPDF · ~120 pages

How to register an organisation, obtain a PIC, and submit Parts A/B/C plus annexes electronically — the only accepted submission route.

View document

Budget split

Typical Budget Breakdown

Algemene decarbonisatie — grootschalig (CAPEX meer dan €100M) — €1,2 mld41%

Cleantech-productie (CAPEX meer dan €2,5M) — €1 mld34%

Algemene decarbonisatie — middelgroot (CAPEX €20M-100M) — €300M10%

Pilotprojecten (CAPEX meer dan €2,5M) — €300M10%

Algemene decarbonisatie — kleinschalig (CAPEX €2,5M-20M) — €100M3%

Calendar

2026 Deadlines

Closed23 april 2026

From submission to money

4 Dec 2025
4 Dec 2025IF25 Net-Zero Technologies call opens
Single-stage call worth €2.9bn across five topics (large/medium/small-scale, pilots, clean-tech manufacturing), submitted via the EU Funding & Tenders Portal.
23 Apr 2026
23 Apr 2026Submission deadline (17:00 Brussels)
Round closed with 358 applications from 27 EEA countries requesting €17.5bn — six times the budget. Part B capped at 70 pages; feasibility study and business plan at 60 pages each.
Apr–Oct 2026
Apr–Oct 2026Evaluation window (running now)
Admissibility and eligibility checks by the Commission, then external experts score five criteria: degree of innovation, greenhouse-gas avoidance, maturity, replicability and cost efficiency.
Oct 2026
Oct 2026Evaluation results communicated
Winners invited to grant preparation; above-threshold non-winners get the STEP (Strategic Technologies for Europe Platform) Seal and may be offered European Investment Bank project development assistance or national grants-as-a-service funding.
Nov 2026 – Mar 2027
Nov 2026 – Mar 2027Grant agreement preparation and signature
Time-to-grant runs up to 11 months from deadline — officially longer than the standard 9 — given the volume and size of projects. Legal entity validation, financial capacity checks and bank account validation happen here.
After signature
After signatureFirst money — but no pre-financing
Unusually for EU grants, there is no pre-financing payment. Interim payments of up to 40% of the grant flow against reporting periods before financial close; the remaining 60%+ after, with generally at least 10% held until after entry into operation.
T+4 years after signature
T+4 years after signatureFinancial close deadline
Projects must reach financial close within four years of grant signature or face termination; then operate 3 years (pilots/small-scale) or 5 years (other topics) for greenhouse-gas monitoring.

After the grant

After you're funded

Grant agreement preparation, not a cheque

Selection starts months of grant agreement preparation (GAP) with CINEA, the European Climate, Infrastructure and Environment Executive Agency that runs the Fund. It is survivable but not automatic: of IF23's 85 selected projects, 2 withdrew before signing, and 83 were ultimately supported.

Four years to financial close — or the grant dies

Grant projects must reach financial close within four years of signature, with credible interim milestones that CINEA monitors throughout the development phase. Auction winners face tighter clocks: roughly two years for heat projects and two-and-a-half for hydrogen. Miss the milestones and the agreement can be terminated.

A decade of performance reporting

Up to 40% of the grant arrives against pre-operation milestones; the rest is paid only against independently verified greenhouse-gas avoidance, reported annually for three to ten years after the plant starts up. Under-deliver on the promised CO₂ numbers and the performance-linked money is repaid pro-rata.

Knowledge-sharing and visibility obligations

Beneficiaries must publicly share lessons learned through the Fund’s knowledge-sharing framework and follow EU visibility rules — your project details, avoided-emissions figures and selected know-how become public goods, by design.

The STEP Sovereignty Seal

High-scoring projects receive the STEP (Strategic Technologies for Europe Platform) Sovereignty Seal — including strong projects the budget could not stretch to. From IF23, 85 funded and 39 unfunded projects got the seal, a quality label meant to unlock other EU, national and private financing.

On the ground

Practical notes

There are no consortia to assemble — you apply solo, and direct.

Unlike Horizon Europe, the Innovation Fund funds individual projects, not multi-partner consortia, so there is no partner-search or brokerage step: a single project owner (or the company building the plant) applies directly. Submission is single-stage via the EU Funding & Tenders Portal — for the IF25 Net-Zero Technologies call (€2.9bn budget) the deadline was 23 April 2026, 17:00 CEST. This means your effort goes entirely into your own GHG-avoidance numbers and financial maturity, not into wrangling academic/SME partners.

The Innovation Fund has its own NCPs — and they exist for one specific thing.

The Fund runs a dedicated National Contact Point network (separate from Horizon's NCPs), published on climate.ec.europa.eu. Their distinctive value is advising on how an Innovation Fund grant interacts with national funding instruments and other EU programmes — i.e. how to stack or avoid double-funding conflicts with your national climate/industry schemes. For everything call-specific (forms, eligibility, deadlines), the official channel is instead the Innovation Fund Helpdesk inside the Funding & Tenders Portal.

Free EIB Project Development Assistance is the real hidden lever — and you can still get it if you lost.

The European Investment Bank runs Project Development Assistance (PDA) free of charge to promoters, providing due-diligence, feasibility, business-planning and capital-structuring support to make a project bankable. Crucially, it is explicitly aimed at projects that applied but were NOT awarded a grant (as well as those still maturing) — so a near-miss is a route in, not a dead end. It is first-come-first-served with geographic/sectoral balancing, EU + Iceland/Liechtenstein/Norway only, and excludes projects currently under evaluation or already holding an IF grant. Note the 90-day rule: no reply within 90 days means you were not selected for that round.

Use the self-check tool and GHG tutorial before you write a word — ranking is decided on cost per tonne.

Projects are scored on five criteria (GHG emission avoidance, degree of innovation, project maturity, scalability, and cost efficiency), and cost efficiency — effectively the grant requested per tonne of CO2 avoided — is a primary ranking lever, so a technically brilliant project can still lose on price. CINEA provides a free Self-Check questionnaire to test fit before applying, plus video tutorials covering the application, the financial forms and the GHG-avoidance calculation for each project category, and a downloadable Q&A document. The Info Day is held online (CINEA + DG CLIMA) a few days after each call launches — attend it for the current-round nuances and live Q&A.

Track record

Who's been funded

STARFISHUp to €225 million

Sequestration Technology And Reservoir: Floating Injection and Storage in Havstjerne

An open-access offshore CO2 storage scheme that lets captured emissions from many industrial sources be shipped and injected into a reservoir about 100 km off Egersund, Norway.

NorwayProject

ACCSION€220 million

Aalborg Carbon Capture, Storage and Innovation

One of Europe's first full onshore carbon capture and storage value chains, built by Aalborg Portland and Air Liquide to avoid about 1.5 million tonnes of CO2 a year from a cement plant.

DenmarkProject

CO2LLECT€157 million

CO2LLECT carbon capture at a German cement plant

A Cemex and Linde project capturing roughly 1.3 million tonnes of CO2 a year from a cement site using a cryogenic-adsorptive process.

GermanyProject

Kristinestad PtX€135.5 million

Koppö Energia power-to-X renewable hydrogen plant

A 200 MW renewable-hydrogen plant by Koppö Energia, the largest grant in the 2024 hydrogen auction, paid as a fixed premium per kilogram of hydrogen produced.

FinlandProject

CarboClearTech

Holcim carbon capture and storage, Martres-Tolosane

A Holcim carbon capture and storage project at its Martres-Tolosane cement plant in southern France, one of several cement-sector winners in the round.

FranceProject

At a glance

Key Features

Subsidies van maximaal 60% van de extra investerings- en exploitatiekosten van een project

Individuele toekenningen van €1,8 mln tot €216 mln in de laatst ondertekende ronde

Gefinancierd door de opbrengsten van de ETS-CO2-markt, niet uit de EU-begroting

Vijf onderwerpen op basis van projectomvang, van €2,5 mln CAPEX tot meer dan €100 mln

Aparte veilingen (Hydrogen Bank, industriële warmte) betalen een vaste premie per eenheid output

Sources

Official links & resources

Frequently Asked Questions

Niet uit de EU-begroting. Het Innovation Fund wordt gefinancierd uit de opbrengsten van het veilen van emissierechten onder het EU-emissiehandelssysteem (ETS), dus het totaal over 2020-2030 — ongeveer €38 miljard — hangt af van de CO2-prijs.

Subsidies dekken tot 60% van de extra investerings- en exploitatiekosten — de meerkosten van de schone optie ten opzichte van een conventionele installatie — niet 60% van het gehele projectbudget.

Elke rechtspersoon, alleen of in een consortium, gevestigd in een EU-lidstaat, IJsland of Noorwegen. Er is geen beperking tot enkel mkb — grote industriële bedrijven, nutsbedrijven en speciale projectvennootschappen dingen in dezelfde calls mee.

Niet echt. Het financiert de commerciële demonstratie van het eerste exemplaar van technologieën die al werken op pilotschaal maar nog niet commercieel zijn uitgerold — ruwweg TRL 6-9, met pilots aan de onderkant (TRL 6-7) en de meeste onderwerpen op TRL 8+. Gebruik voor onderzoek en prototypes Horizon Europe of de EIC.

In de call van 2024 werden 61 van de 359 aanvragen geselecteerd — ongeveer 17%. De call van 2025, gesloten op 23 april 2026, trok 358 aanvragen die €17,5 miljard aanvroegen tegenover een budget van €2,9 miljard — de vraag overtrof het aanbod ongeveer zes-op-een. De resultaten worden verwacht tegen oktober 2026.

Veilingen — de Hydrogen Bank voor hernieuwbare waterstof en een aparte veiling voor industriële warmte — betalen een vaste premie per eenheid schone output in plaats van een eenmalige investeringssubsidie. U biedt de laagste premie die u nodig heeft om het project levensvatbaar te maken.

Geselecteerde projecten gaan over naar de subsidievoorbereiding en tekenen doorgaans ongeveer 9-12 maanden na de deadline van de call, waarna betalingen worden vrijgegeven op basis van afgesproken projectmijlpalen.