Groundbreaking Partnership
At COP26 in Glasgow, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and Bill Gates, the Founder of Breakthrough Energy, together with European Investment Bank President, Werner Hoyer, formalized a partnership to mobilize funding in emerging climate technology projects located in the EU-27. The EU – Breakthrough Energy Catalyst Partnership seeks to mobilize up to €840 million between 2023 and 2027.
The partnership will seek to identify and support projects with high potential for impact & cost-down trajectory in the following sectors:
- Clean Hydrogen (Delegated Act Compliant) to decarbonize industry and transportation
- Long Duration Energy Storage to provide cleaner and more reliable power in addition to heat
- Sustainable Aviation Fuel to power aviation
- Direct Air Capture to remove CO2 from the atmosphere
- Industrial Decarbonization of cement, steel, plastics, textiles, and fertilizers
Projects that are ready-to-build within 9-12 months will be prioritized.
Project Types
Breakthrough Energy Catalyst, the EIB, and the EC will fund two types of projects under the partnership: Demonstration Projects and Large First-of-a-Kind (“FOAK”) Projects:
- Demonstration Projects – Small projects that de-risk earlier-stage emerging climate technologies (TRL 5-7; Project Size between ~€30M-100M)
- Large FOAK Projects – First-of-a-Kind projects focused on emerging climate technology scale-up & market creation (TRL 6+; Project Size between ~€100M-1B)
Funding Products
Breakthrough Energy Catalyst, the EIB, and the EC are able to provide a variety of funding products to help support emerging climate technology projects:
- Demonstration Projects – Venture Debt from the EIB and Capex Grant from Catalyst – more information on EIB’s Venture Debt product can be found here
- Large FOAK Projects – Equity from Catalyst combined with Quasi-Equity from EIB both intended for project capex. For certain projects, where the Green Premium is significant, grants for Opex could be considered by Catalyst and EC (using EU budget resources)
The EU will align capital with Catalyst funding from funds available from Horizon Europe & Innovation Fund through the InvestEU Program.
Applications for Funding Consideration
Apply for funding using the link below.