Some industrial sectors emit particularly large amounts of climate-damaging carbon dioxide. In order to reduce these emissions, Economics Minister Habeck has launched a new funding program. It is aimed specifically at small and medium-sized businesses.
The federal government wants to encourage small and medium-sized industrial companies to use a billion-dollar funding program to implement more climate-friendly processes. “We want to support the many small and medium-sized production companies in particular in switching to low-CO2 processes,” said Economics Minister Robert Habeck at the presentation of the new “Federal Funding for Industry and Climate Protection” (BIK).
The program is scheduled to run until 2030 and, according to current planning, will have around 3.3 billion euros by then. Companies will probably be able to submit their projects for three months starting in September. The money comes from the Climate and Transformation Fund (KTF).
New program added Climate protection agreements
Habeck said the new funding program complements the climate protection agreements. In these, the state steps in financially and covers the additional costs of green production compared to conventional production. It is a project that is unique in the industrialized countries and is intended to help make Germany climate-neutral by 2045. Both funding programs are coordinated and cannot be used together, according to the ministry.
In the BIK, funding starts with a project size of 500,000 euros for small and medium-sized companies and one million euros for large companies. For a project volume of 15 million euros or more, co-financing by the federal states of 30 percent is planned.
Controversial CO2 storage is also being promoted
The first module of the BIK funding is aimed at industrial companies that plan or operate plants in Germany and want to save at least 40 percent of their CO2 emissions in production. The focus is on industrial sectors such as steel, glass, ceramics, paper, cement and lime. “The maximum funding in Module 1 is up to 200 million euros per company,” the Ministry of Economic Affairs announced.
The second module of the new funding program deals with the capture, storage and use of CO2 – so-called CCS or CCU – which has been criticized by environmental associations. According to the ministry, investment and innovation projects can be supported in this area.
However, funding in the second module is limited to CO2 emissions that are difficult to avoid, it was said. These occur primarily in the lime, cement and thermal waste treatment industries. Investment projects are eligible for funding of up to 30 million euros, and industrial research projects are eligible for funding of up to 35 million euros.