|
 On November 5th, 74 new projects were selected by the second call for proposals of the INTERREG IVC Programme (a call that closed on January 30th, 2009). The amount of European funding requested by the projects totals to 125 million euros. As was the case in the first call, the majority of projects fall under the "Innovation and the Knowlege Economy" priority of the programme, whereas 28 projects applied under the "Environment and Risk Protection" priority.
The complete list of selected projects is available on the Interreg IVC website |
 SET-PLAN : in a new communication, the Commission indicated that the transition to a renewable-energy based economy would necessitate an annuel investment of about 8 billion euros by 2020. On October 7th, 2009, the European Commission published a Communication intitled "Investing in the Development of Low Carbon Technologies (SET-Plan)." This communication presented the Commission analysis of the investment needed in order to fund the iniatives of the SET-Plan.
Launched in 2007, the SET-Plan (or "Strategic Energy Technology Plan) aims to provide the European Union with a new research agenda in the field of low-carbon energy technologies.
As such, the Commission, industry and researchers have drawn up road maps for research, development and demonstration of 6 key technologies:
- wind energy
- solar energy
- bio-energy
- electric grids
- carbon capture and storage
- sustainable nuclear fission
The Commission believes that in order to achieve the objectives of the SET-Plan, an additional investment to the tune of 50 billion euros will be necessary over the next 10 years - some 5 billion extra euros per year. It emphasizes the fact that this investment should mostly come from the private sector and from EU Member states. Nontheless, given the current economic recession, and in particular for fields where there is the most risk, Europe will play an important financial role in the future through several instruments:
- The Emissions Trading System (to support carbon capture and storage technologies)
- The Seventh Framework Programme, Intelligent Energy Europe and the Economic Recovery Plan
- The European Investment Bank
In addition, the EU has launched a new initiative known as "Smart Cities" to ease the commercial succes of energy technologies vis-à-vis the greater public in 30 or so European cities. |
 The European Court of Auditors recently published a report on the sustainability of LIFE Nature projects and their management by the European Commission. The report found that while the projects generally achieved their goals in terms of Nature conservation, their results were insufficiently long-lasting. The Court encouraged the Commission to make sustainability more of a priority in their selection of future Nature and Biodiversity projects. Project holders will have have to take note of this development for the coming calls for proposals.
Read the report
|
|
 Enviropea's newsletter #41 is now available.
Download it (in French only) in the section "Newsletters." |
|
|
|
|
<< Start < Prev 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Next > End >>
|
|
Page 7 of 8 |
European Policies 
