Ministry of Economy has opened a grant program worth 9.4 million euros (more than 1.4 million euros is co-financing from the state budget) to increase energy efficiency for 20 SMEs industrial consumers, energy intensive and and with a level of high gas emissions, under the Multiannual Financial Mechanism of the European Economic Area (EEA) 2009-2014.
The 20 selected projects should help to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 8,250 tonnes of CO2 per year and to reduce the energy consumption by 25,000 MWh per year. Submission of projects can be made until May 9 at 13:00 at Department of Industrial Policy and Competitiveness of the Ministry. Applicant SMEs must have at least two years, and not be in economic branches already supported by state aid scheme for energy efficiency.
Applicants may submit a documentation for an individual project or in partnership with a company from one of the donor countries: Norway (94% contribution in this grant), Iceland (5% contribution) and Liechtenstein (1% contribution). For each project, the requested grant (comprised from EEA grants and state aid funds) may be of minimum 200,000 euros and maximum 700,000 euros, plus the contribution of the beneficiary.
Applicant’s Guide, information on energy efficiency program and all relevant documents for applications and for understanding the economic, social and environmental concept of the program are published on the Ministry of Economy website, in EEAGrants section.
Energy consumption management, the best energy resource there is
Grants awarded by the Ministry falls into a true strategic direction in the developed countries, which enters increasingly more in the legislations and economies of Eastern Europe, some of the most energy inefficient in the world. It is revealed more and more that the best energy resource is energy saving, and energy efficiency attracts investments of hundreds of millions of euros and is of great help for consumers, to cope more easily with energy costs.
Two notable examples are aluminum producer Alro Slatina and Doosan IMGB, recognized brand producer of heavy machinery. Alro has invested about 100 million dollars in its energy efficiency, out of a total of 500 million dollars in the last ten years, and in 2006, with the takeover of IMGB by Koreans from Doosan Heavy Industries & Constructions, 160 million euros were invested.
“The funds aimed at increasing production and quality, reduce delivery times and reducing manufacturing costs, and reducing energy bills”, explains the company’s CMO, Florin Antonescu. “A large part of the investment program of Doosan IMGB aimed to streamline, shorten and keep under control big consumption of electricity and natural gas”, said Antonescu.