Nine recommendations for the European Competitiveness Fund and Horizon Europe to deliver targeted and predictable support in the lab-to-scale journey of cleantech innovators and solutions

The document argues that Europe needs a more integrated financial toolbox to bridge the 'valley of death' for cleantech innovators. It recommends increasing the budget for Horizon Europe to €200 billion and the ECF InvestEU guarantee to €50 billion, while calling for binding budgets for clean transition windows and the use of retail financial instruments to stimulate demand from end-consumers.

• There is a significant public funding gap for critical clean technologies in Europe by 2030: €16 to €18 billion is needed for 6 critical technologies, and at least €37.8 billion for 10 critical technologies.
• The authors propose increasing the minimum budget guarantee for InvestEU under the ECF to €50 billion and earmarking at least €10 billion for cleantech via the InvestEU budget guarantee through a Scale Up Facility.
• To stimulate demand for European cleantech, the ECF should provide low-cost, asset-specific retail financial instruments for end-consumers, specifically targeting housing, transport, and agriculture.
• The document recommends a binding budget of €200 billion for Horizon Europe, with a climate and environment mainstreaming target increased to 45% to address the fact that over 70% of quality proposals currently go unfunded.
• The authors advocate for maintaining a 50% budget share for collaborative research under Horizon Europe's Pillar II, with a further increase of at least 50% for the Clean Transition and Industrial Decarbonisation envelope.
• Governance of the ECF should be expert-led and based on an evidence-based methodology involving value chain assessments, investment gap assessments, and financial assessments of the most efficient funding types.

APA

Clean Air Task Force (2025). Nine recommendations for the European Competitiveness Fund and Horizon Europe to deliver targeted and predictable support in the lab-to-scale journey of cleantech innovators and solutions. https://cdn.catf.us/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/04114139/Joint-letter-and-recommendations-for-European-Competitiveness-Fund-and-Horizon-Europe.pdf

Chicago

Clean Air Task Force. Nine recommendations for the European Competitiveness Fund and Horizon Europe to deliver targeted and predictable support in the lab-to-scale journey of cleantech innovators and solutions. 2025. https://cdn.catf.us/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/04114139/Joint-letter-and-recommendations-for-European-Competitiveness-Fund-and-Horizon-Europe.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite press release |author=Clean Air Task Force |title=Nine recommendations for the European Competitiveness Fund and Horizon Europe to deliver targeted and predictable support in the lab-to-scale journey of cleantech innovators and solutions |date=2 December 2025 |url=https://cdn.catf.us/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/04114139/Joint-letter-and-recommendations-for-European-Competitiveness-Fund-and-Horizon-Europe.pdf |access-date=23 October 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@misc{cleanairtaskforce2025nine, author = {{Clean Air Task Force}}, title = {{Nine recommendations for the European Competitiveness Fund and Horizon Europe to deliver targeted and predictable support in the lab-to-scale journey of cleantech innovators and solutions}}, publisher = {Clean Air Task Force}, year = {2025}, month = dec, url = {https://cdn.catf.us/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/04114139/Joint-letter-and-recommendations-for-European-Competitiveness-Fund-and-Horizon-Europe.pdf}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }