Circular Funding : Ireland garners €490 million for sustainable projects

In Ireland, a series of sustainable projects won €490 million in funds.

The grants were issued by Ireland’s first Circular Economy Innovation Grant Scheme (CEIGS), the money going towards projects relating to food packaging, construction, marine plastic and construction.

Awardees are as follows: AM Acoustic Materials, Community Resources Network Ireland, Cork Environmental Forum, Everlend Ltd, GIY Ireland, Irish Green Building Council, Marine Applications Ltd T/A Verifact, Novelplast Teoranta, PACE Organisation and Thriftify Technologies.

Within the remit of the grant, money is allocated to social enterprises, voluntary and community groups counting less than 50 employees.

The innovation grant scheme comes as a part of the country’s 2021 All of Government Circular Economy Strategy.

Said strategy will see the establishment of a national policy framework for Ireland’s transition to a circular economy, the measures included intended to significantly reduce Ireland’s circularity gap so that the rate will be above the EU average by 2030. (A circularity gap is the figure derived from setting the annual volume of recycled materials against annual total material input.)

Currently, Ireland’s material recovery rate is the second worst in the EU. At 1,6%, the disparity in comparison to the EU average at 11,9% is high.

Other strategy objectives relate to generating public awareness around circular economy as well as to investment promotion.

The new strategy is set to be released in September, following a public consultation this spring.