Wigan firms could benefit from Government's £40m fund to help polluting industries clean up

Businesses in energy-intensive sectors, including pharmaceuticals, steel, paper and food and drink, will be able to apply for grants worth up to £14m through the Industrial Energy Transformation Fund – totalling £289m in funding up until 2024.

In this second competition window, the minimum grant has been lowered to £100,000 for deployment projects, offering more flexibility for small businesses to receive funding so they can speed up getting their ideas to market.

The grants will enable businesses nationwide to use new technology to improve the efficiency of industrial processes and reduce energy demand.

This includes factories installing electric motors and heat pumps to replace their natural gas-fired boilers and steam turbines, manufacturers using heat recovery technology to recycle waste heat and generate renewable electricity, and industries such as the food and drink sector carrying out studies to replace natural gas with hydrogen as their primary fuel.

Doing so will create and support thousands of jobs, cut carbon emissions and lead to cleaner air for the people of the North West.

Energy Minister Anne-Marie Trevelyan said: “We can only achieve our ambitious plans to tackle climate change if everyone plays their part, including businesses large and small.

“That’s why our £40m investment will not only help some of the highest polluting industries like steel, paper and pharmaceuticals build back greener by finding innovative ways to reduce their carbon emissions, but will also create more opportunities for growth and jobs by levelling up and making industry fit for the future.”

Today’s announcement follows a launch in June which saw 39 applications approved for funding in the first window, totalling £31m.

It is calculated that as a result of these projects, carbon emissions will be reduced by 2.6m tonnes over their lifespan, which is equivalent to taking 38,000 fossil-fuelled cars off the road over a 30-year period.

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