EIBI - European Industrial Bioenergy Initiative

The EIBI is one of the industrial initiatives under the SET Plan that aim to prioritise and facilitate 'first-of-a-kind' demonstration of innovative 'clean energy' technologies in Europe. The latest implementation plan can be viewed via the link below:

European Industrial Bioenergy Initiative (EIBI) Boosting the Contribution of Bioenergy to the EU Climate and Energy ambitions - Implementation Plan 2013-2017

The European Industrial Bioenergy Initiative EIBI was officially launched on 15-16 November 2010, following development of a draft EIBI proposal by the EBTP and the EC in 2009, which laid out the planned objectives and scope of the initiative. The draft proposal was originally presented to the European Community Steering Group for Strategic Energy Technologies at a first EIBI Workshop on 26 June 2009.

'Industrial Initiatives' bring together the EC, Member States and Industry to collectively face the challenge of funding and prioritising innovative technologies that offer societal benefits, but are not yet established commercially in the energy market.

The aim of the EIBI is to demonstrate the technical and commercialefficacy of all steps of a value chain (from feedstock through conversion to end product) on a single site, based on technologies that are not yet commercially available and which could be deployed at large scale (thus excluding existing biofuels and heat & power technologies).

Seven "generic" EIBI value chains have been defined covering the main groups of biochemical and thermochemical pathways for conversion of diverse feedstocks (e.g. agriforestry residues, wastes, microbial/aquatic biomass, and energy crops) into advanced biofuels for aviation, marine and road transport end use, and/or advanced bioenergy.

In December 2013 an Expert study on Financial instruments for the SET-Plan was published and is available on the JRC SETIS website. Following an FP7 call in July 2012, an ERA-NET Plus activity was launched entitled Bioenergy Sustaining the Future (BESTF). A first BESTF call was launched in January 2013. This activity aims to provide funding and support to collaborative bioenergy projects that demonstrate one or more innovative steps resulting in demonstration at a pre-commercial stage. A second BESTF2 call was launched in December 2013.

In March 2014, it was announced that 3 projects will be funded by ERA-NET+ BESTF: a novel technology to simplify gas clean-up; an improved process for production of grid-quality BioSNG; and production of microbial oils from lignocellulosic sugars from straw, and conversion into advanced biofuel.

 

In November 2013, the EC published the Horizon 2020 Draft Work Programme for 2014-2015 including the draft work programme for Secure, Clean and Efficient Energy. The energy work programme includes B.2.11.: Supporting first-of-a-kind, commercial-scale industrial demonstration projects in the field of competitive low carbon energy. This action aims to establish a sub-facility for making loans to first-of-a-kind demonstration projects in the field of energy or extending guarantees to financial intermediaries who will make such loans. The projects supported will aim to scale up technologies currently at Technology Reference Level (TRL) 6 to TRL 8.