The European Union’s Modernisation Fund has disbursed €2.4 billion to 31 projects in seven beneficiary countries to help modernise their energy systems, reduce greenhouse gas emissions in energy, industry and transport, and improve energy efficiency. It is the joint largest disbursement to date and will provide a boost to Europe’s green transition. These investments help those Member States to reduce dependency on Russian fossil fuels, meet their 2030 climate and energy targets, and contribute to the EU’s long-term commitment to reaching climate neutrality by 2050.

Thanks to revenues from the European Emissions Trading System, additional investments were made in Romania (€1.1 billion), Czechia (€1 billion), Bulgaria (€197 million), Poland (€47 million), Croatia (€88 million), Latvia (€5 million) and Lithuania (€1 million). The amounts disbursed today bring total disbursements from the Modernisation Fund since January 2021 to around €7.5 billion, benefitting 10 eligible Member States. The projects supported today focus on renewable electricity generation, modernisation of energy networks and energy efficiency.

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Examples of proposals that have received funding today include:

• modernisation of the electricity distribution grid in Bulgaria to accelerate the electrification of transport, storage deployment, and the decarbonisation and decentralisation of energy consumption and production;
• deploying photovoltaic and energy storage capacity for public water service providers in Croatia;
• improving energy efficiency and energy savings in new buildings for the public sector through the ENERGov Programme in Czechia; 
• introduction of electric vehicles and corresponding charging infrastructure in Latvia;
• renovation of multi-apartment buildings in Lithuania;
• supporting cogeneration for district heating in Poland;
• new renewable electricity production capacities,  district heating, and gas infrastructure to replace coal-powered energy in Romania.

The next deadline for beneficiary Member States to submit investment proposals for potential support by the Modernisation Fund is 15 August 2023 for non-priority proposals , and 12 September 2023  for priority proposals.