Deadline: 24-Jun-21
The Scottish Enterprise is calling applications for Green Jobs to improve the Environment and Achieving Net Zero Emissions.
Their green jobs funding is being delivered as competitive funding calls, which are rounds of funding that open and close periodically for fixed amounts of time and from which the best projects will be chosen for support.
The green jobs calls aim to support businesses to create and maintain jobs that improve the environment, and to support projects that align to the Scottish Government net zero policies.
By ‘net zero’, they mean the Scottish Government’s commitment to achieving net zero carbon and greenhouse gas emissions by 2045.
The first call is aimed at supporting businesses to:
- Create green jobs (these are new jobs that relate directly to the transition to net zero) or facilitate the transition of a job from non-green to green
- Minimise environmental impacts by developing sustainable low carbon products or services
Funding Information
- This call will offer grants of between £50,000 and £500,000. During your application, you’ll be able to request the amount you need, but you must be able to demonstrate why you need this amount. When reviewing your application, they’ll consider your eligible project costs, public funding rules and your activity types to determine if this is an appropriate amount.
- This call involves a claims process, meaning it does NOT offer an up-front grant payment. If successful, you’ll need to pay for your costs up front and then claim them back from your grant. In most cases you can claim at intervals throughout your project, so you don’t need to pay for all your costs at once.
- However, this grant cannot cover your entire project costs. You’ll need to fund some of these costs yourself or via other sources of funding. This grant can fund between 10% and 50% of your eligible costs.
Key Information
This call:
- Is for businesses located in the Scottish Enterprise area, or looking to set up a trading location in this area before 1 October 2021 (you can check this in the ‘Is my business eligible’ section)
- Offers grants between £50,000 and £500,000
- Can support between 10% and 50% of eligible project costs depending on factors such as company size, location and project activities
- Is for businesses looking to create jobs that are directly related to sustainability and reducing carbon emissions (green jobs)
- Is also for businesses undertaking activities that will result in green jobs, including investing in premises, purchasing capital equipment or conducting research and development
- Involves a claims process rather than a single up-front payment – this means you’ll need to pay for your project costs and then claim eligible costs back from your grant
- Is a competitive discretionary grant – applications will be assessed based on their merit against scoring criteria. Not all eligible applicants will receive funding.
What kinds of projects will this grant support?
This call can support the following activities:
- Creation of green jobs
- Capital equipment purchases(such as buying new machinery)
- Investment in premises(for example, to help you expand activities that contribute to the green economy)
- Research and development activities(for example, to develop innovative new products and services or improve your existing products and services to make them more sustainable)
- These activities must be undertaken with an aim of growing sustainable activities, reducing your environmental impact, or reducing your emissions.
Eligibility Criteria
To be eligible, your project will need to:
- Create long-term green jobs that can be sustained after the project has finished. These must pay at least the real Living Wage (currently £9.50 in Scotland), even for employees who would normally be paid a lower minimum wage (such as employees aged 18-22)
- Have a clear need for funding – for example, without funding it would take significantly longer, be scaled back or not go ahead at all
- Require a grant of at least £50,000 to go ahead
- Not require more than £500,000 of grant funding to go ahead
- Take place mostly in Scotland
- Start by 1 October 2021
- End by 30 September 2024
- This call is open to businesses of any size. To be eligible, you must:
- Be registered or trading in the Scottish Enterprise area, or looking to set up a trading location in this area before 1 October 2021
- Be a registered company (a company that’s registered with Companies House)
- Be an individual business – they can’t accept applications from collaborations
- Not be able to fund the full project on your own (for example, difficulty securing enough finance elsewhere)
- Be committed to fair working practices. Fair work is work that offers all individuals an effective voice, opportunity, security, fulfilment and respect. It also includes paying employees at least the real Living Wage (currently £9.50 in Scotland).
For more information, visit https://www.scottish-enterprise.com/support-for-businesses/funding-and-grants/business-grants/green-jobs