Circular Plastics Netherlands, an initiative of the Dutch National Growth Fund, has assigned €35.5 million to fund plastics recycling innovation in 2025.
Applications for subsidies will open on Feb. 18 and close on May 20, 2025.
The €35.5 million fund is divided between research projects (€4.5 million) and showcases (€31 million). A research project can receive up to €1.5 million whereas showcases can receive a maximum of €3 million. Showcases integrated in a demonstration project can receive up to €7.5 million.
Research projects may last a maximum of four years whereas showcases can last up to five years.
Research projects should focus on the following topics: microplastics; development of in-line analysis techniques for sorting processes; automatic sorting of large plastic waste items; optimisation of mixed plastic waste flows for recycling
Showcases should focus on: mechanical recycling of polyolefin packaging; recycling of polyolefin food contact packaging; recycling of household or industrial plastic waste by dissolution; depolymerisation; recycling of technical plastics; recycling of soft PVC; carpet recycling; thermochemical recycling of mixed plastic waste streams into new monomers for plastic production.
Applications for funding must be done in a partnership, where a partnership consists of at least two organisations of which at least one is a company.
Companies or research organisations within partnerships must have a branch or subsidiary in the Netherlands.
Applicants can participate in more than one project as long as they submit separate applications for each project.
Applications will be evaluated based on how well they contribute to the objectives of the Circular Plastics Netherlands initiative, their degree of innovation, chance of success in the Dutch market and society at large, as well as quality of both project and partnership.
The Netherlands has set a target to recycle 50% of all plastics by 2030 and achieve full plastics circularity by 2050.
In 2022, the country recycled around 45% of its plastics packaging, according to Eurostat data. In 2024, seven plastics recyclers went bankrupt in the Netherlands