The Secretary General for Industry, Francisco Blanco, and the Commissioner for the Electric and Connected Vehicle (VEC) Part, José María López Martínez, held a meeting today with the main automotive associations and companies to finally give them specific details about the second call for aid with European funds for the automotive sector.
The meeting, which will be followed by another next week to clear up doubts, has had a mainly technical content, with the aim of preparing the companies for a call to be published this month and in which they want to work with the highest speed, according to sources from the Ministry of Industry and companies.
The objective is to unblock aid for about 3,500 million euros. If in the first call only 792 million were distributed with Volkswagen as a major driving company, now the 2,000 million that remained to be allocated closer to 1,500 additional million will be distributed, until forming a Perte VEC of 4,295 million. In support are the 94,344 million euros requested by the Government from Brussels as part of the Recovery Plan.
From the second call, there is a game of 834 million euros for electric batteries that already has the approval of the European Commission and that will be accompanied by others in which the presentation of individual projects will be allowed. For this, the aid thresholds must be raised in a new regulation of exemptions by categories that has already been practically approved by Brussels and that is pending small details.
The Ministry of Industry assumes that the ministerial order of bases that it publishes this month will include not only aid for batteries, but also for individual projects, which is what generates broad interest among hundreds of companies in the sector, including of components.
The execution period of the projects will be until 2026, but the companies hope to extend it until 2028. There is a good willingness from Brussels and the Government to do so, although the companies warn that they have not yet seen a paper that ratifies it.
The battery projects, which could each receive up to 300 million in aid, may be the boost for some of the companies that have expressed interest in Spain to take the definitive leap. The Chinese Envision has a project in Extremadura and the Slovakian Inobat has opted for Valladolid. In both cases the projects are around 3,000 million euros.
The addendum recently sent to Brussels includes an item to promote industrial projects for an amount of 7,700 million that will be used both for automotive projects and for those being prepared in other areas.
