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Home / Horizon Europe / HORIZON-JU-CBE-2026-IA-02

Bio-based additives as alternatives to unlock and increase recyclability and/or biodegradability

Open now · HORIZON JU Innovation Actions · HORIZON-JU-CBE-2026-IA-02

Next cut-off
22 Sept '26
in 16 days
Per grant
€85M
the call's own average
Grants expected
2
projects that will be funded
Funding rate
70%
the rest is your own money

In context of Horizon Europe

This grant€85M
The track runs to the largest grant in Horizon Europe (€171M). The median across the 482 calls we publish is €5.3M, this one is above it.

What this call funds

Expected Outcome:

Successful proposals will contribute to the implementation of the Zero Pollution Action Plan, the Circular Economy Action Plan, the Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation, the Chemicals Strategy for Sustainability and the Chemical Industry Action Plan. They will provide solutions in line with the objectives of the EU legislation on waste but also the Horizon Europe Mission "Restore our Ocean and Waters by 2030" in particular to Objective 2: "Prevent and eliminate pollution of our oceans, Seas and waters” as well as the Horizon Europe Mission “A Soil Deal for Europe”, in particular objectives “Reduce soil pollution and enhance restoration”.

Projects results are expected to contribute to the following expected outcomes:

  • Wider availability of bio-based additives targeting high functional properties, stability and compatibility with polymers/matrices.
  • Contribution to improved circularity of end products in relevant market sectors.
  • Potential replicability into other industrial sectors to widen market opportunity.
  • Reduction or avoidance of environmental impacts related to life cycle of additives and additive-containing materials and/or products.

Scope:

While additives are often necessary to confer specific properties to materials and/or products, their presence can hinder their circular EoL (including – depending on the application – recycling and/or biodegradation). Risks upon recycling and biodegradation encompass the release into the environment of harmful substances, e.g., release of persistent organic pollutants (POPs), volatile organic compounds (VOCs), toxic metals, microplastics. Proposals under this topic should:

Trimmed here, the full scope, expected outcomes and award criteria are on the official topic page ↗.

What applying costs you

ItemEstimateNote
Drafting effort6–8 weekssingle submission
Partner search4–8 weeksruns in parallel, and it is the part that slips
Your own money€37M30% of project cost, over the project's life
Time to first payment6–9 monthscut-off → evaluation → grant agreement

These are Bemzu's estimates from the call's structure (the number of stages and whether a consortium is required) not figures published by the Commission. Only the co-financing share is read from the call itself.

Where these conditions come from

Two kinds of row. Most are the sentence we read the condition from, quoted out of the call itself. Some say plainly that they are not a quotation but the programme's own rule for this type of action, the EU portal publishes a table of contents where the conditions should be, so for a Research and Innovation Action the rate comes from the rulebook rather than from the fiche.

ConditionQuoted from the call, or the rule behind it
Consortium sizeNot quoted from this call — Innovation Actions under the Horizon Europe rules are at least three independent legal entities from three different Member States or Associated Countries, at least one established in a Member State.
Funding rateNot quoted from this call — Innovation Actions under the Horizon Europe rules are funded at 70% of eligible costs for profit-making organisations, and 100% for non-profit legal entities — the rate shown here is the one that applies to a company.
MaturityProposals under this topic should: • Demonstrate (at least at TRL 6) innovative processes for the synthesis of bio-based SSbD additives that: • Enable a circular EoL for materials and/or products that are currently not recyclable and/or not biodegradable, or • Improve circularity of materials and/or

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