EU Funds Polish Pipe, Inks Deal with Bill Gates

The European Commission (EC) said October 17 that it has given €51mn ($59mn) to help build a gas pipe between Tworog and Tworzen, in Poland's Slaskie region. 

This pipeline is part of Poland's North-South gas corridor, a project of common interest for Trans-European Energy Infrastructure. The €51mn came from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF). Slaskie, or Silesia, is the region of southern Poland centred around Katowice, so borders the Czech and Slovak frontiers.

Around €472mn of such ERDF 'cohesion policy' funds have been earmarked for different sections of the corridor during the 2014-2020 programming period, the EC added. EU regional policy commissioner Corina Cretu said the pipe is "another brick in the wall of the European energy market [which] will help provide Poland with more affordable, secure and sustainable energy." 

Two months ago, Brussels announced the award of a €145.5mn grant for construction of the 168km 'Pogorska Wola to Tworzen' gas pipeline in southern Poland.

In other news, the EC and Bill Gates-led Breakthrough Energy have agreed to launch a new €100mn investment fund – Breakthrough Energy Europe – to help innovative European companies develop and bring radically new clean energy technologies to the market. A signing event attended by Microsoft founder Gates will take place in the afternoon of October 17.  The EC said the fund was part of a long-term strategy for the reduction of greenhouse gases, a proposal for which will be published next month ahead of the COP-24 climate change negotiations to be held in Katowice.

Breakthrough Energy Europe is expected to be operational in 2019: half its €100mn equity will come from Breakthrough Energy and half from InnovFin, part of the EU Horizon 2020 programme.