New Grant Information for Businesses

Here is a list of grant opportunities for businesses throughout the country. If you are interested learning more please email me

Two New Grants for Glasgow Businesses:

Glasgow City Council has stumped up a £200,000 budget for two new funds, Supporting Sustainable New Business scheme and the Glasgow4Business Fund.

Through Supporting Sustainable New Business, grants worth up to £1,500 are available to help local SMEs that have been trading for less than 12 months to grow and create new jobs. The Glasgow4Business Fund provides match funding worth a maximum of £5,000 to promote sustainable growth for existing firms that have been trading for a minimum of a year. Investment can cover up to 50% of the total project costs and can be spent on marketing, upgrading ICT equipment, purchasing essential capital items, or product development.
Source: Glasgow City Council, 22/06/2009

£25 Million Electric Car Trial Launched:

The government is offering eight new projects across the UK will share the cash to offer members of the public and businesses the opportunity to pilot the next generation of high performance low carbon vehicles. Over the next 18 months up to 340 electric and hybrid cars and models will be made available in areas including London, Oxford, Coventry, Birmingham, and Glasgow. It is hoped the demonstration projects will showcase the technological advances that the car industry has made in producing low carbon vehicles that are as appealing in terms of price and performance as petrol or diesel-powered alternatives. Amongst the car manufacturers involved are Toyota, who are making 20 plug-in hybrid cars available for testing; Mini, who will pilot 40 all electric “smart-cars” and Ford, who have contributed a fleet of zero emission Ford Focus BEVs.

Source: Technology Strategy Board, 23/06/2009

More Support For Low Carbon Vehicles:

As part of the government-funded Technology Strategy Board’s Low Carbon Vehicles Innovation Platform, a second Integrated Delivery Programme Competition has been launched to test out the technologies that are needed to deliver more environmentally-friendly cars.
Support is available for two kinds of project:

1. Innovation Focus Area 1 - £5 million of the overall competition budget has been set aside to fund 12 month proof of concept studies investigating the development of a number of short-term research priorities.

2. Innovation Focus Area 2 – the remaining £10 million will support up to 12 collaborative R&D projects, over a maximum of three years, which will look to achieve medium and long-term research priorities with a view to supporting mass market readiness by 2016.
Both kinds of project will aim to develop technologies in the following areas: propulsion; energy storage; vehicle efficiency; system control; and process and tool development.
Successful projects will need to demonstrate:

3. Clear potential for mass market adoption.

4. Quantified CO2 savings when compared to the current "best in class" technologies and a clear contribution towards getting the public to embrace low carbon vehicle technology.

5. Durability, integrity and safety (in line with industry expectations).

6. A clear route to a viable market and that the innovations are economically advantageous to current technologies.

Applications for Innovation Focus Area 1 funding are made through a single, fast-track process. Bids must be submitted by 6 August. Innovation Focus Area 2 proposals are made via a two-stage process. Interested consortia should initially submit an expression of interest by 6 August. Shortlisted bidders will then be invited to complete a full application by 16 October.
For further information about the funding competition, visit the Technology Strategy Board website

Source: Technology Strategy Board, 22/06/2009

WRAP Reveals Fantastic Plastic Recycling Opportunity
Government-funded waste watchdog WRAP is making grants worth up to £2 million available to increase mixed plastic recycling capacity in England, Northern Ireland and Wales. At the moment, more than 180,000 tonnes worth of plastic bottles are collected for recycling across the UK each year.

But WRAP research has revealed that more than a million tonnes of other household plastic waste - such as margarine tubs, fruit trays and yoghurt pots – is currently being sent to landfill every year due to lack of suitable reprocessing facilities. They are now looking to fund private, public or community sector recycling organisations to increase recycling capacity for this “mixed plastic” waste.

Grants can cover up to 30% of the capital costs involved with either expanding existing facilities or building new recycling plants.

Applications for funding have to be made by 10 September, with shortlisted bidders invited to present their ideas in greater depth to a panel of industry experts.
The successful proposals will be announced by 16 October and the projects will be up and running by 31 March 2011 at the very latest.

For further information about the Mixed Plastics Capital Grant Competition, visit the WRAP website

Source: WRAP, 18/06/2009

If you think you may qualify for any of these funds please check out their website or contact us via http://www.straightfinance.com/ or via email to mparry@straightfinance.co.uk