The European Investment Bank (EIB) is granting the Austrian development service provider, AVL List, a EUR 30 million loan for research and development involving environmentally friendly powertrains. The loan agreement was signed at the automotive component manufacturer’s headquarters in Graz.
AVL List is developing a broad range of powertrains, including both combustion and electric/hybrid engines. The Austrian company also specialises in developing plant and equipment for testing engines and vehicles. Today’s loan will enable AVL to step up its R&D aimed at reducing emissions in both combustion and electric engines.
The EIB has been has been targeting the climate action and environment sectors with its loans for a number of years. In the past year alone, the EU’s promotional bank signed loan agreements totalling nearly EUR 29 billion for environmental projects, in which sustainable transport technologies play a major part. The EIB is committed to help improve the technological competitiveness of Europe’s car industry, with a strong focus on new, environmentally friendly powertrain and safety technologies.
R&D is dependent on reliable long-term finance. And the EIB caters for this need with a special financing instrument – the Risk Sharing Finance Facility (RSFF), a joint initiative with the European Commission designed to increase the capacity to finance research, development and innovation (RDI) projects. Under the RSFF, up to EUR 10 billion worth of loans for RDI is available to businesses. Today’s loan to AVL will also be financed from the RSFF.
In the words of EIB Vice-President Wilhelm Molterer: “The global car industry is faced with the enormous challenge of developing environmentally friendly, sustainable powertrain concepts. Innovation is frequently only made possible by smart long-term financing. This is what the European Investment Bank is now making available to AVL, a company that has long been a world leader in the development of less polluting powertrains.”
According to AVL’s CEO Helmut List: “The European Investment Bank’s major commitment to supporting R&D in the field of environmentally friendly powertrains is highly welcome. Today’s loan will enable AVL to step up its efforts to develop more economical and efficient low-emission vehicle powertrains. Combustion engines – which still have great development potential – will continue to play an important role in this. And the production of electric powertrains opens up a whole new world of possibilities.”