"With this vote, the Parliament recognises that wind energy R&D needs its own budget line. It reinforces the value that investing in wind energy has to society in driving down the costs of a secure, reliable renewable energy system with huge job creation prospects."
"The decision has huge symbolic meaning. It creates a precedent for a dedicated financial allocation to wind energy R&D in the EU's 2014-2020 multi-annual financial framework", Vilma Radvilaite, the European Wind Energy Association's Regulatory Affairs Advisor, said.
"We hope the EU will now go forward with its support for wind energy R&D and allocate a total of €1.3 billion from 2014 - 2020 in its proposal for the multi-annual financial framework ", Radvilaite added.
During the current multi-annual framework, wind energy R&D has been allocated around €20 million under FP7 and €565 million under the European Energy Programme for Recovery.
The “symbolic” €1 million EU budget line for 2012 for wind energy R&D would be in addition to approximately €24 million that should be allocated to wind energy research in 2012 under the FP7 Programme.
The budget line comes under the EU's strategic energy technology plan (SET-Plan) which aims to support low carbon technologies and was launched in 2007. As part of the SET-Plan, in 2010 the European Commission, together with industry and member states, launched a 10 year wind energy R&D plan totalling €6 billion called the European Wind Initiative (EWI). The wind industry will finance half, with about 30% coming from the EU budget and the remainder from national governments. Today's vote is a first step towards actually establishing proper and regular funding for this initiative.
The €1 million budget line proposal must now be negotiated with the European Council and a final decision is expected by the end of November.
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