NRW ignites the investment turbo!
With the NRW.BANK Invest Zukunft program, NRW.BANK is offering more favourable financing conditions than ever before to support the economy. The rule of thumb is: the smaller the company and the more it invests in transformation, the greater the savings on financing costs. This is made possible by an interest rate that is 2% below the market rate and repayment discounts of up to 20%.
This means that savings of up to € 2 million are possible for an investment of € 10 million. A small company that finances € 500,000 over a period of 10 years can save up to € 170,000. This makes investments profitable more quickly.
Applications for loans from the NRW.BANK.Invest Zukunft program can be submitted via the respective house bank from 19 May 2025. Until then, the house banks will be available to advise companies - as will NRW.BANK's Service Center. All further information on the subsidized investments, application eligibility and other benefits can be found on the Invest Zukunft website.
Fin.Connect.NRW welcomes this strong impetus from NRW.BANK and the NRW Ministry of Economic Affairs, Industry, Climate Protection and Energy for the transformation of the economy. Because one thing is clear: investing in the future ensures long-term competitiveness!
What is being supported?
1. Climate protection (technologies)
- Renewable energy systems for local and decentralized electricity and heat generation
- Storage and flexibilization of corresponding technologies (e.g. battery storage, electrolysers)
- Hydrogen applications - projects for the use of hydrogen in the production process and structural infrastructure for use/connection
- CO2 management - investment projects in plants, procedures and processes for the capture of industrial CO2 quantities, their use/utilization as a raw material (CCU), their storage (CCS) and the associated transport infrastructure (CCT) as well as investment in technical plants for the generation of negative emissions (NET)
- Electrification and renewable heat - systems for converting electrical energy into process heat/cooling (power-to-heat) in the production process and associated infrastructure
- Power-to-X - conversion of electricity into other substances (e.g. hydrogen)
- Waste heat utilization and provision
- Increasing the environmental friendliness of production processes (open to all technologies)
2. Environmental protection
- Climate adaptation - measures to mitigate climate change
- Air pollution control - measures to reduce pollutants by at least 10% by replacing mobile machinery and equipment and retrofitting them with appropriate pollutant-reducing filters
- Air pollution control - measures to reduce pollutants by at least 10% by replacing or retrofitting engines on inland commercial vessels
- Noise protection measures - reducing noise levels by at least 10dB (A) by retrofitting existing or investing in new machinery and equipment
- Water/soil protection measures - measures that lead to a reduction in soil and water pollution
3. Circular economy
- Recycling/reprocessing facilities through which a worn/depreciated product can be returned to a comparable use or production process
- Investments in strengthening material cycles (incl. CCU); improving resource efficiency by replacing primary raw or starting materials with secondary (reused or recovered) raw or starting materials
- New and improved facilities to prevent or reduce the amount of waste generated by the waste recipient or a third party; by preparing it for reuse, by decontaminating it or by recycling it
- New facilities or modifications to existing facilities for the production of circular products as well as facilities that (partially) process products or disassemble them into individual parts/components in preparation for reuse
- Material use of (waste) biomass, including preparation of (waste) biomass for further processing
- Other support technologies
4. Efficiency and savings
- Energy efficiency gain of 15% for new purchases and 10% for refurbished machinery and equipment
- Resource efficiency gain of 2%: Material savings in the operating part or (sub)process that is to be improved or changed
- Resource efficiency gain of 2%: Saving of consumed water/reduction of wastewater produced through corresponding measures in the operating unit or (sub)process that is to be improved or modified
- Investment measure based on a subsidized resource efficiency consultation from the NRW State Office for Nature and Consumer Protection (LANUV)
5. Mobility
- Purchase of electric, fuel cell and hydrogen vehicles (exception: lease financing)
- Conversion of vehicles to climate-neutral drives
- Investments in connection with electromobility
6. Digitalization
- Digital production, service provision and processes
- Integration of digital interfaces/workflows for seamless data consistency across various IT systems for comprehensive networking of resource planning and production and service systems; also with suppliers and customers,
- Setting up the infrastructure for collecting and analyzing large amounts of data (big data applications, etc.) or
- Integration of mobile operating devices in the control of production and services, networking of devices, integration of new hardware.
- Digital products and services e.g. development of digital platforms and development of self-used product/service-related software and/or user control software)
- Development of digital platforms (software),
- Development of product/service-related software and/or user control software (apps etc.) or
- Development and/or application of (digital) standards and norms.
- Digital strategy and organization
- Development of a comprehensive digitalization strategy,
- Initialization effort for the use of cloud technologies or
- Development and implementation of an IT, data security and/or digital communication concept.
7. Innovation
- Inclusion of new, technologically advanced products and services in the product range
- Introduction of new, technologically advanced (production/service) processes
- Significant improvement of existing products/services and processes
