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European Climate, Infrastructure and Environment Executive Agency

How to apply

The CEF Energy and Transport application process explained

Application

Identify the relevant call for proposals

Calls are regularly published – check our calls for proposals page regularly as well as any news items published announcing the calls. You may also want to follow CINEA on its various social media channels as calls and results of calls are announced this way too.

Read the call documentation and prepare your documents

Carefully follow specific guidelines on how to apply, as eligibility conditions and procedures are unique for each call.

Submit your application online

The call page on this website will provide you with a link to the Funding and Tenders portal, from where you will be able to build and submit your application.

Evaluation and Selection

The European Commission, with the assistance of the Agency, carries out the evaluation and selection of submitted proposals. For the evaluation of the proposals, the European Commission and the European Climate, Infrastructure and Environment Executive Agency are supported by independent external experts. The experts have an advisory role providing a technical analysis of the submitted proposals, whereas the selection decision remains the responsibility of the European Commission.

Proposals which meet the eligibility criteria and formal requirements specified for a call are evaluated on the basis of the criteria defined in the relevant work programme and call texts.

A list of proposals recommended for funding is then prepared by the European Commission. Successful applicants are then invited by the Agency to prepare and sign the individual grant agreements.

Legal Framework

Three legal documents guide the allocation of EU financial support in the energy and transport infrastructure sector and provide information about the specific types of projects which can be funded and the size of the grants.

CEF Regulation: Regulation (EU) 2021/1153 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 7 July 2021 establishing the Connecting Europe Facility and repealing Regulations (EU) No 1316/2013 and (EU) No 283/2014

For Energy

TEN-E Regulation: Regulation (EU) 347/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 17 April 2013 on guidelines for trans-European energy infrastructure 

For Transport

TEN-T Regulation: Regulation (EU) 1315/2013 European Parliament and of the Council of 11 December 2013

For any questions relating to a specific call for proposals, please check the individual call page.