Climate Ready Program launched - Partially fixes Commercial Ready Debacle

On the 28th July Minister Carr launched the Climate Ready Program. It is a competitive merit-based grants program that aims to increase the level of high quality innovation activities by small to medium sized enterprises in Australia that address the effects of climate change. It provides grants from $50,000 to $5 million for the costs of research and development, proof-of-concept and early-stage commercialisation activities in eligible projects.

The program will support projects for innovations designed to address the impacts of climate change which may include:

• water recycling, waste recovery or small scale renewable energy technologies
• technologies that reduce the energy used by appliances or increase the efficiency of industrial processes
• products, processes or services to monitor emissions or power usage
• using biotechnology or nanotechnology to address the effects of climate change on humans and the environment
• information systems for businesses or consumers to compare the carbon footprints of different activities
• green building materials that make homes more energy efficient

For further information on the program please refer to the AusIndustry website: AusIndustry or click here.

This goes some way towards addressing the removal of the Commercial Ready program. It does not, however, address the needs of any non renewable energy / climate change focussed innovations. I hope that all of the active lobbying will result in positive news once the Innovation Review is complete.