Cabinet offers industry €150m to offset power costs in 2027

The cabinet is making €150 million available in 2027 to help industry pay high electricity costs. The "electricity cost envelope" (elektriciteitskostenenvelop) was announced in the coalition agreement and was due to start in 2028. The €150 million for 2027 is additional.

Why it matters

• Companies must invest at least half of the money they receive in greening their operations.
• Qualifying measures include energy saving, electrification, sustainable power generation, electrolysis or more flexible electricity use.
• The cabinet will decide next spring how the money from 2028 is spent.

Minister Van Veldhoven (Climate and Green Growth) said: "Lower electricity costs are a priority for this government." She said that with the envelope and compensation for indirect costs under the EU emissions trading system, €1bn a year will eventually be available.

State Secretary De Bat called it an urgent step: "Companies are leaving, running into difficulty, scaling back their ambitions, or lack the strength to go green."

The cabinet looked at cutting industry's costs through grid tariffs, the power price and taxes. A subsidy to grid operator TenneT for the offshore grid would lower tariffs for everyone, but industry would gain only a little. Legal advice says aiming that benefit at industry does not fit within the Energy Act (Energiewet) and would need European Commission approval.

Direct compensation of grid costs is the most efficient route, but European state aid rules do not allow it now. The cabinet is pressing Brussels to change them, but the outcome is uncertain and it cannot happen in 2027. Instead, the cabinet will offer support in 2027 through the European CISAF framework of the Clean Industrial Deal, and the scheme is being worked out so companies can use it next year.

From 2028 the envelope amounts to €345 million, and from 2029 to €495 million a year until 2035, the cabinet said.