Promotion of aquatic ecology in the national CAP strategic plan
The special guidelines for RD project funding as part of the national CAP strategic plan came into force at the beginning of 2023. These also include the promotion of measures to improve the ecological status of small and medium-sized running waters in rural areas.
The funding for measures to improve the ecological status contained in the previous RD 14-22 programme are continued and expanded in terms of content in the CAP Strategic Plan 2023-2027. Funds totalling to EUR 26 million are now available until 2027 for measures to achieve the good ecological status of small and medium-sized running waters. Around 44% of the funding comes from the EU, 60% of the national co-financing is provided by the federal government and 40% by the Federal Provinces.
The funding programme focuses on promoting the improvement of the passability of existing small hydropower plants. In Austria, hydropower is one of the most important sources of renewable energy. At the same time, however, these structures also represent barriers to bedload transport and fish migration. Appropriate measures are therefore needed to reduce the resulting negative ecological impact on water bodies. The aquatic ecology funding in the CAP Strategic Plan supports aquatic ecology measures to improve the passability of existing small hydropower plants with a bottleneck capacity of up to 500 kW.
Depending on the size of the company, the subsidy amounts to between 40 % and 60 % of the eligible investment costs. Funding is provided in the form of investment grants and is limited to EUR 100,000 per project.
In addition to the creation of passability, municipal projects for the restructuring of morphologically altered stretches of running waters with a catchment area of up to 500 km² can also be funded within the framework of the under the CAP Strategic Plan. In this case, the subsidy amounts to 90%of the eligible investment costs. Funding is provided in the form of investment grants and is granted up to an amount of EUR 500,000 of eligible investment costs.