Climate transition finance research
Research grants for Swedish-led partnerships developing knowledge to improve financing and investment for a sustainable climate transition.
Esta oportunidade está atualmente disponível em inglês.
The 2025 call funded five-year research projects with up to SEK 20 million each. The grant could average at most SEK 4 million per year, with different amounts in individual years. Projects started on 1 December 2025.
Research could address financial policies, investment behaviour, business models or risk assessment. Projects had to take a broad view of the climate transition, linking emissions reductions, adaptation and biodiversity, and actively help societal actors use the results. Projects could cross national and sector boundaries.
Partners doing non-economic work could receive full coverage of eligible project costs. Economic activity means offering goods or services on a market, regardless of legal form or profit motive. Partners doing this work could receive at most 50% of their eligible costs, regardless of organisation size. Formas primarily treated the research as industrial research under the EU state-aid rules.
Eligible costs included project staff, equipment or premises used for the research, external consultants and licences, travel and other direct project costs. Equipment costs were limited to the extent and period of project use. If equipment was not used throughout the project’s lifetime, only depreciation for the project period was eligible. Buildings were limited to depreciation for that period. Universities and research institutes could use their full-cost method for overhead; other partners could add overhead of at most 30% of eligible personnel costs. No overhead was funded on equipment depreciation or premises. Costs had to support work beyond normal operations and could not be charged to another project or funded twice.
For staff at universities, higher education institutions and research institutes, salary funding across funders could not exceed a full-time salary; fully retired researchers could not claim their own salary. Travel and staff time for Formas’s cross-project meetings had to be included in the budget.
Eligibility
- The lead organisation had to be a Swedish university, higher education institution or qualifying research institute. Qualifying institutes included state-controlled research companies or partnerships, foundations with government-appointed board members, and government agencies required to conduct their own research. The grant administrator had to be in Sweden and approved by Formas.
- The consortium needed two to six project partners, including a research organisation and at least one other societal actor. Partners could include companies, municipalities, regions, public agencies or civil-society organisations. Cooperation with financial-sector actors, or actors clearly linked to finance, was required; applicants had to explain the form and extent of that cooperation.
- The project leader had to be affiliated with the lead organisation and hold a doctorate by the deadline. They could lead only one application, but could participate in others if their combined salary funding did not exceed 100%. Identical applications with different leaders were not allowed.
- Foreign universities and state research institutes could receive project funds. Foreign non-academic actors without a Swedish organisation number could participate in kind, contributing their own resources without receiving the grant. Research had to be initiated and led from Sweden, and overseas participation had to be justified. Projects involving research cooperation with state or federal research institutions in Russia or Belarus were excluded.
- Sole traders could neither receive funding nor be project partners. Projects solely developing technologies or materials were excluded.
- Partners seeking funding for non-economic work alongside economic activities needed a signed declaration. It had to demonstrate separate costs, funding and revenue without subsidising the economic activities, or independent research as the organisation’s main purpose with economic activities limited to 20% of annual research capacity. Funded non-economic results could not be used in the partner’s economic activities.
- Formas checked the creditworthiness of economic partners before award; recipients could not be in financial difficulty, and funded activities could not begin before the application. Formas could alternatively use de minimis aid, which limits this type of public support to EUR 300,000 across a company group over three years. Applicants using that route needed a signed declaration of previous de minimis support. Each project partner was responsible for its permitted rate.
- One partner could not finance another within the project. Costs of concluding the consortium agreement and licences between partners were excluded from eligible costs.
- Economic partners applying for state aid consented to publication of awards above EUR 100,000, or EUR 10,000 for primary agriculture, fisheries and aquaculture.
How to apply
- Estado
- encerrado
- Encerra
- Condições do período de candidaturas
- Closed 2025 call for five-year research projects.
The 2025 intake closed on 29 April 2025 at 14:00. Read Formas’s call page for the awarded round and its conditions.
Applications were submitted through Prisma. The project leader needed a personal account and the lead organisation an organisational account. The application described the research, partnership, implementation and use of results, with a budget for each partner, key-person list, CVs and publications. English was recommended for the international review panel; the popular-science description had to be in Swedish and abstracts in both languages. The administrator had to sign digitally within seven calendar days after closing.
Before the first payment, all partners had to sign written commitments and submit any requested supplements. Partners had to conclude an agreement covering their commitments, project results and background information by the first financial-report deadline. Partners receiving at least SEK 3 million needed an auditor’s certificate with the final financial report; municipalities, regional councils, government agencies and universities could use an internal auditor. Formas could also require a certificate below the threshold.
Awarded projects had annual financial reporting, a progress report after 36 months, and final financial and results reporting three months after the spending period ended. Funds could be used for six months after project completion. Research results had to be open access, with a maintained data-management plan in place before research began.