This slideshow illustrates how the project selection process described in Article 8 of the Decision could be made to work. The slideshow presents a grossly simplified version of how the real process will work, using a far smaller number of categories, subcategories and potential host countries.

The Commission wants to avoid having to scrutinise every successful NER300 proposal for compatibility with the Community Guidelines on State Aid for Environmental Protection.

It is exploring whether it can distinguish demonstration projects that are selected purely on the basis of a “genuinely competitive bidding process [using] clear, transparent and non discriminatory criteria” from the rest. The former group’s eligible costs can reasonably be assumed to represent the lowest possible eligible costs and can therefore be borne by the public purse in their entirety without the risk of over-subsidy. The latter, selected out of consideration for geographic or technological balance or from a subcategory where there has been insufficient competition, would need explicit State Aid clearance to proceed, and would have restrictions put on the percentage of their relevant costs that can borne by NER300 and the public purse.