Brussels, 30/03/2009 (Agence Europe) - The European Commission intends to kick off, next July, three public-private partnership projects (PPP) to encourage research and innovation in the construction, manufacturing and automotive industries. The projects, which focus on the sectors which have been hardest hit by the crisis, were announced in the European economic relaunch plan adopted last December by the heads of state and government of the EU27. The first calls for tender concerning these PPPs will be launched next July, with the objective of moving to concrete application by 2010. The three partnerships will be 50% funded by the Commission through funds from the seventh framework programme for research and development of the new (7th FPRD), and the other half will come from European industry. The "European initiative in favour of green cars", which will help to create intelligent energy technologies and infrastructure to develop non-polluting vehicles, will be funded to a level of €5 billion euros from European funds, the European Investment Bank (EIB), industry and the member states. The seventh FPRD and industry will contribute half a billion euros each. Four calls for proposals (involving the Directorates General for Research, Transport, Energy and the Information Society of the Commission) on the electrification of road transport and research into hybrid technologies will be published in July for a total of €100 million. The "factories of the future" initiative aims to help European manufacturers, particularly SMEs, to increase their competitiveness by developing engineering technologies for adaptable machines and industrial processes, information and communication technologies (ICT) and advanced materials. The funding available under this action will be €1.2 billion, €119 million of which will be available in 2010. In the construction sector, the "European initiative in favour of low-energy buildings" aims to encourage green technologies and the development of low-energy materials systems in new buildings and renovated buildings in order to considerably reduce their energy consumption and CO2 emissions. In total, this initiative will have an envelope of €1 billion, part of which (€130 million) will be used to support projects to be launched next year. (B.C./transl.fl)