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The European Investment Bank signed guarantee agreements with Banco Santander totalling EUR 450 million on 29 January 2026, announced by EIB Group President Nadia Calviño during the Group's results presentation in Brussels. The guarantees are expected to unlock around EUR 900 million in new supply-chain financing for European companies: EUR 400 million for security-and-defence manufacturers (cybersecurity, surveillance, resilience and defence-technology suppliers) under the EIB's EUR 3 billion pan-European intermediated financing instrument for the defence industrial base, and EUR 500 million for companies in clean technologies, telecommunications and digital infrastructure via reverse-factoring supply-chain-finance instruments. Santander is reported as the fourth major European bank to sign under the defence-supply-chain programme, and the clean-tech/digital tranche contributes to the EIB Group's TechEU initiative.

On 16 December 2025 the European Commission adopted the Communication on a Battery Booster Strategy (later published in the Official Journal as C/2026/682), part of the EU Automotive Package presented alongside the CO2 emission-standards review, the Automotive Omnibus simplification, and the Corporate Vehicle Decarbonisation initiative. The Battery Booster envelopes EUR 1.8bn of EU-budget support for the European battery value chain: EUR 1.5bn from the Innovation Fund as interest-free loans for European battery cell producers ramping to giga-scale output (delivered through a dedicated Battery Booster Facility, with the implementing Commission Decision in stakeholder consultation through 15 March 2026), plus EUR 300m for critical raw materials projects in Europe. The strategy is the first standalone EU industrial-finance instrument targeted exclusively at battery cell manufacturing, and is paired with RESourceEU (3 Dec 2025) and the Industrial Accelerator Act proposal (4 Mar 2026) to stitch together upstream CRM, midstream cell production and downstream automotive demand.

The European Commission approved on 6 November 2025 a EUR 700 million Spanish State aid scheme (SA.119884) under the Clean Industrial Deal State Aid Framework (CISAF Section 6.1), to support the build-out of new manufacturing capacity for net-zero technologies listed in CISAF Annex II. The scheme funds direct grants, open Spain-wide and available until 31 December 2028, for investments producing batteries, solar panels, wind turbines, heat pumps, electrolysers, carbon capture/storage/utilisation equipment, and the critical raw materials used to make these components. It is a distinct, larger sister scheme to Spain's EUR 408 million SA.119880 CISAF Section 5 scheme (approved five weeks later), which instead funds decarbonisation of existing industrial processes rather than new clean-tech production capacity.

Slovakia's Národná rada adopted Act No. 31/2024 Z.z. on 13 February 2024, amending Act No. 57/2018 Z.z. on Regional Investment Aid by inserting two new sections — §28a (Mimoriadna investičná pomoc / Exceptional Investment Aid) and §28b (Exceptional Investment Aid in sectors strategic for the transition to a climate-neutral economy) — creating the national legal base for disbursing the EC-approved €1 billion Slovak TCTF net-zero state-aid envelope (EC decision 15 December 2023, SA case approved under the Temporary Crisis and Transition Framework). The scheme supports manufacturers of batteries, solar panels, wind turbines, heat pumps, electrolysers, CCUS equipment, key components thereof, and related critical raw materials, with aid ceilings of €350 million per project in general districts and €150 million in Bratislava region, at aid intensities of 15–60% depending on company size and geography. Act 31/2024 is the horizontal enabling statute underpinning all large-scale Slovak net-zero state-aid awards flowing from the TCTF/NZIA envelopes — including future battery gigafactory, electrolyser, and clean-tech plant grants in the 2024–2025 window.