Victorian Circular Economy Recycling Modernisation Fund – Round 4: Information bulletin

Victorian Circular Economy Recycling Modernisation Fund

Information Session

Thursday, 15 June 2023

Presented by:

moderator:

John Polhill

Manager

Speakers:

Ki Halstead
Team Leader

Sarah Levy
Program Officer

[Opening visual of slide with text saying ‘Victorian Circular Economy Recycling Modernisation Fund’, ‘Information Session’, ’15 June 2023’, ‘Sustainability Victoria’]

[The visuals during this webinar are of each speaker presenting in turn via video, with reference to the content of a PowerPoint presentation being played on screen]

John Polhill:

Good morning everybody. Thank you for coming along to today’s session joining us for the recently announced Circular Economy Recycling Modernisation Fund delivered in partnership with the Victorian and Australian Government.

I’d like to begin by acknowledging the traditional owners of the lands on which we are meeting from today. I am presenting from the land of the Dja Dja Wurrung people up in Woodend in the Macedon Ranges. And I’d like to pay my respects to their Elders past, present and emerging.

It’s great to see so many familiar names on today’s attendee list. And for those who don’t know me my name’s John Polhill. I’m the Manager of the Infrastructure Partnerships Branch here at Sustainability Victoria and I’ll be taking you through some of the policy content for this session along with my colleagues Ki and Sarah who will be taking you through the specifics of the Fund. Also from the team we have Lusha and Lara and members of the grants team as well who will be assisting us with today’s session.

I’d like to just let everyone know that we will be recording today and the session will be publicly available on SV’s website in around a week. An email notification will be sent out to everybody who has registered just advising that the recording is available.

The purpose of today’s session is to give you an overview of the funding opportunities. And there will be time at the end of the presentation to ask questions but don’t wait until right to the end. You’ll see on the right hand side of your screen there’s the ability to post questions as we go. So feel free to start posting when you do have a question. Ki and Sarah will help facilitate these at the end of the presentation.

We only have an hour so we will be prioritising questions and we will do that by liking them. So if there is a question that you see that you would like to know the answer of please give it a thumbs up and we’ll address the ones at the end of the session with the most likes. If we don’t get to all of the questions today we will be compiling a Q&A and make that available along with the recording.

The Circular Economy Recycling Modernisation Fund Round 4, which we’ll refer to from hereon in as the Fund, is being co-funded by the Australian and Victorian Government with a current joint investment of over $88 million. And this is part of a national strategy to change the way Australia looks at waste, grow our economy, protect our environment and reach a national resource recovery target of 80% by 2030.

The aim of the Fund is to generate $600 million of recycling investment and drive a billion dollar transformation of Australia’s waste and recycling capacity. More than 10,000 jobs will be created and over 10 million tonnes of waste diverted from landfill to produce materials that will go into the manufacture of new products. The Fund will support innovative investment and new and existing infrastructure to sort, process and manufacture materials such as plastic, paper, cardboard, tyres and glass all impacted by the waste export regulations.

The Recycling Victoria A New Economy policy is a $380 million ten year action plan to fundamentally transform our recycling sector, reduce waste, create thousands of jobs and set Victoria up for a more sustainable future. Circular economy will drive investment in jobs and increase the processing capacity of waste in the recycling industry. The reforms will be delivered alongside investment and innovation as a comprehensive package to provide reliable services and a strong industry for the future of which we all play a great part and will make these services meet and exceed community expectations.

The Victorian Government’s contribution to this Fund has been established under the Recycling Victoria policy to respond to goal three of the Circular Economy goals which is to recycle more resources and divert them from landfill. The Fund’s intention is to stimulate investment in priority infrastructure to support increased recycling across the state and ensure we have a viable local capacity and capability network to produce quality materials that can be used as inputs in the manufacturing of new products.

I’d like to now hand you over to Ki who will take you through the nuts and bolts of the Fund.

Ki Halstead:

Thank you John. Hi everyone. I’m Ki. I’m the Team Leader delivering this program alongside my colleagues here with us today.

The aim of the Fund remains the same as in previous rounds. So that is to support recycling infrastructure that will build the capacity, capability and resilience of Victoria’s resource recovery sector, prepare businesses for the implementation of the national regulation of waste exports and rollout of the new standardised four-stream household recycling system, in addition increasing the quality of the materials for remanufacturing and to create jobs in the circular economy.

The Fund will provide State and Australian Government funds for reprocessing, manufacturing and end-market capacity projects for materials impacted by the national regulation of exports. Additionally the Fund includes projects that will be funded solely by the Victorian State Government and these are the projects that will be specifically for mechanical decontamination of food and garden organics from kerbside to support the kerbside standardisation rollout.

So Round 4 will support projects that purchase, install and commission new equipment at existing facilities operated by the applicant or upgrades to existing facilities currently operated by the applicant. The eligible materials are those materials subject to the national regulation of waste exports and FOGO from kerbside. So the specific definitions for the regulated materials, you can find those on the Australian Government website and these are the mixed plastics that are not of a single resin/polymer type that require further sorting, cleaning and/or reprocessing before use in manufacturing, single resin/polymer plastics that have not been reprocessed, plastics from e-waste except for brominated and flame-retardant plastics – these aren’t eligible – mixed and unsorted paper and cardboard, unprocessed glass in a whole or broken state, and these projects must be located in and service regional Victoria, all used tyres or in pieces larger than 150mm including baled tyres but not including bus, truck and aviation tyres exported for retreading to a verified retreading facility.

So funding will be provided to applicants that wish to purchase, install and commission new equipment or upgrades in order to increase domestic reprocessing capacity, improve the quality of materials including secondary sorting and increase the use of recycled content in manufacturing.

There is $8 million available in this Fund for Australian businesses, State and Local Government entities, social enterprises and not for profit organisations.

So in regards to the co-contribution applicants must contribute at least $2 for every $1 funded for those projects addressing the materials affected by the national regulation of waste exports and then at least $1 for every $1 funded for applicants investing in eligible projects that are for mechanical decontamination of food and garden organics from kerbside.

I’d like to point out here that investment leverage is a key consideration as part of the application assessment so higher investment from applicants is looked upon favourably.

SV will accept applications requesting funding from between $50,000 and $1 million excluding GST. Funding from other Government sources including Federal, State or Local can’t be included as part of your co-contribution.

I’ll now go through some of the eligibility criteria for the Fund and we’ll start with who will be funded.

As I mentioned eligible organisations must be one of the following types. So Australian business, Victorian or Local or State Government entity, social enterprise who must be currently registered with the Social Traders or prove accreditation before entering into a Funding Agreement, other not for profit organisations ideally registered on the ACNC charity register.

The applicant must have an ABN. If the applicant is a trust then the trust as the trading entity must meet this requirement. They must have been operating in Australia for a minimum of two years by the application closing date to be validated by the date that the organisation’s ABN is active from. The project must be located in Victoria and service Victoria. It must meet or exceed the minimum co-contribution requirements. It must also agree to comply with SV’s Terms of Participation in Grant Programs which is available via the guidelines online and agree to comply with the terms and conditions of the general Funding Agreement also available online.

A new requirement since last round is to submit your Fair Jobs Code Pre-Assessment Certificate Number or Application Number with their application if applying for $500,000 or more exclusive of GST. So information on the Fair Jobs Code is published in our Terms of Participation which is accessible online through the guidelines.

Applicants and project participants, so your project partners, must also demonstrate financial capability to undertake the project and that the project can be completed before the 31^st of May 2025. You must not have failed to meet program timelines with other SV funded programs without sufficient rationale. You must not have failed to address an environmental or safety breach in the last five years or if there was a breach that this has been satisfactorily addressed. You must not have any unresolved environmental or safety breaches and you must not have a current industrial relations investigation or prosecution in the last five years.

So now I’m going to go over what is eligible for funding.

In order to be eligible you must purchase equipment only – so no civil works in this round – for an existing facility located in Victoria. Your feedstock must be more than 50% located from Victoria, so sourced from Victoria. You must meet the eligibility criteria and one or more of the Fund objectives listed in the guidelines. Sarah will go through these objectives later. You must meet all regulatory and planning requirements and demonstrate a need for Government support for your project. And you also must be commissioned and operational by the 31^st of May 2025. Projects should maximise public value and leverage co-investment. So requested funding must be directly related to the project.

So what won’t be funded?

Projects will be ineligible if they require any building or construction or civil works as part of the project. They must not have commenced the project before signing the Funding Agreement however once you have been notified in writing that you are successful which we anticipate to be in January 2024 equipment can be ordered at your own risk.

As per the guidelines we do state that requests for retrospective funding where projects have commenced before the applicant is notified in writing that their grant is successful can purchase that equipment to accommodate shipping and delivery time issues. However if you fail to execute the Funding Agreement or withdraw your application your eligible costs won’t be reimbursed so it is a risk to you.

In addition projects that are ineligible are ones that are solely undertaken to comply with regulation or a regulatory notice or order, if it focuses on materials not listed previously, if it focuses on waste to energy solutions, if it seeks to extend capacity for accepting or sorting of unsorted material, so for example transfer stations and materials recovery facilities where you’re doing the primary sorting.

If you have received funding or support for the same activities from other sources your project will also not be eligible.

So as listed in the guidelines the in-kind contributions and a number of other costs are not eligible for funding and can’t be counted towards your co-contribution. I’m not going to read all these out because there’s quite a lot there but you can review this list on our website. However I do want to highlight a couple that we often give feedback about.

So civil works and other site prep costs. Previously we have funded this activity however given the short timing for the project delivery we are focusing on simpler projects that can be completed in the timeframe. Purchase of vehicles for example front-end loaders, excavators and forklifts are not eligible. Costs for equipment not dedicated to the project – so that includes such things as establishing a site or an office building and any fit out in regards to that, security cameras, things like that – they’re not eligible. Leasing of equipment is not eligible and that does include leasing equipment in order to install and commission your project. So cherry pickers and the like. We also don’t fund training and other educational activities. Training your staff to operate equipment is not covered by this program. So neither Government funding nor your co-contribution can be applied to any of the costs listed here.

So I’ll now hand over to my colleague Sarah and she will go through the assessment criteria with you.

Sarah Levy:

Thanks Ki and good morning everyone. I’m Sarah one of the Program Officers in this team. I help manage the grants and work with our amazing stakeholders. So I’ll kick off by providing an overview of the assessment criteria which the assessment panel will use to score your application. You can read the detail of this criteria in the guidelines on our website.

We have two streams depending on how much funding you are applying for. Stream 1 is a simplified application for projects requesting between $50,000 and $250,000. Stream 2 is for higher risk projects above $250,000 up to $1 million. These require a more detailed application than Stream 1.

The application forms are also structured in a way that makes it clear which criteria each question falls under. Different weightings apply to the various assessment criteria.

In your responses to questions across all of the criteria it’s really important that you address the questions and support your statements with evidence. Your project may be technologically and financially viable, have fantastic potential outcomes and a great team to deliver it however without supporting evidence the assessment panel cannot assess the validity of your statements. I’ll provide some examples of what we are looking for as we go through the criteria.

It’s also important to note that after you have submitted your application we can’t come back to you asking for any additional information. We can only ask for clarification on information provided that isn’t clear. I’ll now go through each of the four assessment criteria starting with how.

Under the how criteria applicants will be assessed on how well they have demonstrated viability to successfully deliver the project including financial viability. The weighting for how is 30%. Examples of supporting evidence we are looking for is proof of site ownership or lease agreement and council planning approval or relevant EPA permissions. We’ll also be asking for a detailed timeline for the project to ensure that it can be delivered within the required timelines, also an overview of the project expenditure and how you intend to finance the required co‑contribution. This is fairly similar between the two streams however Stream 2 will require a project Gannt chart in a template provided by SV and a risk management plan.

The next section is the what. The weighting for this criteria is 30%. Under what you’ll be asked to demonstrate the project meets one or more of the funding objectives, which are listed in both the guidelines and application form, to demonstrate the project is viable and assessment ready and to demonstrate that the objectives of the project align with the strategic priorities of your organisation.

The project should make sense to the strategic goals of your organisation so we’re wanting you to demonstrate how it aligns with your organisation’s vision for the future or perhaps how the project will support strategic goals such as the growth or stability of your existing operations. Also to demonstrate the impact your project will have on capacity requirements resulting from the impacts of the national regulation of waste exports.

You might consider the quantity and quality of materials that will need to be processed onshore as a result of the new regulations or the possible pathways for materials once they can no longer be exported.

Things to consider when thinking about the impact your project will have include is your project of a scale to achieve a significant outcome for the relevant materials, how much of the relevant material is currently exported and what proportion of current export volumes will your project address, will your project directly reduce exports of the relevant materials, and does your project support a new end market or address a difficult to recover material or a gap in the market.

Rather than giving you a narrow definition of impacts we want you as the experts in the market to tell us what is going to achieve a significant outcome. We recommend that you look at the national regulation of waste exports information available online and use available data such as current export volumes and markets to support your statements. Potential data sources include your own business data, industry reports, reports available on the SV website such as the annual waste data reports and the recovered resources market bulletins, as well as data and reports available by the Australian Government’s Department of Climate Change, Energy, Environment and Water, and to export data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

Something else to keep in mind as you fill out your application is how will your project help shift Victoria away from the buy, use, dispose culture of a linear economy to an avoid, minimise, reduce and reuse culture known as a circular economy.

I’ll now provide an example of supporting your statements with evidence. For example your project is to install equipment that is going to clean a certain grade of material that will increase the quantity of high grade material available for manufacturing. This would meet the funding objective to increase the use and market demand of quality recovered materials in remanufacturing and to make new products.

The sort of evidence we would be looking for to demonstrate the project is a viable solution to achieve this objective would include technology specifications on how much the equipment will clean the materials, evidence of manufacturing uses for your proposed product, any market research available and demonstration of end markets through quotes, commercial agreements or letters of support from potential customers, also evidence of where and how you will obtain the feedstock or input materials required, such as existing supply agreements or letters of support from transfer stations or local councils.

The next section is the who section. So under the who criteria the assessment panel will be looking for applications that demonstrate the participants’ capability and capacity to successfully deliver the project. This criteria is worth 20%. If for example your organisation or project partners have experience delivering similar infrastructure projects we are looking for details on what these projects were, any challenges or setbacks in delivery and how these were overcome, also the project outcomes achieved. More generally we also want to know what project management and governance processes you have in place.

The last criteria section is why. Under the why criteria which is weighted at 20% projects will be assessed on why the project is needed, why government financial support is needed, the benefits that the project will provide and how it aligns to the priorities of the Government. Again any statements should be supported by evidence where possible.

In terms of demonstrating the need for Government financial assistance we do recognise there’s a conflict here in terms of projects needing to be viable and also demonstrate the need for funding. The key here is to explain potential outcomes with and without government support, for example the impacts on capacity or delivery timing if financial assistance is or isn’t provided.

In addition to being scored on the assessment criteria I’ve just gone through the assessment panel may overlay diversity considerations such as geographical spread, a spread across industry and types of applicants and types of projects and materials addressed to achieve a diverse mix of projects. Successful applicants from previous rounds of this Fund can apply for this next round of funding however it must be for a different project. Previous funding allocations will also be considered as part of the diversity assessment of Round 4 applications.

An important part of the assessment process is for SV to complete due diligence on applications similar to if you were applying for a bank loan or seeking private sector investment in your project. During these checks SV looks at any compliance issues, the financial viability of the applicant and project partners, adequate insurances, any conflict of interest and delivery history with SV. SV may use a contracted third party to undertake financial viability checks but we will notify you prior to any external parties contacting you and any information you provide to satisfy these checks will be considered commercial in confidence. The results of these due diligence checks then form part of a risk-based assessment of the project.

And now I’ll hand back to Ki to walk you through exactly how to apply.

Ki Halstead:

Thank you Sarah. I’ll go through the steps now that you can follow to apply for the Fund.

So before you start your application please ensure that your project meets the eligibility and assessment criteria. Have a read of and understand the guidelines, the terms of participation in the grant program and our general Funding Agreement all of which are available through our guidelines. One of my colleagues will provide the link to the guidelines or they have previously. In the start of the chat you’ll be able to find the link there.

The next step is to register or login to SmartyGrants and start your application. The link to the SmartyGrants platform can be found within the funding guidelines.

The first page of the application form in SmartyGrants is an eligibility check and we recommend that you complete this early to make sure that your project is eligible. And if you don’t pass this check or if you have any questions about it please get in touch with the SV Grant team via the Grants Enquiries email or phone number. And we can share these details in the chat for you.

Review the questions in the application form and once you have completed the eligibility check you should be able to navigate through the application to see all of the questions. You may also wish to download a preview of the application form so that you can see all the questions and you can start preparing your responses or checking with anyone external.

Note that some of the fields in the preview of the application are conditional so you may not have to answer every single question. Once you get started you’ll work out what is relevant to you and your project.

Step number six. Make sure you plan, research and gather your information for your application as early as possible to give your application the best chance of success. The application form will take some time to complete and we recommend that you start the bulk of your application no later than two to three weeks before the closing date particularly so that you have time to get any letters of support, quotes, internal approvals or other documentation that you might need. The SmartyGrants system means that you can save and go back at any time.

Step seven is to complete all the required questions in the application form and it will let you know if anything is missing. So you won’t be able to submit the form if you haven’t completed everything. And upload any supporting documents. Double check your supporting documents. Sometimes we get blank ones so just double check that you’ve uploaded the right files.

So the next step is that you need to submit your application via the SmartyGrants by 11:59pm on Friday the 11^th of August. On submission you’ll receive an electronic reply from SmartyGrants acknowledging the receipt of your application. And sometimes emails from SmartyGrants do go into people’s spam folders so please check that before you contact SV for assistance. Late applications will not be accepted except under exceptional circumstances which are outlined in our Terms of Participation in Grants Programs. And if your computer or internet is prone to meltdowns we suggest you submit your applications early.

If you need support with any of these steps you can contact our Grants Enquiries team.

I will now hand back to Sarah who will help you put your best application forward. Thank you.

Sarah Levy:

Thanks Ki. I will now go through some key tips to improve your chance of success. The Infrastructure Investment team at SV offers targeted support for projects and companies investing in Victoria’s circular economy. As part of this offering the team provides a free application review and advisory services for selected programs that target priority circular economy infrastructure.

The team does not answer questions in regard to program eligibility or guidelines. These must be directed to our Grants Enquiries team. The team can review your grant application and provide feedback and suggestions on areas that may help to strengthen your application and business case before you submit. They are unable to provide any feedback on the prospects of your application. The team is separate and removed from the independent grant assessment process and use of the service does not guarantee success for your application.

To access the ARAS you must confirm your eligibility as outlined in the guideline under who can apply. If you’re unsure please contact the Grants Enquiries team to complete your application in full in SmartyGrants but do not submit it. Please contact Grants Enquiries if you have submitted your application through SmartyGrants by mistake and need for it to be reopened. Download the SmartyGrants application as a PDF and attach to your email with the information below. Provide the details below and attach the application which you have downloaded from SmartyGrants along with all relevant supporting documents which you will include with your application.

Send your draft application for review at least two weeks before the program application deadline. So this is to the 28^th of July for this Fund. However we ask for you to send it as early as possible for the team to review to provide you with the feedback and still allow enough time for you to submit your final application before the deadline.

Subject to the volume of applications received and the timing of your request SV cannot guarantee your application will be reviewed before the application closing date. Additionally requests for extensions will not be considered in the event you are unable to receive feedback on your application before the round closing date.

We will say this many times and please take the time to read the guidelines. In the past it’s been clear that not everyone has read them but it really is critical that you read them to understand the objectives and eligibility requirements of the Fund. The second tip is to start your application early so that you do have that time to gather the required evidence. We also recommend applicants engage with SV’s investment support services before submitting their application to ensure their project is investment ready and set up for success. SV’s Grants Enquiries team are available to provide support and respond to any queries about eligibility or how to apply for the grant. They cannot review drafts or provide feedback.

SV does offer an investment facilitation service and this is for projects that build Victoria’s resource recovery sector. This service can tell you what you need to have in place for your project and provide connections within the industry. More information about this service is available on the SV website and we’ll also pop the details in the chat. Please note that the investment facilitation service cannot tell you if your project is eligible or if it will be funded.

Finally wherever possible provide evidence to support the statements that you’re making in your application and clearly explain what your project will achieve and why it’s important for Victoria. Don’t assume that the assessors will have prior knowledge about your organisation, the type of project you’re proposing or in-depth industry expertise.

Some further considerations to keep in mind when the assessment panel are considering whether your project is investment ready. If you can answer yes to all or most of these questions your application will have the best chance of success. If the answer to any of these questions is no it doesn’t mean your project won’t be funded. It means that you need to consider how you can develop these project elements and how to address them in the application including in the risk management plan. So this includes has your project plan or business case been internally approved? Have you secured feedstock? Have you secured end markets for your materials or products? Have you commenced seeking environmental permits if required? Do you have commitment in writing from project partners or investors? Have you identified the required technology for your project? Do you have the required cash co-contribution secured? Do you have a detailed risk management plan with mitigations?

For example if you do not yet have secured feedstock which can be the case for these types of projects you should provide detail on the availability of feedstock in the market and the amount required by the plan to ensure financial stability for the operation, also how you plan to secure feedstock and any potential suppliers you may have approached and any key dependency in securing feedstock.

Now I’ll quickly run through the timeline. So I should point out that these dates are subject to change. Should the dates change we will provide applicants with all the information as soon as possible. Again the applications do close 11:59pm Friday the 11^th of August. We do acknowledge this is a relatively challenging timeframe in which to complete an in-depth application so we do recommend again to start your application as early as possible.

Notification of outcomes is subject to the approvals process but rest assured SV will advise you on the outcome of your application as soon as possible. Once projects are approved we will be aiming to establish the Funding Agreement and let you get started on your project as soon as possible so that you can meet the deadline for project completion. As noted earlier all successful projects must be completed by the 31^st of May 2025 to align with the Funding Agreement between the Victorian and Australian Governments.

So that completes the information session. We have also received some really great questions and I encourage you to pop your questions in the chat now if you haven’t already. As John said at the start we’ll focus on the questions with the most likes. Any questions we don’t get to cover or you think of later please do send them through to Grants Enquiries and we’ll add them to the FAQ section of the website.

Some questions we’ve received previously includes:

Q: Can I submit more than one application?

The answer is yes as long as it’s for a separate project. A single business or Local Government can submit more than one application if they have multiple projects that meet the eligibility criteria and the individual projects can demonstrate how it addresses the assessment criteria and objectives of the Fund.

A question.

Q: I have a smaller scale project. Should I still apply?

Yes. The Fund seeks to maximise public value and return on investment in the industry. Co‑contributions are not intended to discourage applications in respect of smaller scale projects that demonstrate public value. SV encourages projects of varying investment size.

Q: Are waste to energy projects eligible?

Waste to energy projects are not eligible for funding under this particular Fund. This includes incineration, gasification, refuse derived fuel, anaerobic digestion.

Q: Can SV review a draft of my grant application?

As we have discussed the grant application is a competitive process so the Grants team are unable to review a draft or provide feedback on your application itself. However SV’s investment facilitation service is a separate function from the grants assessment and delivery teams and can provide support in discussing your project, the concept of business case and to make sure your project is investment ready.

Now I’ll pop over to the chat and see what questions we have to answer.

[Visual of slide with text saying ‘Questions?’, ‘Enter or like questions in the Q&A chat’, ‘Contact us’, ‘+61 3 8656 6757’, ‘grants.enquiries@sustainability.vic.gov.au’]

So I can see a few likes on:

Q: What is meant by mechanical decontamination of FOGO?

Ki Halstead:

I can speak to that if you like. So for that one particularly we’re looking to move away from manual picking for FOGO specifically. Knowing that the rollout of the FOGO is increasing contamination significantly we wanted to provide one to one ratio funding for the industry to be able to support it to mechanical decontamination of FOGO.

Sarah Levy:

Excellent. There is a question there about e-waste and if e-waste is included. So plastics from e‑waste is eligible however not those that contain brominated and flame-retardant plastics.

Ki Halstead:

Just a note too that we have released the Hazardous Waste Fund and that those particular materials, the brominated plastic and flame-retardant plastics are eligible under that fund so you can have a look at our website to be able to access that one.

Sarah Levy:

A question.

Q: Does it mean that asphalt projects are considered ineligible?

Asphalt is not a priority material of this Fund.

Q: So re funding criteria it states that projects that have already commenced before the Funding Agreement is signed will not be funded. Does this mean that for large projects such as composting facilities any prior prep work before installation of new equipment cannot occur before the Funding Agreement is signed?

Ki Halstead:

So I can speak to that one as well. So civil works and site prep aren’t eligible so you wouldn’t be asking for funding towards that. So we wouldn’t consider that part of your project. So you might put in an application for your mechanical decontamination equipment. So we’re just funding equipment. But you just can’t order that equipment before you’ve had confirmation. So if you choose to go ahead and do other preparation and other works on your site in order to prepare for equipment then that’s at your own risk and up to you. If you’re successful then you can order that equipment at your own risk before signing a Funding Agreement.

Sarah Levy:

Excellent. Another question around:

Q: How long does the ARAS review process take?

As we said two weeks before the deadline is sort of the minimum time. But once that is in it does depend on the volume of applications received and the timing of your request. So we can’t guarantee that it will be reviewed but the earlier you get it into the team to have a look at then the better your chances of that.

And then one last question here.

Q: Is there funding available above $1 million through future rounds?

Ki Halstead:

In regards to future rounds we don’t have any information about particular future rounds and caps and what the details of those will be. But you can sign up for our newsletter and to get notified when grant funding does become available. So I recommend that you sign up for that.

Sarah Levy:

So there were two more questions here.

Q: Can the FOGO mechanical separation be for pasteurised FOGO?

Ki Halstead:

Yeah. I can’t see why not. It’s just to decontaminate to improve the quality of the material.

Sarah Levy:

Q: Is the Fund focusing on export diversion of the nominated materials or can it be for Victorian landfill diversion or recycling?

Ki Halstead:

The funding that we’re receiving from the Commonwealth Government that’s through the Recycling Modernisation Fund, their objectives are to support the industry to manage those materials that are going to be restricted by the waste export regulations. So we are prioritising those. Yes. If you are diverting them from landfill as well that’s a bonus.

Sarah Levy:

Q: Do you think there is likely to be a Round 5 of this program? If yes when might that round open?

Ki Halstead:

So our rounds are open based on how much funding we have left. So if we are undersubscribed and we still have funding left then we would look to open another round probably towards the end of the year. But it’s really dependent on whether or not we allocate it in this round or not.

Sarah Levy:

Excellent. I think that is the end of the questions so we’ll bring the information session to a close. Thanks everyone for attending and we look forward to seeing your applications come through.

Ki Halstead:

Thanks everyone. Bye.

[Closing visual of slide with text saying ‘Thank you’, ‘f @SustainVic’, ‘t @SustainVic‘, ‘in Sustainability Victoria’, ‘Sustainability Victoria’, ‘Victoria State Government’]

[End of Transcript]