Press release
Taxpayers forced to fund €2 million ‘sustainability’ grant for Europe’s biggest plastics facility
02 July 2025
Campaigners and legal experts have reacted today to the news that INEOS’s under-construction plastics facility in the Port of Antwerp will receive a €2 million, taxpayer-funded grant from the Flemish government for ‘strategic ecological support’.
This is in addition to a significant guarantee already granted by Flanders – as well as enormous financial support from the governments of the UK (€700 million), Italy and Spain.
‘Project One’, a €4 billion ethane cracker that would transform shale gas into the key building blocks for plastics, is facing ongoing and existential legal challenges, with further rulings and refreshed action expected, but is currently being built nonetheless.
Brecht Rogissart, research and campaigns at FairFin, said: "It is downright cynical that an ecological subsidy is being granted to one of the most polluting industries. The chemical sector is responsible for more than a quarter of industrial emissions under the Emissions Trading Scheme in Flanders. Project One may be a more efficient cracker than its predecessors, but it remains a plant that consumes enormous amounts of fossil fuels. This project is a disaster for the environment, climate and health."
INEOS insists that future hydrogen infrastructure in the area will enable the cracker to become ‘green’.
Dries Verhaeghe, lawyer and director at legal NGO Dryade, said: “The strategic ecological support focuses on making the production process of the ethane cracker greener – whereas it’s the fossil output that’s the major problem. If you replace your gas stove with an induction plate, does that make everything you cook sustainable?”
Recent research demonstrates links between INEOS’s European supply chain and contested fossil fuel sources in the Permian Basin, in Texas.
ClientEarth lawyer Tatiana Luján said: “This project is being propped up by taxpayers all over Europe, while people actively want to see plastic production and use slashed – this defies belief. From gas extraction across the Atlantic, to plastic creation right here in Europe, this project is a disaster and it’s being pushed by people who should know better. We need to see authorities invest aggressively in the future of nature, the climate and people’s rights – not their downfall.”
ENDS
Contact:
Ellen Baker | Global Communications Manager, ClientEarth | ebaker@clientearth.org | +44 (0)203 030 5951
About ClientEarth
ClientEarth is a non-profit organisation that uses the law to create systemic change that protects the Earth for – and with – its inhabitants. We are tackling climate change, protecting nature and stopping pollution, with partners and citizens around the globe. We hold industry and governments to account and defend everyone’s right to a healthy world. ClientEarth teams in Europe, Asia and the USA work to shape, implement and enforce the law, to build a future for our planet in which people and nature can thrive together.