Green Economy Regulatory Initiative

The Green Economy Regulatory Initiative (GERI) is a whole-of-Government platform for accelerating innovation in Singapore's green economy. It builds on existing agency sandbox programmes and gives businesses a one-stop route to propose green products, services or technologies whose development is constrained by regulatory restrictions or uncertainty. GERI is a regulatory-sandbox and agency-coordination mechanism: it is not a grant, a blanket exemption from regulation, or a guarantee that a proposal will be approved for trial (MTI, Green Economy Regulatory Initiative, last updated 29 April 2026).

Areas that may be trialled

MTI lists eight areas in which proposals may be trialled through expedited regulatory sandboxes: carbon services and trading; circular economy, including plastics and e-waste recycling; CO2 to aggregates; electric vehicles; energy, including solar, energy storage and smart-grid solutions; hydrogen; sustainable aviation and maritime; and sustainable tourism (MTI, Green Economy Regulatory Initiative, last updated 29 April 2026). The list describes the initiative's current focus areas, not a promise that every proposal in an area qualifies or that every technology will receive the same regulatory treatment. It also does not rank the areas or assign a fixed quota of sandboxes to each one.

Qualification criteria

GERI proposals should demonstrate five elements. They must be aligned with the green economy; achieve at least one desired outcome such as reducing greenhouse-gas emissions, optimising waste, water or energy use, or building climate resilience; and face a regulatory restriction or unclear regulation that impedes development. Applicants should also show measurable economic benefits in Singapore, such as jobs or revenue, and demonstrate innovation by proposing something new to Singapore or markedly different from existing solutions (MTI, Green Economy Regulatory Initiative, last updated 29 April 2026). Meeting the themes alone does not establish eligibility: the proposal must explain the regulatory problem and the measurable Singapore benefit.

Application scope and safeguards

An applicant should explain the proposal's contribution to green-economy growth, potentially through job creation, revenue generation, skills transfer or intellectual property anchored in Singapore. The sandbox submission should define the purpose and benefits of the trial, proposed duration, safeguards, and key performance indicators or assessment criteria for success. MTI also asks applicants to show that the idea has not already been trialled or implemented in Singapore, or is substantially different from alternative solutions (Enterprise Singapore, Green Economy Regulatory Initiative).

These requirements make a sandbox a bounded experiment rather than final market authorisation. A successful trial can provide evidence for later regulatory or commercial decisions, but the trial's conditions, permitted activities and safeguards remain proposal- and agency-specific. GERI therefore does not remove the need to identify the agencies, licences, standards and other rules that apply to the eventual product or service (Enterprise Singapore, Green Economy Regulatory Initiative).

Process and relationship to other toolkits

GERI provides a streamlined one-stop submission route. MTI says businesses may receive provisional feedback within 30 days, while agencies aim to scope a sandbox within four to six months; these are process targets, not guaranteed approval or deployment dates (MTI, Green Economy Regulatory Initiative, last updated 29 April 2026). Partner-agency programmes include the Energy Market Authority energy sandbox, HDB's Cool Ideas Enterprise, NEA's regulatory sandbox and PUB's Global Innovation Challenge (Enterprise Singapore, Green Economy Regulatory Initiative).

GERI is one of three Pro-Enterprise Panel regulatory toolkits, alongside the First Mover Framework and New Idea Scheme. FMF principally concerns access to public land or spaces for a market test; NIS addresses novel business models facing regulatory obstacles; GERI focuses on green-economy innovation and coordinated sandboxing. They may overlap, but none is a general business grant or a substitute for final regulatory approval (MTI, Pro-Enterprise Panel overview, last updated 1 April 2026).