LPRC attends the EU Sustainable Week (part 1)

LPRC participated in this year’s EU Sustainable Energy Week (EUSEW 2020) from the 23 to the 26 June 2020, an event hosted by the European Commission. Due to the current limitations imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic this event was held online with many talks, presentations and discussions. This event enables citizens and companies to learn and exchange about sustainable energy, digitalization and green development.

23 June 2020

The first event was the award-winning ceremony celebrating projects and EU citizens which work to push the EU as a whole toward climate neutrality.

• The winner in the Engagement category was Clear 2.0, a pan-European project spanning from Spain to Slovenia. The project helps citizens to become producers and consumers of renewable energy in their own homes.
• In the Youth category, Fair (FER) won. From Zagreb, Croatia, the project teaches electrical engineering students how to do household audits to identify energy-saving solutions.
• The Innovation award went to REMOTE – Remote area Energy Supply with Multiple Options for integrated hydrogen-based Technologies) – a project started in Italy, Greece and Norway. The project helps locally produced renewable energy to be stored.
• The first, second and third prizes of the EaP went to Green Light Moldova; EU4Civil Society Energy Efficiency in Armenian Communities; and Biomass Energy and Energy-efficient Technologies in Georgia.
• The Citizens’ Award went to the Dutch project cVPP, based in Eindhoven. The project helps local communities to take charge of their renewable energy generation through community-based Virtual Power Plants (cVPPs) in Belgium, the Netherlands and Ireland.
• The three winners of the Women in Energy awards went to: Sophie Attali (Director of Guide Topten in France), Katharina Habersbrunner (Women Engage for a Common Future) and Ada Ámon (Climate Commissoner to the Mayor of Budapest).

Following the award-winning ceremony, a discussion on The EU’s support for clean energy technologies and innovation was held by European Commissioner Kadri Simson and IEA Executive Director Dr. Fatih Birol.

Commissioner Simson announced that the Clean Energy Transition – Technologies and Innovations Report will soon be released, together with the State of the Energy Union report this Autumn. Funding clean technologies has gotten a massive boost recently through the Recovery Plan for Europe that the Commission proposed a few weeks ago. The Green Deal is its growth strategy at its core. So, it is designed to help accelerate innovative investment through a number of programs:

• The reinforced Multi Annual Financial Framework, with the proposed increase in Horizon Europe to 94 billion EUR will bring extra resources for the digital and green transitions. Horizon will allow the Commission to support the most innovative new ideas.
• The InvestEU research and innovation window of 10 billion EUR guarantees help to scale-up private sector investments in R&I. Most importantly it will help downstream bringing the results to the market and seeing a tangible solution.
• The European Commission also created a new Strategic Investment Facility to support private investments in European strategic value chains with a guarantee of 15 billion EUR. So, any company planning to invest in clean hydrogen technologies for example, you could use the Strategic Investment Facility for projects to scale up electrolysers or for carbon capture and storage solutions.

in July a first 1 billion EUR call under the Innovation Fund will be launched. It will fund – amongst other things – demonstration projects for innovative hydrogen-based and renewable technologies. Soon after, in September, the European Commission will adopt a Green Deal call of 1 billion EUR under Horizon 2020. Of that, more than one third will be dedicated to energy topics, including a call for a large-scale electrolyser.

The private sector also has a very important role in funding clean energy technologies. In fact, private investments still represent roughly three quarters of R&I funding. That’s why the EU will also launch a new Hydrogen Alliance, to bring public and private to the same table.

Link of all presentations: https://eusew.eu/programme