ENER2i
ENErgy Research to Innovation: Reinforcing cooperation with ENP countries on bridging the gap between energy research and energy innovation
Energy supply and usage and the stimulation of innovation activities are some of the most important challenges for the EU and for the Eastern European countries within the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP). Increased resource efficiency and innovation in renewable and sustainable energy offers the best potential to solve the urgent, interrelated societal challenges of insecurity over energy supplies, growing energy demand, and looming climate change. The ENER2I project focuses on the need to find innovative and sustainable solutions to these energy challenges, directly addressing the gap between new energy research and European industry. Linkages between research and innovation will be stimulated with effective knowledge transfer methods in the ENP countries Armenia, Belarus, Georgia and Moldova contributing the sustainable cooperation between research and innovation actors across EU and ENP countries.
General Objectives of ENER2i
1. Enhancing innovation capacity and improving the innovation performance of manufacturers, energy service companies and industry in the field of energy efficiency and renewable energy supply and use.
2. Tackling knowledge deficiencies and strengthening the links between research bodies, enterprises, and political stakeholders at local and bi-regional level, and creating a stable framework for knowledge transfer between EU and ENP countries.
3. Analyse the innovation landscape and survey key stakeholders in the focus regions to identify opportunities as well as potential bottlenecks and barriers related to cooperation and knowledge transfer between public research and industry for the take-up of research results and innovation management and financing.
4. Improving competencies and mutual learning across the EU and ENP countries by promoting exchange of information and best practices through twinning and training activities between relevant organisation,
Specific Objectives of ENER2i
- Collect information on the local energy sectors and energy research in the ENP countries Armenia, Belarus, Georgia, and Moldova, and identify strengths and weaknesses of the local energy sectors and assess the development landscape of EE/RES. The main players in energy research and business will be identified.
- Connect and establish contacts between local and transnational stakeholders of the knowledge chain in order to set up new partnerships and launch new collaborative projects. In this way, ENER2I will strengthen the cooperation between businesses and research organisations, as well as between innovation support agencies of ENP and European countries active in the energy field, and provide a simple and direct access point to find partners in the ENP area and the EU.
- Increase the competencies and skills of local researchers, start-ups and businesses in EE/RES in Armenia, Belarus, Georgia, and Moldova, empower the local innovation processes in energy efficiency and RES. The ENER2I capacity building programme will consist of two elements: training workshops on various aspects of innovation held in the ENP countries to support the successful transfer of research results to business and to facilitate start-ups from the academic sector, and a twinning scheme developed to enhance the capacities of experts from the ENP countries to facilitate knowledge exchange and build up sustainable linkages between innovation players in ENP and EU countries
- Provide innovation support to the target countries and enhance of transnational cooperation between SMEs and research institutions by strengthening innovative thinking of stakeholders. A pilot action, an innovation voucher scheme, will be jointly developed and implemented which will directly support the EE/RES innovations in the ENP countries and to achieve tangible results.
- Utilize appropriate dissemination tools and methods as well as to ensure that the project results will be distributed to the relevant stakeholders.
List of participants
| Participant no. * | Participant organisation name | Country |
| 1 (Coordinator) | ZSI – Centre for Social Innovation | Austria |
| 2 | RCISD – Regional Centre for Information and Scientific Development | Hungary |
| 3 | ESEIA – European Sustainable Energy Innovation Alliance | Austria |
| 4 | BelISA – Belarusian Institute of Systems Analysis and Information Support | Belarus |
| 5 | NAS RA- National Academy of Sciences, Republic of Armenia | Armenia |
| 6 | AITT- Agency for Innovation and Technology Transfer | Moldova |
| 7 | TTA – Technology Transfer Association | Armenia |
| 8 | BIF – Belarusian Innovation Fund | Belarus |
| 9 | EECG – Union “Energy Efficiency Center Georgia” | Georgia |
| 10 | ee – Energy engineers GmbH | Germany |
| 11 | ODIMM – Organization for Small and Medium Enterprises Sector Development | Moldova |
Contact
E-mail: ener2i@rcisd.eu