Research Ministers of the EU Member States and Associated Countries, together with the European Commission, are announcing in Brussels three new pan-European energy research infrastructures. A wind research facility is planned in Denmark, a concentrated solar power installation in Spain and a nuclear research reactor in Belgium.
Research Ministers of
the EU Member States and Associated Countries, together with the European
Commission, are announcing in Brussels three new pan-European energy research
infrastructures. A wind research facility is planned in Denmark, a concentrated
solar power installation in Spain and a nuclear research reactor in Belgium. The
overall investment is about € 1.2 billion. They will be part of the Roadmap of
the European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures (ESFRI). The
announcement will take place at the Belgian Presidency ENERI Conference, at the
Square, Mont des Arts, Brussels. Energy research infrastructures play an
important part in realizing the European Strategic Energy Technology
(SET)-Plan.
European Commissioner for Research, Innovation and Science,
Máire Geoghegan-Quinn, said: "Developing world-class research infrastructure in
Europe, by pooling resources at EU level, is an important objective of the
Innovation Union. These facilities will enable ground-breaking research and
innovation and ultimately they could help to secure the EU's future energy
supply. We need to bring research, technology, industry and market
implementation closer together and that is the purpose of the European Strategic
Energy Technology Plan."
In its updated Roadmap 2010, ESFRI has
identified 50 new research infrastructures or major upgrades of existing ones,
in order to stay at the forefront of research over the next 10 – 20 years. Their
total construction cost amounts to some € 20 billion and their operational cost
would be around € 2 billion per year.
One of the objectives of the
Innovation Union is to launch by 2015 the construction of 60% of these priority
European research infrastructures, primarily financed by EU Member States, but
with the support of European Programmes.
The new infrastructures
announced today
In Denmark the WindScanner
project has the capacity to produce detailed maps of wind conditions at a wind
farm covering several square kilometres. This knowledge will lead to more
efficient, stronger and lighter wind turbines. The facility will be in operation
from 2013 and costs will be between € 45 and 60 million. WindScanner will be
operated by the Risø DTU National Laboratory for Sustainable Energy near
Roskilde, leading a consortium with six other partners, from Germany, Greece,
Spain, The Netherlands, Norway and Portugal
The solar research
infrastructure EU-SOLARIS at the Advanced Technological Centre for Renewable
Energy in Tabernas, Almeria (Spain) focuses on developing new technologies for
concentrated solar power and has a construction cost of about € 80 million.
Other complementary sites at several leading European laboratories –
representing European countries with the most solar potential (Portugal, Italy,
Greece and Turkey) and Germany (technological provider) – will be part of the
new research infrastructure.
The Belgian nuclear fission research
infrastructure MYRRHA, in Mol, has research capacity on the reduction of
radioactive nuclear waste. The detailed engineering design of the facility is
scheduled to be completed in 2014. The total construction cost is budgeted at
approximately € 960 million (2010-2023). MYRRHA will be the first large facility
in the world for research on radioactive spent nuclear fuel and its reduction
via partitioning and transmutation. The infrastructure can also be used to test
the feasibility of a new generation of nuclear power plants – the Lead Fast
Reactor technology. MYRRHA is a complementary infrastructure to the Jules
Horowitz Reactor (thermal spectrum reactor), under construction in Cadarache,
France.
Background
Research infrastructures can
be major scientific equipment, collections, archives or structured scientific
information such as bio-banks, data and computing infrastructures. They are used
by scientists to conduct top-level research paving the way for applying
technology to solve the grand challenges that society faces today, not only in
the field of energy, but also for example climate change, health, the secure
supply of resources and coping with an ageing population.
The 7th
Framework Programme for Research of the European Union has a budget of € 1.7
billion for research infrastructures. About € 560 million, including the € 200
million European Commission contribution to the Risk Sharing Finance Facility,
of this is specifically for the development of new research infrastructures.
Additional funds of € 10 billion are available from EU Structural Funds. Support
for the construction of research infrastructures can also be obtained from the
European Investment Bank in the form of loans.
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