Crossover grant NWO: 4 PhD students for Kitepower
On 12 December, NWO announced that the NEON consortium, led by Eindhoven University of Technology, will receive a Crossover grant of 8.5 million euros for innovations that can accelerate the energy transition. The Kite Power research group at the Faculty of Aerospace Engineering is one of the partners in the consortium. With the subsidy 4 PhD students can be hired for the research into kite power. These are co-financed by two start-up companies in the field of airborne wind energy of the faculty: Ampyx Power and Kitepower.
The NEON project
The NEON Consortium, led by Eindhoven University of Technology, is one of five consortia that receive a Crossover grant from NWO. The consortium focuses on the development of new methods and techniques to give the energy transition a significant boost. NEON is a multidisciplinary research programme in which engineers work closely with social scientists, NGOs and companies. On 12 December, NWO announced that it would be awarding this programme a crossover grant of 8.5 million euros.
Kite power
The kite power research group at the Faculty of Aerospace Engineering at TU Delft is one of the partners in this consortium. The subsidy gives them the opportunity to put to work 4 new PhD students on the topic of airborne wind energy. These PhD students are co-funded by two start-up companies in the field of airborne wind energy of the faculty, Ampyx Power and Kitepower. Dr.-Ing Roland Schmehl, head of the research group and Associate Professor in the Wind Energy section at TU Delft, "In NEON, TU Delft and the two start-ups are working closely together on a future free of fossil fuels.”
A total of 4 principal investigators at TU Delft are involved in the NEON project. In addition to Schmehl, these are Prof. Dr. Pavol Bauer, Dr. Gautham Ram and Dr. Thiago Batista. Read more about the NEON project on the website of TU Eindhoven.
Crossover programme NWO
The Crossover programme is new to NWO and is part of the NWO contribution to the Knowledge and Innovation Contract 2018-2019. With this contract, the government, the business community and knowledge institutes endorse the substantive ambitions for the top sectors, with the aim of strengthening the Dutch knowledge and innovation system. Compared to the 'regular' public-private partnerships, the projects in the Crossover programme cover a broader range of top sectors and other research agendas. Read the press release of the NWO here.
RELEASE
The Reversible Large-scale Energy Storage (RELEASE) consortium, led by Prof. Paulien Herder of TU Delft, also received a Crossover subsidy. Read the press release here on the website of TU Delft. https://www.tudelft.nl/2019/tu-delft/miljoenen-voor-onderzoek-naar-grootschalige-energieopslag/