Last week was a busy one for our project. On Tuesday 25th March, we were in Brussels meeting with our sister projects from the European Innovation Council (EIC) Green Hydrogen Challenge Portfolio. Just after that, on the 26th and 27th, we also joined the roadmapping event on renewable hydrogen, fuels, and chemicals, co-organised by the EIC and EU-funded initiative SUNERGY.
The EIC Hydrogen Portfolio meeting began with brief overview presentations of all projects. We already know each other—although there were some new faces, such as Carina Faber, our new EIC Programme Manager, replacing Francesco Matteucci and Marco Pantaleo—but it served as an opportunity to discover each project’s current state of play. It also served as a training session, allowing us to fine-tune the final details for the next day, as many of us were also pitching our projects at the EIC–SUNERGY event. Sticking to the 10-minute presentation limit can sometimes be challenging.
Apart from that, the meeting focused on discussions around the continuation of the techno-economic assessment started last year. This included an introduction to the developed methodology and a discussion on its applicability for each project. The communication managers also had our time on the agenda and agreed on new steps to keep things moving forward. In summary, although it was a bit exhausting day, all the projects were very happy and eager to continue working.
Our busy week in Brussels continued with the joint EIC–SUNERGY event, where experts from academia, industry, and policy met. A full house for the opening talk by Carina Fabe, an indication of how stimulating the two days ahead were expected to be. And expectations were certainly met—if not exceeded!
The event focused on the goal of finding solutions for climate change mitigation, where sustainable fuels, chemicals, and materials derived from renewable energy, water, and abundant resources become crucial. However, sustainability must also meet scalability. That’s why, right from the start, very interesting questions were raised, such as ‘How can we bring down the cost of hydrogen production?’ or ‘Would it theoretically be possible to supply the entire global energy demand using photovoltaics?’.
So, innovation is essential, but putting it into practice is critical. We had the opportunity to explore this topic looking also at some success stories for instance those coming from a start-up perspective. And we also had the opportunity to see our project coordinator Pau Farràs, from the University of Galway (Ireland) pitching our project!
Last but not least, the workshop sessions, which covered topics ranging from young researchers to advanced electrochemical conversion, probed to be incredibly fruitful. The discussions were highly engaging, and we left feeling very proud with the shared insights and outcomes from each group.