Professional Engineering

The Department for Energy and Climate Change has launched two energy storage competitions.

Innovators across the country will be offered the chance to get their hands on cash to develop innovative energy storage designs to help cut costs and bring new technologies to the market.

The first competition is for large-scale energy storage demonstration projects, and the second for research and feasibility studies into storage systems and their components.

Energy and climate change minister Greg Barker said: “As we move towards a low-carbon future, the ability to store energy when we don’t need it, for times when we do, will become even more important, helping us balance our electricity network and use more clean green power.

“This investment will help boost innovation in this area and bring more technologies into this growing market.”

£17m energy storage technology demonstration competition

This scheme offers organisations the opportunity to secure contracts to design and test energy storage technologies currently in the early stages of development. The competition will be run in two stages, with the first stage offering up to £40,000 for project designs.

Innovators who are judged to have submitted project designs which offer the best value for money and best fit with the competition’s aims will be invited to take part in a second stage where up to £12 million will be available to test designs.

Applications will be assessed against a range of criteria including the technical specification, value for money and potential for commercialisation.

£3m component research and feasibility studies contest

Under this scheme organisations can bid for grants of up to £1 million to improve components or materials used for energy storage systems or to develop feasibility studies to further explore how systems work and how they can be used in the UK electricity network.

The bids will be assessed against a range of criteria including the technical specification, value for money and potential for commercialisation.

Interested organisations are allowed to bid for funding under both competitions and are encouraged to attend the briefing event in London on 6 November 2012 before submitting an application.

There are two opportunities to apply. The first application window closes at noon on 13 December 2012 and the second closes at noon on 27 March 2013.

• For more information see www.decc.gov.uk