Over EUR 1 million to invest in R&D in the energy area – INESC TEC and EDP sign programme contract
21st May 2019
The programme contract, which aims to define a framework for the R&D collaboration between INESC TEC and the companies of the EDP Group in the domains of the energy systems, will be signed at 2:00 p.m. at INESC TEC’s headquarters, in the city of Porto. This partnership predicts that companies of EDP Group will be able to pay INESC TEC a maximum annual amount of EUR 250 000 for contracting advanced consultancy, research, development and training services.
“Over the next five years, EDP Group will have INESC TEC as a national R&D partner in order to promote research activities, scientific development, technology transfer and advanced training in emerging areas, yet essential for the electricity sector. The signed contract is therefore a clear investment in R&D, which is extremely important for Portugal.”, explains João Peças Lopes, Associate Director of INESC TEC and Full Professor at the Faculty of Engineering of the University of Porto.
"The collaboration that was now renewed between the EDP Group and INESC TEC is essential to align the corporate strategy with advances in scientific research and in technological development, in the fields of electrical, computing and computer science engineering. The signing of this programme contract is a clear sign of our determination to establish partnerships with Portuguese institutions of reference in the area of applied R&D and it is the acknowledgement of the collaborative work that has been carried out since 2014", says João Marques da Cruz, Member of EDP’s Board.
This programme contract includes other areas besides the energy systems, on which INESC TEC has knowledge and EDP is interested in such as: cybersecurity, software engineering, business analytics, data mining, mathematical sciences, architectures, communication technologies and solutions in the area of smart grids, inspection and monitoring of infrastructures with the use of autonomous vehicles, serious games, sensor development, among others.
Nowadays, EDP is a global company, being present in 16 countries in the areas of production, supply and distribution of power. The laboratory studies and activities, which the group is carrying out to support its clients facing the challenges such as performance and quality of equipment and systems, are centralised at EDP Labelec.
The collaboration between the two institutions has a history of more than 20 years. An example of this partnership was the InovGrid / INOVCity project, developed in the city of Évora, in which a smart meter platform of electrical energy was developed and tested, involving the installation of several thousands of smart meters, associated to a seminal project of smart grid. For this project, which was led by EDP and that had the participation of several Portuguese companies, it was INESC TEC that defined the reference models and technical specifications.
INESC TEC’s Board, the members of EDP’s Executive Administration, of EDP Distribuição and of EDP Labelec will be present in the signing of the programme contract.
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For more information:
Joana Coelho
Communication Service
INESC TEC
FEUP’s Campus
Rua Dr Roberto Frias
4200-465 Porto
Portugal
Tel.: +351 22 209 4297
Mob.: +351 924 444 321