08 Sep Extremadura has received €1.5 million from the European Commission’s most prestigious scientific research program for the first time.
The European Research Council, the European Commission’s largest program for funding excellence in scientific research, grants the region €1.5 million for the first time.
For the first time, Extremadura has received €1.5 million in grants from the European Research Council, the European Commission’s most prestigious and widely funded program for excellence in scientific research.
This money will be invested in pioneering research on the legal framework for energy storage, and batteries in particular. The results will help shape a new energy law that regulates consumption reduction in the European Union.
The Regional Ministry of Education, Science, and Vocational Training thus achieves the milestone of Extremadura becoming part of this prestigious European program, which supports cutting-edge research. This has been made possible thanks to the research proposal submitted by the Hydrogen Department of the Iberian Center for Research in Energy Storage (CIIAE) and the European Projects Office of the Extremadura Science and Technology System, a public instrument managed by FUNDECYT-PCTEX and the University of Extremadura.
Thanks to funding from the Horizon Europe program, a scientific and technical team led by CIIAE will work on the “DELaw” project for the next five years.
The objective is to investigate the legal framework for energy storage in the European Union’s electricity system, enabling the development of a new energy law based on degrowth, that is, the reduction of energy and resource consumption in the European Union, fostering a more sustainable and equitable economic and social system from a legal perspective.
In this way, Extremadura assumes an essential role in the future of international regulation of energy storage and is leading an ambitious international research project. The research carried out in the region will be crucial in providing global solutions to the greatest environmental challenges in battery production. While battery production is necessary to increase renewable energy sources and combat climate change, it depends on critical raw materials such as nickel, cobalt, and lithium, the extraction of which accelerates biodiversity loss and wreaks havoc on local communities.
It is worth highlighting the work carried out by the European Projects Office to access this type of funding, which is competitive and among the most demanding on the European and international scene. This is a tool that the Regional Government of Extremadura makes available to the region’s research and business community to secure funding and position Extremaduran science in the region.