An overview of Horizon Europe low carbon funding

Good morning everyone from sunny Comrie in Perthshire and thank you Jonny for that professional introduction – as always we always feel in very safe hands at webinars when Jonny is behind the scenes sorting things out and it's a delight to be here.

When you get five minutes to chat about the kind of greatest challenge and the biggest economic opportunity of our time it's always a bit of an awkward thing to do in five minutes, but I'm going to try and speak about climate change, this challenge and numbers. There's a couple of big numbers I'd like people to bear in mind – you might even want to jot them down because they are quite stark.

At the moment the planet emits 51 billion tons of carbon into the environment every year, and by 2050 – which isn't actually that far away, you know, it’s only actually 30 years or so away – that needs to be net zero. Now that is a staggering challenge for any society let alone one that has such complexity like we have with Covid and Brexit, not to mention economic collapse and biodiversity crisis.

There's so many challenges that are facing businesses today, it's exciting to speak about something that's hopeful like Horizon Funding, because this is that glint of sunshine in what seems to be stormy skies ahead. We really need now to think about focusing on attracting investment for solving some of these challenges, because if we do that, we will shift the emphasis from managing the problems of climate change to exploiting and exploring opportunities.

And that's where I think this particular audience today – you guys – are absolutely the last chance saloon. I think I'm going to quote John Kerry who said recently – who is the UN special envoy for climate change – and he said that Glasgow is the last chance saloon. And that's really important because what it does is it's sending signals to investors that ‘have a look at Glasgow, have a look at Scotland, see what's going on there, see if they've got ideas, see if they've got some thinking in there, see if they've got some solutions, and above all see if they're up for it’. Because when the world comes to Glasgow in 202 days (another number to remember), well they see a nation on its knees, because of the climate, they will see a nation that's lost and faced with this cliff edge scenario that keeps getting presented to us. But they see a nation on its toes. One that's looking at ideas, opportunities, solutions, collaborative working.

And again speaking about Horizon, you're going to hear from real experts like Helen and you're going to hear from practitioners like Oliver and Connell later on. These people are the real experts. I'm the phony that's just here trying to build up the atmosphere for ‘you know what I wonder if we've got a chance of success here’ and I would love you to indulge me for a minute because I'm not just speaking from the sense of a kind of a hopeful person I'm speaking from fact because Scotland has done this before. We have done ground-breaking transformative climate change work in the past.

In the decade 2008 to 2018 Scotland cut its emissions whilst growing its economy steadily faster than any country in the G20. Now that’s staggering and again you probably don't hear much about these stats because it seems glib at a time of huge anxiety to be speaking about hope but this is exactly what we need to be doing.

We need to now be bravely speaking about hope over fear. We now need to be speaking about shifting that mindset from climate change being the cliff edge to being a mountain because people like climbing mountains – there's an endeavour to climbing mountains. It makes you become an adventurer, you become bold and ambitious and then you seek support via Sherpas, you set up base camps. You steadily work your way towards success and that summit and we have to have that attitude because if we don't – and this is where my momentary negativity comes in – we are doomed. There is no one after us that's going to solve this problem. There's no one smarter than us or bolder than us that is going to be able to shift this narrative because – and here's another number – scientists collaboratively agree that if we haven't actually significantly tackled the climate emergency within the next eight years it's almost a pointless exercise because the tipping point will have happened.

So, in under five minutes time I've mentioned a couple of big scary numbers there but I want to speak about big exciting numbers. Mark Carney – he's another UN ambassador for climate change, he's the finance expert and the former governor of the bank of England so knows a thing or two about finance – speaks all the time about the economic opportunity from tackling climate change. There is a massive shift towards net zero across Europe. I would love, personally speaking, for Scotland to be leading in that agenda – I think we will, and I think we are in our energy sector. No one can touch the energy sector in Scotland because – thankfully – because of the likes of Horizon funding and this collaborative approach from Europe.

And in Scotland we've got a slightly bolder target than the rest of the UK and much of Europe because our target of 2045. I personally still think it's too late. I think we should go for 2035, 2040, because it's by being bold and ambitious that the investors will look to see who are the countries that have got that mojo, who's looking at solving these problems rather than simply managing them. So it's going to be great to hear especially about Orbital later on from Oliver because that's a business that has a story to tell and no spoiler alert but wait till you hear from Oliver. It will literally blow your socks off. And from Helen there's so much excitement coming from the opportunities that are right in front of us.

But my big message today is very, very simple. We need to stop thinking about climate change as someone else's problem. We need to stop thinking about who we have to blame for the issue and for the challenges we face and we need to switch that and start to be more collaborative and less combative. We need to think about who we can work with to solve these problems. How does Scotland stand up – it’s only 40 million tonnes out of that 51 billion, so it’s literally peanuts compared to the global picture.

And people often say to me ‘well why should Scotland be leading this climate change?’. Well I'll tell you why. Because we can, and because we should, and because we must. Because we gave the world, with parts of the UK, the first three industrial revolutions. And let's not pretend it wasn't all good because it was – there was certain parts of it that helped grow prosperity or the intellectual education system, our medical, health system and advances, so on and so forth. But there were some environmental challenges left behind.

So let's make sure the fourth industrial revolution that we bring to the world is one that's predicated on solving the problems the first three left behind. And let's not forget about Adam Smith, and we brought the world the current economic system; albeit ever so slightly flawed because it doesn't solve everybody's problems nor does it address global prosperity. So let's make sure when we come back out of COP26 in Glasgow – and this is my final line before passing back to Jonny – is that we know that fear paralyzes people and hope mobilizes them. So let's engender this momentum of hope. Let's think about the opportunity from solving the climate crisis rather than the arduous journey of incrementally trying to improve a system that wasn't perfect for everyone in the first place.

So the opportunity is right in front of us right now. Are we big and bold and brave enough to take it on and challenge it? Absolutely. Do we need massive amounts of funding to make that happen? Absolutely, definitely, and the committee on climate change said that in their report. They said Scotland’s doing pretty good but if you really want to go at that next level – and we do and we need your help to do it – you need to attract funding. And having funding available for us from this European collaboration is just fantastic. So we need to make sure that everyone on this call today gets on to those polls because your opinion matters. And let's make the most of this climate emergency and turn it into a climate opportunity.

So I think that's just maybe around about the five minutes mark Jonny so thank you for indulging me for my proposition, because I never do presentations. And over to you now for the poll you were speaking about.

Thanks, Martin, much appreciate it. And thanks for those words to kick off this session today.

Like Martin says, we're now going to get onto a quick poll before we hear from Helen Fairclough. So this is going to appear on your screen just now. As Martin said, your opinion really does matter so please do get involved, and it's coming onto your screens right now. So first question: Which type of calls would you be interested? So there’s a range of answers there: energy efficiency, carbon capture, utilisation and storage, geothermal, marine energy, or other. Now this isn't just one answer that you can pick. Please pick as many as applies to you, and you can tick all of them if you wish, but just let us know which ones are most interesting to you. And we'll leave that open just for maybe, 10, 15 seconds more. Then we'll close up, and we'll have a quick look to see what the overall opinion as on the call today.

Alrighty, just another 5 seconds. If you've not cast your vote already, please do so now, and then we'll hear from Helen very shortly. Alright, going to close that up. Let's just have a quick look. So just ignore the percentages just because you can select more than one answer, they're not going to total up to 100%. OK, seems like the energy efficiency calls are of most interest, followed by carbon, capture, utilisation and storage, and then some other calls, marine energy, and geothermal.

OK, that's great and that's really helpful, so thank you so much for getting involved with that, poll just there. We've got another poll that we’ll get to later on.

But without further ado, I'm going to pass you over to Helen Fairclough, who as the national contact point for Horizon 2020 Energy. So, Helen, over to you.

Thanks, Jonny. Good morning everyone, and thank you to SEGEC for the opportunity to present to you today. And, especially, thank you to Martin for setting the scene in such an inspirational way. I'm hoping that what I present today is an opportunity to find solutions to those challenges. I'm presenting about funding programme called Horizon Europe, and my role as National Contact Point for her energy and horizon is to provide support to UK organisations in this area.

So the national contact points are funded by the UK government, in the case of energy by the Department for Business, Energy, and Industrial Strategy. And our role is to provide support to UK organisations on European programmes, and, in my case, on the Energy programme. We're part of a UK and international network of national contact points, and so if you are joining from elsewhere around Europe or beyond that, there’s likely to be a national contact point in your country. It’s really about helping you to access the opportunity that is Horizon Europe funding.

So what is Horizon Europe? Well, it's a successor to a programme called Horizon 2020, which some of you may be familiar with. And the work programme is due to be published later this month or next month, not very long to wait until you've got the got the work programme in your hands. It will run from 2021 to 2027, so it's a seven-year programme.

The budget is €95 billion at present, but that's without the money that the associated countries will put in. So the UK has agreed in principle to associate to Horizon Europe, and other countries are looking to do that as well. So the budget is likely to go up to €120 billion over the course of that 7 year programme. So, considerable amounts of money, but as Martin said, the challenge is also significant. So the commission will focus on specific areas of activity to try to have a large impact in those areas.

As I said, the UK has announced that it will associate to Horizon Europe, and that's just in principle at the moment. The reason that it's in principle is because the programme hasn't yet been ratified at a European level. So once the programme has that has been ratified at the European level, it would be possible for the UK to associate.

This is highly likely to happen and will mean that UK organisations will be able to participate in the programme in the same way that member states can do, so on equivalent terms to those member states. Associated Status is a long-standing arrangement in framework programme, so it'll be a familiar arrangement to potential partners.

This is great news as the first calls for proposals are coming up soon. They're expected to be launched later this month, or early next month, and there's €688 million just in these first calls for proposals for energy topics.

I mentioned that the work programme hasn't been published yet, but there is a working document that's available. So, once you get the copy of these slides, you'll be able to click on the link and get that working document, if you haven't already got access to it.

Association will mean that UK organisations can co-ordinate or be a partner in proposals and projects. They will count towards the eligibility requirements. So in most cases, that's a minimum of three independent legal entities from different member states are associated countries. So the UK would be in that associated countries category. UK organisations will be able to receive funding in the same rates as Member States and receive that funding directly from the European Commission.

It will also be possible for the UK government to participate in the programme committees. And these are the committees that consulted on the funding priorities. So, it would be possible again for the UK to influence the content of the programmes. For more information on the UK’s eligibility, there is a commission prepared, Frequently Asked Questions document, and the link for that will be in the final version of the slides once it's circulated.

The structure for Horizon Europe is similar to Horizon 2020. So those of you who are familiar with the predecessor programme will see some continuity here. The key difference I wanted to flag is in relation to pillar two, where there’s clustering of the topics. So where previously energy had been standalone, now it's linked with climate and mobility in a single cluster. The idea here is to increase into linkages between these highly related areas of research and demonstration, and to remove silos from between them.

The overview of the programme is presented here, but I won't go into the details, because that's been covered in an earlier webinar, and as Jonny says, you're able to access the recordings for those. If there are other parts of the Horizon Europe structure, that you’re interested in, it will be possible for you to find out more information on those.

So moving on to look at cluster five in more detail, here you can see that it's made up of six destinations. So ‘destinations’ it's a new terminology for Horizon Europe. It's used because the aim is to indicate both the specific direction and the ultimate point of arrival of the projects supported through the programme. So whilst researchers have the opportunity to put forward the mechanisms for achieving those expected impacts and points of arrival, the commission is clear in what needs to be done. And as Martin said, there are many statistics out there as to what the challenge is, and the commission is trying to focus into specific areas of activity, to have high impact.

So, destination 3 and 4 are focused on energy. These run alongside the destinations for climate and mobility, and you can see on this slide, the information on these destinations at a high level, and the contact details for the relevant national contact points.

The first call openings have been delayed, so we don’t expect them to be launched in a couple of days time, but as soon as they are launch will provide you with more information.

Before we look at the call topics for the 2021 calls, I will cover eligibility and funding rates a high level. The majority of proposals for Horizon Europe require a minimum of three independent legal entities to be involved in a consortium to submit a proposal.

These independent legal entities need to be established in a different EU member state, or an associated country, and at least one of them must be in a member state. So as I said, the UK will count towards an associated country contribution to the eligibility criteria. Other countries, that are expected to associate are those that associated to Horizon 2020, including Norway, Turkey, Switzerland, and others, and it's possible that other countries beyond Europe will also associate to Horizon Europe. There's interest from Japan and Canada, for example, but that's still to be confirmed.

The funding rates at a very high level are indicated here, so there's lots of detail about how Horizon Europe projects are funded. But at a high level, I can tell you that for research and innovation actions, which are low technology readiness level activity, they can be funded up to 100% of eligible costs.

Innovation actions, which are higher technology readiness level activity, organisations can receive up to 70% funding, unless the organisation is constituted as a not for-profit organisation, in which case they can receive up to 100%. Co-ordination and support actions, which are activities to support the market uptake of the technologies, can be funded up to 100%. The type of action is specified by the Commission, so it's not up to the organisations themselves to define that. And I'll explain what type of action is relevant for each of the topics that I'll cover today.

So moving on to look at energy in Horizon Europe. The energy related activity is split into two destinations: destination three, on energy supply, and destination four, on energy use. So in energy supply, renewables activity, energy systems and grids, and carbon capture utilisation and storage are covered. Then in energy use, the activity is split into buildings and industry.

The information I'm presenting today is draft and is subject to change, both in terms of the content of the topics and the timings. So really the idea today is to give you a taster for what's coming up so that it might inspire you to get involved in the programme or to find out more. If it does do that, please do follow up on the links that you'll get once you've received the slides and the recording. I'm very happy to explore that detail with you at a later date.

So if we move on to look at the indicative timings and budgets for the 2021 calls, here you can see the deadlines, the number of topics that the commission is expecting to put funding towards, and the budgets. And you can see that a significant amount of money for renewable energy technologies, and energy systems and grids, in particular coming up. But there are also large chunks of money for the carbon capture and storage areas, the buildings and industrial decarbonisation areas. So, funding across the board for the topic areas that many of you identified of interest in the poll.

So, if we go in to look at a little more detail on the topics, in destination three, on the energy supply side, as I mentioned, you can see that the aims are to make the energy supply side cleaner, more secure, and competitive by boosting cost performance and reliability of a broad portfolio of energy solutions. So, the commission recognises that we're going to need a broad portfolio of solutions to address the climate challenge, and they are saying that currently, they wish to focus funding on wind, wave, tidal, bioenergy, PV, CSP, and biofuels. There's also funding for CHP, hydro, and geothermal. There's also money for the energy system integration, as I mentioned, and for accelerating the development of CCUS, both in electricity generation and also in industrial applications.

So, there's a lot of detail on this slide, and on the subsequent slides, but it's really just to give you a taster. Because of the number of topics that are open in renewables, I can't show them all here. So, what I've tried to do is to give you some examples of the range of the technology areas covered, and the technology readiness levels of the activity. I've also included the indicative project size (so that's the amount of money the Commission expects to contribute per project) and the budget for the area. So you could work out roughly how many projects will be funded. And then finally, the deadline is shown.

So, the first slide shows the activity foreseen at relatively low technology readiness levels in renewables. So the support available for next generation technologies, for instance to advance renewable fuels, the PV for geothermal and for concentrated solar power. There's also low TRL activity going to be supported in CHP and hydropower, and then it's anticipated that there will be demonstration funding so innovation actions, higher TRL activity, in offshore wind and ocean energy.

Also, on this slide, you can see that there's a non-technological project for seeing the market uptake activity on renewable energy systems. So here, the Commission is looking to smooth the way for the uptake of new technologies by supporting policy makers and increasing societal acceptance of these technologies.

Activities in the energy, systems and grids area of the call is largely focused on demonstration activities. So, you can see here three innovation actions; the first on the reliability and resilience of the grid, one on the use of power, electronics and the energy system, then on systems integration, considering different energy factors. As I say, these are examples, so there are more projects planned in energy systems. And there's also one on market uptake, so there's activity planned to have an upskilling and reskilling training programme for stakeholders, and those stakeholders include distribution system operators to network operators and local and regional authorities.

Finally, in destination three, we have CCUS and cross cutting activity. There are two topics in CCUS: one is a market uptake activity, a CSA, and the second, are large-scale demonstration projects – sorry, a research project on carbon capture, so a research and innovation action.

On cross cutting activity, there’s support for the European Geological Service and here the aim is to achieve harmonised data at a European level of mineral resources and resilience.

Now moving on to look at destination four, where the target is the energy demand side. This, as I said, is split into buildings and industry. Given the smaller number of topics on buildings, I am able to show all of the topics here but I won't cover them in any detail. This slide shows the majority of projects, our innovation actions, the demonstration projects that I mentioned, the higher technology readiness levels – so here moving through from TRL six to seven and eight by the end of the projects. The key thing to point out about buildings projects is it's not just about the energy and resource efficiency of the buildings; increasingly the commission is focusing on citizen benefits from energy generation and use activity, and how the citizen needs to be engaged in these projects in order for the take up of the technologies to be increased. So here, the commission is looking for projects to consider the qualitative and aesthetic and human dimension of the increase in the energy performance of buildings. There's also a co-ordination and support action plan to encourage knowledge sharing, and creation of innovation clusters, on buildings energy efficiency.

The final 2021 call slide shows the topics on industrial energy efficiency, where the focus is on waste heat valorisation, building on a considerable amount of work that was done at the end of Horizon 2020 in this area. Demonstration will be supported in two areas: on heat upgrade, that first topic on the list, and then on industrial waste heat use in the second topic.

Finally, you may have noticed that I haven't mentioned fuel cells and hydrogen in my slides. Clearly, this is a key activity area in terms of energy, research, and demonstration, but this is covered by a partnership in Horizon Europe, as has been done for the last over 10 years at a European level. The Clean Hydrogen Partnership will continue the work of the fuel cells and hydrogen joint undertaking, and the plans for the partnership are currently being developed. The first calls are expected in 2022. There is a strategic research and innovation agenda for the partnership, and so if this is an area that you're interested in, please contact me and I can provide you with more information.

Also, some of you may be familiar with the energy efficiency market uptake projects that were previously funded under the Intelligent Energy Europe programme, and then became part of Horizon 2020. These are now moved to the LIFE Programme. The LIFE Programme is not part of Horizon Europe, so the rules for UK participation are different, and it will only be possible for UK organisations to be a part of projects if third country participation is permitted. So, please do again contact me if this is an area you're interested in and I can provide more information.

So, if based on what you've heard today, you're interested to find out more, what should you do? Firstly, please do have a look at the working document that I've provided a link to in the slides, and you'll get the slides with the link, to read more about the core topics that I've presented today. I’ve given a very high level at a high speed, so please do read through the information and familiarise yourself with those topics. Then please do contact myself and the SEGEC team to discuss your proposal idea, and Conall will provide more information on what the SEGEC team could offer, and I'll conclude shortly with information about what the national contact points can offer.

We’d suggest you prepare a proposal summary that you're willing to share with us and with potential partners, so that you can start to build your consortium. Find out what's already been funded, and that can help with your partner searching activity. But also, you need to be working at the state-of-the-art, at a European level in order to be able to be successful in the Horizon Europe programme. So, we’d encourage you to familiarise yourself with what's already been funded by the Horizon 2020 Programme, but also what else is happening around Europe, so that you are truly considering the state-of-the-art at the European level.

You then need to be proactive at finding potential partners, the organisations that you really need to work with, in order to achieve the expected impacts that are set out in the work programme. And we'd encourage you to attend further webinars and information days, and we’ll be advertising more opportunities to find out information about the programmes, but also about brokerage et cetera.

So the national contact point services in energy are outlined here. All national contact point services are free and confidential, and in energy we provide a telephone and email helpline. We have a monthly newsletter, we have information on our website, including factsheets – although we haven't yet developed these for Horizon Europe, but there's lots of information there about Horizon 2020, much of which will be relevant for Horizon Europe. We run webinar sessions and we're happy to meet you to have proposal clinics (online at the moment but hopefully back in person relatively soon) and then we're also happy to review your draft proposals.

So, I'll leave you with our contact details, and just really encourage you to consider the opportunity that is Horizon Europe, and to consider whether collaborative European and collaborative R&D is for you. You'll hear more from Oliver shortly about the benefits, which is more than the money, it’s more than about the funding. So, we'd really encourage you to consider whether this is right for your organisation, as there is a significant opportunity here, with large amounts of money available, but it is a highly competitive process. So, do contact us to find out more. And we can inform you about the opportunities, and how to take advantage of them.

So, I'll hand back to Conall, thanks very much.

The contact details for EU Energy Focus are:

• 0845 6000 430
• mail@euenergyfocus.co.uk
• www.euenergyfocus.co.uk

Thank you very much, Helen, that was a fantastic overview of the Horizon Europe programme.

So, hi everyone, good morning. My name is Conall McGinley and I worked for the Scottish European Green Energy Centre, also known as SEGEC. So we are Scottish Government funded support service that helps businesses to apply for European funding for low carbon projects.

So, I'll just skip onto the next slide. There we go. So as Helen has said, the Horizon Europe Programme is a vast funding scheme. There’s a huge amount of money available, and it covers a range of research and innovation topics all the way from early-stage lab-based concept development through to demonstration projects in the ground that are real-world projects. So, if you're developing a low carbon innovation, European funding can be a really useful avenue.

We support bids that are collaborative (so bids that involve more than one organisation), and we support Scottish organisations to identify networks across Europe and build those networks. And I think it's important to note, as well, that Scotland has been historically successful in attracting European innovation funding. The predecessor programme to Horizon Europe was known as Horizon 2020, and we attracted €816.5 million over the seven years of that programme, and €115 million went to Scottish businesses. So it's important to note that this isn't just a programme for research organisations and universities, it’s also a programme which can really benefit your business. And in that bubble in the screen, you will see an example of some of the Scottish companies and universities that have benefited from Horizon in the past. And you'll see Orbital is there as well, and we'll hear from Oliver shortly.

So just to introduce my team, so SEGEC sits within Scottish Enterprise, and we essentially provide a central point for any business that wants support to apply for the Horizon Europe programme. And we work very closely with Helen Fairclough on that service. We support every area of Scotland, so we support the Highlands and Islands region as well as the South of Scotland. And we cover specifically the climate, mobility and energy aspect of the Horizon Europe work programme. If you have any queries really into other areas, we can also signpost you to support for that.

And we don't work alone, we work closely with a number of key agencies such as Helen's agency, EU Energy Focus, and also the Knowledge Transfer Network, and the Enterprise Europe Network.

So, just to run you through the types of support that my team can provide your business. Essentially, we start with providing support around how the application process works – if you haven't applied for European collaborative funding in the past, it can be a little bit daunting, so we can support you through that in terms of just providing a guide to the basics. We can help you to identify the right call for you, and identify the one that's most appropriate to your innovation plans.

Also, as Helen has said, in order to apply for this programme, you need to collaborate with other European nations, so we can help you to identify organisations in those nations. And then we can help you to develop a concept for your project and start to flesh out that concept as well. We can also provide access to our contacts within the European Union and the Commission to provide guidance on the process.

And lastly, when you're writing a bid, we can provide support with the writing element of that and also the reviewing element. And we have a small pot of funding that we can use to bring in external consultancy to support businesses with the final stages of the bid.

So, you'll see in the slide there the deadlines are fairly imminent as well, towards the end of the year. So my message to anyone on this call would be, it's really important that you start to work on this as soon as you can, and we can support you through that process in the coming months.

So, you'll see my colleague on the screen, so Doreen Reid works alongside me in the SEGEC team. And I would encourage you to join our newsletter, and I'll provide a link in the follow-up e-mail that comes out after this webinar. So I'll now pass to Jonny, who will host another poll.

Thanks, Conall. We're going to be hearing from Oliver shortly, but before that as Conall says, let's just get to that final poll. So it should be coming onto your screens just now. So just take a moment just to read the question: based on what you've heard so far, to what extent are you currently interested in Horizon Europe? So I'll just leave that there for a few seconds, let you cast your vote and then we will get on to the session with Oliver. So just a few more seconds and then we'll close things up. Nearly 70% of the audience today have voted on this one, so thank you very much.

Let's close that poll up no then. So just under three quarters, of the audience voted on that and here's a quick overview. So most saying, to a large extent, interested in Horizon Europe, based on what they've heard today. Some saying, to some extent, some not at all, and five don't know. And that's OK, it might not be applicable for everyone, but thank you for your honesty folks. And with that being said let us now go on to our final speaker for today, before we take some of your questions. So Oliver Wragg, Commercial Director at Orbital Marine, over to you.

Cheers, thanks very much guys and my thanks to the team at SEGEC and Scottish Enterprise for organising this and inviting me along to speak here today.

I've not prepared any slides for this presentation because what I wanted people to try and focus on when they're thinking about the Horizon Europe programme is I've got a four letter acronym for everyone to write down and remember these things when you're actually working through a proposal, or even considering starting looking at funding. Because it's a significant undertaking but there are significant benefits to it.

I myself have been working in the renewable energy sector for over 12 years now, and I've worked with programmes all the way from Framework Programme 7, all the way through Horizon Europe – sorry, Horizon 2020 – from some of the initial discussions with the sector and helping to shape the programmes and the call text, so that then they come out, and then actually applying for them and securing them and working to deliver some of the projects.

So you also have to think long term with some of this stuff and if what you're seeing in the call text you’re thinking ‘who’s writing this, why isn’t it sitting with what I’m looking for’, I’d encourage you to engage with the team at SEGEC. They can put you in contact with the people who are helping to draft some of these plans that feed into this, or, with other European trade bodies. And, again, I've been involved in that, personally, through my involvement on the board of Ocean Energy Europe, the last 11 years, as well. And so, it's important, as an industry sector, or a member, and you're looking at what you're doing, and you're thinking ‘these call texts, just, where are they coming from? They really don't relate to what I'm looking at and what my business is interested in, or what the state-of-the-art is within the sector?’. Then I encourage you to take that first step.

Admittedly that means that you're not going to see funding come around within the next six months, because this is a long programme, Horixon Europe it’s a beast, it’s a big system, a big process that gets worked through through, but there are significant benefits from it. For example, the project that my company at the moment, Oribtal Marine Power, is working on is a project called The Flow Tech Project. That’s a €22.1 million project, and it's been provided with €9.8 million of funding from the Horizon 2020 Programme.

Now, one of the things I will say, and as Helen mentioned, the funding that you can secure from Horizon Europe is substantial, it’s a huge benefit, because it’s non-diluted cash in your business that doesn't dilute equity, and hopefully it means you can go out and undertake projects quicker, with more aggressive objectives than you would otherwise. However, you do have to realize that comes with an administrative overhead and an administrative burden, that you have to make sure that you staff up for. You know, looking at your reporting, making sure that your procurement processes are done correctly. And if you, as a company or organisation, haven't done that before, I would encourage you to speak to some people who have. It's not incredibly complicated, but it is an undertaking and you have to be prepared for that.

Anyway, through to my brief acronym for everybody to consider when they're looking at this – so the first word in my acronym is Time, so a ‘T’. So why am I saying time? Because you need to make sure that you're allocating sufficient time to prepare these projects. The thing that I would suggest is if you're looking at the call now and you're considering applying for it, that's good because you've got the longest lead time that you possibly can. Well, I kind of say, it takes maybe one person – and bear in mind, if you’re going to be in it you’ve got to be in it to win it, and you need to be scoring, I think it's almost 13 to be eligible in some of these projects. Some of them are highly competitive, so you need to be scoring 14, 14.5, 15 out of 15, in order to win them.

So, you really have to make sure you're putting your best foot forward and in order to do that you need to allocate sufficient amounts of time. I would suggest that that’s anywhere from three to six person months with an organisation to do that. And making sure that you've got your first draft well ahead of the deadline. If you're trying to draft something two days before the deadline you're really against the clock there and that's not the way to get a winning proposal.

So the second bit in my acronym is Europe, so you’ve got an ‘E’ there. There’s two elements to this, so there’s the pan-European angle which Helen has touched on very well there. And then the second thing is European language. And when I say European language, I’m not talking about Esperanto or something like that, what I'm talking about, is the language that the Horizon 2020 programme, or Horizon Europe as it will be, the language that they're using in A; the call text, and B; in the actual application itself. So the words that they're putting in there have very specific subtext behind them, so it's important for you to try and understand these. And obviously you can work with the team that we've heard from today, or even contracting some external assistance – there are companies and consultancies that specialise specifically just in these grant application.

The other thing that can be incredibly helpful, is if you can identify the technology lead within the European Commission, who has helped to draft some of this text, and contacting that person, and asking them ‘my understanding of where you've written this in the objectives or the requirements, by my understanding is this what you’re looking for? That is incredibly valuable and time incredibly well spent at the beginning of your proposal crafting to make sure that you're doing that sense check.

Within that, it's important to make sure you're not trying to put a square peg in a round hole. You need to make sure that what you're proposing actually fits with the call text. There’s no point trying to completely bend what your business or company is doing just to try and get hold of some of this funding, because otherwise, ultimately, you will end up damaging your business, and what you're trying to do.

The third letter I've got in my acronym is Accessibility, so we’ve got an ‘A’ here. And when I say accessibility, I mean it's the language that you're using and the information that you're providing in the proposal. So, you have to remember that the person that's going to be reviewing this proposal will be reviewing a huge stack of them. These are long documents, you know, they’re 70 pages in length, with additional sections, and additional information in there, and what you need to be able to articulate your concept and how you're addressing the call text really simply. The way that I always like to do that is with diagrams and images to pull things out and really make it clear and easy for the reviewer to understand what you're doing. And with that, as well, I think it's also about, when you're making your application accessible, it's about consistency all the way through the document, from top to bottom; talking about the same piece of technology, the same context, the same concept, same outcome, all the way from top to bottom, so you're not losing people halfway through the reading of it.

And, again, to kind of help with that, the last letter I’ve got is Measurement and making things that are measurable in there. So your outputs, it's actually your outputs and your deliverables, it’s about putting numbers against these things and making sure that you can quantify them. And that's incredibly important to the proposal, and that really – I feel when I'm drafting proposals, or even when I spend some time reviewing a proposal – it makes it much, much easier for the reviewer. Really, what you want to be focusing on – so my last two about accessibility and measurements – is about making it easy for the reviewer. You just want them to be picking up the green pen, and putting tick, tick, tick all the way through it and not picking up the red pen and putting cross, cross, cross.

So if we look at those four words – time, Europe, accessibility and measurement – together we’ve got TEAM. And that's really the last thing that you need to make sure that you've got here is an excellent team behind you. Clearly, obviously, start engaging with the other speakers that we've heard from here, so with the guys at SEGEC and also with Helen and the team at the national contact point. They’re an excellent resource I've worked with several times before, and they provide huge benefit. But you also need to think about your team with your other partners that you're working with. My advice on that is don't bring people in you couldn't see yourself doing business with normally. You really rely on your consortium partners a lot in the bid drafting and also on delivery, so you don't want to be stuck with partners in the delivery phase that you're not going to be happy working with as you move forward.

And then it’s also your internal team – it sounds a bit like overkill, but my suggestion is that you really want about three people involved in the bid writing process. You want two people, kind of leading the actual bid drafting – and when I say two people, it’s because it's a mammoth task. You know, it's a lot. You've got a lot of information to pull together in terms of, not just the technical content, but also the administrative side, and the budget that you need to pull together. Having two people assist with that helps lighten the load, that means you can focus on the bits that you need to focus, so you don't get bid-writing fatigue at any point.

And then the third person, I'd suggest, is someone who's almost doing a red team review, which is when you've finished drafting a proposal, in the last two weeks or so, they're reviewing that, they're giving you critical feedback, on the actual application, to kind of help to round it off and make sure that it’s in its best possible state for submission.

So that's my quick overview of successful Horizon 2020 bidding, from someone who's kind of been there and done that. And I'm hoping that means that's going to be successful for delivery into Horizon Europe, as well.