STIMULATING AND SUPPORTING NEW BUSINESS IN IRELAND

Supporting Internationalisation - A&M Renewables Ltd. joins COST Action 542

By James Donlon, May 9, 2007

A direct outcome from the ‘internationalisation’ business meetings held in Galway, Ireland in June 2006 as part of the INNOVINT project, has resulted in A&M Renewables Ltd. - manufacturers of renewable energy products including solar trackers and windmills, becoming the first Irish delegate to the Management Committee of COST Action 542.

COST Action 542 is the European Co-operation in the field of Scientific and Technical Research and it is focused on the development of high performance energy storage systems and their implementation in mobile and stationery applications in transportation and energy technologies

For A&M Renewables this participation means the company is collaborating with top researchers across Europe and Russia with regards to new supercapacitor technology and their many applications, including renewable energy sources, which has significant market potential both at home and abroad.

The following is a list of successful outcomes for A&M Renewables which have occurred as a result of COST participation:
· As a member of COST Action 542's Management Committee, the company plays an active role in the action's strategic activities
· A&M Renewables is playing a key role in the development of a major FP7 Energy project with COST colleagues in Germany, France, Poland, Romania, Spain and Russia, a project which would have a significant component in the BMW region, and in which EirGrid has already expressed an interest in participation
· Detect-IT-2 (another BIC project) will help refine the FP7 proposal
· Sustainable Energy Ireland has made additional suggestions regarding European funding sources (Intelligent Energy Europe)
· Another Irish SME in the BMW region (Donegal) is now involved in the supercapacitor project, and will be able to expand its business in backup generators by collaborating with A&M Renewables to incorporate cutting-edge supercapacitor technology
· A COST Short Term Scientific Mission will take place in the BMW region
· DCU will also join the COST Management Committee, which may lead to some major supercapacitor research and projects in the transportation area
· In January 2007 a workgroup meeting for the COST action was held in Dublin, successfully attracting participants from ESB Networks, ESBI, EirGrid, E-Connect, ArCOGEN, Grant Thornton (renewable energy division), Airtricity, DCU, DKIT, and others.
The Galway INNOVINT meetings sowed the seeds which led to these developments and as a result A&M Renewables is becoming more confident and eager to collaborate with other companies and institutions in Europe and abroad.

For more information on COST Action 542, log onto http://wttc.de/cost/.

For more information on the INNOVINT internationalisation project, part-funded by the European Union through the INTERREG 3C programme, log onto www.innovint.net.