ETIP Ocean is organizing a webinar that will investigate the use and value of PCP and stage-gate development processes in funding bodies operating in the ocean energy sector.
Pre-commercial procurement (PCP) is an increasingly popular methodology among public funding organizations, according to the European Technology and Innovation Platform for Ocean Energy (ETIP Ocean).
PCP involves issuing contracts for research and development services, rather than supporting innovation through grant schemes.
This allows public bodies to provide up to 100% funding whilst placing a greater level of duty on contractors than is possible through grant funding, ETIP Ocean said.
The other procedure for funding ocean energy sector to be investigated in the webinar is that of stage-gate development processes, which are used to ensure that innovative technologies develop fully and at a suitable rate.
Stage-gate development processes allow the continual assessment of competing technologies against established metrics and the selection of the best performing technologies for continued support and investment.
As such, often carried out in conjunction with PCP methodologies, they can be of great value to organizations looking to fund innovative technology development in the ocean energy sector, ETIP Ocean noted.
The speakers at the webinar will include Tim Hurst and David Langston from Wave Energy Scotland, and Patrik Möller, CEO of Swedish wave energy developer CorPower Ocean.
The webinar will be held on October 5, 2017, and requires registration .
ETIP Ocean is regarded as an advisory body to the European Commission. It is managed by Ocean Energy Europe and the University of Edinburgh, bringing together around 250 experts from 150 organizations covering the entire European ocean energy sector.