First Project Periodic Report - EU-Solaris...FP7-INFRA-312833 First Project Periodic Report 4 of 92 requirements and their views on how EU-SOLARIS services should be improved. Analysis

Grant Agreement number: 312833

Project acronym: EU-SOLARIS

Project title: The European SOLAR Research Infrastructure for Concentrated Solar

Power

Funding Scheme: FP7-CP-CSA-Infra

Date of latest version of Annex I against which the assessment will be made: 19/12/2013

Periodic report: 1st x 2nd □ 3rd □ 4th □

Period covered: from 1st November 2012 to 30th April 2014

Name, title and organisation of the project's coordinator:

Dr. Manuel Jesús Blanco Muriel

Fundación Centro Tecnológico Avanzado de Energías Renovables de Andalucía (CTAER)

Tel: +34 954 17 43 67

E-mail: [email protected]

Project website address: www.eusolaris.eu

First Project Periodic Report Publishable version

FP7-INFRA-312833 First Project Periodic Report

Declaration by the project coordinator

I, as project coordinator of this project and in line with the obligations as stated in Article II.2.3 of the Grant Agreement declare that:

The attached periodic report represents an accurate description of the work carried out in this

project for this reporting period;

The project (tick as appropriate) 1:

has fully achieved its objectives and technical goals for the period;

X has achieved most of its objectives and technical goals for the period with relatively minor

deviations.

has failed to achieve critical objectives and/or is not at all on schedule.

The public website, if applicable

X is up to date

is not up to date

To my best knowledge, the financial statements which are being submitted as part of this report

are in line with the actual work carried out and are consistent with the report on the use of

resources and financial statement for the project (section 3) and if applicable with the certificate

on financial statement.

All beneficiaries, in particular non-profit public bodies, secondary and higher education

establishments, research organisations and SMEs, have declared to have verified their legal

status. Any changes have been reported under section 1.3 (Project Management) in accordance

with Article II.3.f of the Grant Agreement.

Name of the Coordinator: Manuel Jesús Blanco Muriel

Date: 30th June 2014

Signature of Coordinator:

For most of the projects, the signature of this declaration could be done directly via the IT reporting tool through an adapted IT mechanism and in that case, no signed paper form needs to be sent

1 If either of these boxes below is ticked, the report should reflect these and any remedial actions taken.


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Executive Summary

The First Project Periodic Report, elaborated by the EU-SOLARIS Project Office with contributions from

Work Package (WP) leaders to sections related to their corresponding WP, lists the main activities

carried out in each WP in the first eighteen (18) months (November 2012 to March 2014) of the

Preparatory Phase of the EU-SOLARIS project.

During this first reporting period, the major results have been:

WP1 – Governance and financial issues: Centro Tecnologico Avanzado de Energias

Renovables (CTAER)

- Design and definition of a governance structure for EU-SOLARIS, which requires an

exhaustive analysis of the different international Research Infrastructure (RI) governance

structures. In doing so, an external evaluation of possible structures have been evaluated in

conjunction with an internal analysis based on the visions and exchange of approaches within

the consortium.

- Analysis of the different economic funding schemes potentially suitable to EU-SOLARIS

allowing its financial sustainability beyond this Preparatory Phase is currently being

undertaken. A comprehensive search of public and private funding schemes at regional,

national, European and international levels is being elaborated.

- Elaboration of a preliminary business plan report and analyisis of the mechanisms to ensure

a fair return to all EU-SOLARIS members are in progress.

WP2 – Legal status and user access policies: Plataforma Solar de Almeria (PSA)

- Analysis of the most appropriate legal structure of EU-SOLARIS and the definition of its

internal law is under development, as well as the study and evaluation of other existing

national, European, and international research infrastructure legal vehicles have been

performed, closely linked to the work carried out in the framework of WP1.

- Investigation into the elaboration of protocols and procedures to be implemented during the

operational phase of EU-SOLARIS to manage Intellectual Property Rights, technology

transfer and exploitation of results.

- Analysis of possible collaboration agreements between the partners and interested third

parties are currently being studied.

- Preliminary investigation regarding existing procedures and schemes for the project selection

and peer-review of proposals to get access to RIs is being undertaken in order to define the

most suitable methodology for EU-SOLARIS.

- Survey of existing protocols to provide to external users in Research and Technological

Development (RTD) centres RIs is being carried.

- Investigation into the access rules and procedures to be implemented for users or entities

wanting to get access to EU-SOLARIS RIs.

- Preliminary work on the definition of terms and conditions of membership to EU-SOLARIS.


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WP3 – Capacity building and services: Weizmann Institute of Science (WEIZMANN)

- Existing RI capacities, technological and human resources in EU-SOLARIS partners’ facilities

have been catalogued. A listing of such facilities is under preparation and will be continuously

updated.

- Technical services currently offered by the EU-SOLARIS partners have been listed and

classified. This list is also subject to additional and updated information.

- Research identifying the state of the most significant scientific research facilities of non EU-

SOLARIS partners (EU & internationally) both operating and under development is currently

in progress. This list is under preparation and will be continuously updated.

- Elaboration of a recommendation plan for upgrading and development of research facilities,

complementarities and synergies is currently in progress.

- Definition and assessment of the needs for the new infrastructures to guarantee excellence is

under preparation.

- Preliminary analysis of EU-SOLARIS partners’ Strategic Research Agendas has started.

WP4 – Innovation and contacts with industry: European Solar Thermal Electricity

Association (ESTELA)

- Information exchange between research community and industry has been maintained and

new mechanisms are being developed in order to allow a common understanding on

research centre capabilities and industry needs and to reinforce contacts between both

sectors.

- Preliminary investigation into assessment of industry needs and demands is currently being

undertaken.

- Delphi panels and questionnaires targeted to industrial and researchers have been set up in

order to estimate the forthcoming technology development and assess the RIs needs for

industry in the coming years.

- Preliminary work for the elaboration of a methodology to spread widely the positive

environmental conditions and proactive elements to foster the creation of spin-offs during the

EU-SOLARIS operative phase is currently under preparation.

- EU-SOLARIS consortium’s previous experience of collaboration with the industry are

currently being assessed through interviews with all partners in order to establish the future

EU-SOLARIS participation procedures for the private sector and industry.

- Preliminary investigation into recommended ways to align EU-SOLARIS new RIs and

strategy with industrial needs has been carried out.

WP5 – Distributed facility activity and logistical work: Centre National de la Recherche

Scientifique (CNRS)

- Analysis of other ESFRI projects already implemented have started to identify best practices

for the implementation of EU-SOLARIS and identify possible synergies and collaboration with

other CST infrastructure projects (EU and worldwide).

- Identification of existing users of EU-SOLARIS partner facilities has been undertaken,

resulting in the completion of a report on users amongst EU-SOLARIS partners and the

creation of a database of existing users of CST technologies.

- Exploration of new potential users of CST technologies is currently being undertaken; A

questionnaire has been distributed at European and international levels to assess users’


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requirements and their views on how EU-SOLARIS services should be improved. Analysis of

the replies to the questionnaires is currenlty in progress.

WP6 – Dissemination and outreach: Agenzia Nazionale per le Nuove Tecnologie, l’Energia

e lo Sviluppo (ENEA)

- A Communication Plan for the Preparatory Phase of EU-SOLARIS has been devised.

- The EU-SOLARIS official website is online and regularly updated (www.eusolaris.eu).

- Dissemination material has been designed and distributed among the EU-SOLARIS partners

(logo, leaflets, PowerPoint presentations, roll-up, videos, pictures, etc,), being used in the

different dissemination actions carried out by the consortium.

- Dissemination activities, such as participation and representation at international and national

events, distribution of leaflets, etc., are constantly undertaken in order to raise public

awareness on the project’s objectives, goals and benefits.

- Investigation into existing training programs on CST technologies in Europe amongst EU-

SOLARIS partner centres has been conducted; A Training Offer Database is currently in

progress and a proposal of an EU-SOLARIS pre-doctoral course is under preparation.

WP7 – Technical design of STE research infrastructure and research activities: Deutsches

Zentrum Fuer Luft – Und Raumfahrt Ev (DLR)

- This WP is due to begin in month 20.

WP8 – Management: Centro Tecnologico Avanzado de Energias Renovables (CTAER)

- A central EU-SOLARIS Project Office has been established in Seville at CTAER’ premises,

responsible for all aspects of the financial, administrative and general management aspects

of the project.

- The governance structure for the Preparatory phase of EU-SOLARIS, consisting in the

Steering Committee (SC), the Project Management Committee (PMC) has been defined and

implemented.

- The Advisory Board for Technical and International Cooperation has been constituted.

- The groundwork for the establishment of the Advisory Board for Funding and Administration,

comprised of representatives from regional and national governments of the EU-SOLARIS

partners, has been undertaken.

- Quality assurance procedures for the Preparatory Phase have been defined and

implemented, An internal collaborative workspace system and project internal communication

procedures have been established and it is fully running being subject to continuous

improvement.

- Public relations and project external representation have been undertaken by the

Coordinator, assisted by the Project Office;

The most important milestones and deliverables scheduled for the first reporting period (M1-M18) of the

Preparatory Phase of the EU-SOLARIS project have been fully achieved, and although some minor

reports have not been fully finalised on time, all project partners concur in the assessment that the

delays so far incurred are not substantial and they are to be expected in a complex project like this, with

multiple work packages, tasks and deliverables and with a relatively large number of partners, some of

which have not worked together in the past. During these first 18 months of the project, the

http://www.eusolaris.eu/


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collaboration among all project partners has been relentlessly gaining momentum in an atmosphere of

collegiality and partnership, to the point that currently there is intensive collaboration among all project

partners on all WPs, and there is a lot of excitement about the project and the benefits EU-SOLARIS

will bring to the European CST technologies stakeholders and to the consolidation of the European

leadership in this very promising field in the world.


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Index

Executive Summary ..................................................................................................................................2

Publishable Summary ...............................................................................................................................8

1. Core of the report for the period: Project objectives, work progress and achievements .................. 12

1.1. Project objectives for the period .................................................................................................. 12

1.2. Work progress and achievements during the period ................................................................... 13

1.2.1. WP1. Governance and Financial Issues ................................................................................ 13

1.2.2. WP2. Legal Status and User Access Policies ........................................................................ 28

1.2.3. WP3. EU-SOLARIS Capacity Building and Services ............................................................. 37

1.2.4. WP4. Innovation and Contacts with Industry ......................................................................... 44

1.2.5. WP5. Distributed Facility Activity and Logistical Work ........................................................... 51

1.2.6. WP6. Dissemination and Outreach ........................................................................................ 56

1.2.7. WP7. Technical Design of STE Research Infrastructure and Research Activities ................ 72

1.3. Project Management .................................................................................................................... 73

1.3.1. Consortium management tasks and achievements ............................................................... 73

1.3.2. Problems and envisaged solutions ........................................................................................ 75

1.3.3. Changes in the consortium, if any; ......................................................................................... 76

1.3.4. Project meetings ..................................................................................................................... 76

1.3.5. Communication between beneficiaries .................................................................................. 80

1.3.6. Project planning and status .................................................................................................... 81

1.3.7. Impact of possible deviations from the planned milestones and deliverables, if any ............. 83

1.3.8. Any changes to the legal status of any of the beneficiaries ................................................... 83

1.3.9. Development of the project website ....................................................................................... 83

1.3.10. Project external representation ............................................................................................ 84

1.3.11. Co-operation with other projects and programmes .............................................................. 86

2. Deliverables and milestones tables ................................................................................................... 89

3. Explanation of the use of the resources and financial statements .................................................... 90


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List of Tables and Figures

Table 1: EU-SOLARIS website visits in the “top 10” countries with the highest number of visits ........... 60 Table 2: EU-SOLARIS Events/Conferences ........................................................................................... 67

Figure 1: Preliminary proposal of governance structure ......................................................................... 18 Figure 2: Classification of available services proposed in this report...................................................... 41 Figure 3: EU-SOLARIS website visits during April-May 2014 ................................................................. 59 Figure 4: EU-SOLARIS website homepage ............................................................................................ 61

Figure 5: EU-SOLARIS project leaflet ..................................................................................................... 63 Figure 6: EU-SOLARIS project industry-oriented leaflet ......................................................................... 64

Figure 7: Extract of the EU-SOLARIS PowerPoint presentation template .............................................. 65 Figure 8: EU-SOLARIS roll-up................................................................................................................. 66 Figure 9: EU-SOLARIS booth in the Event: ICRI 2014 ........................................................................... 68 Figure 10: EU-SOLARIS Smartsheet Events Calendar .......................................................................... 68

Figure 11: EU-SOLARIS Events webpage .............................................................................................. 69 Figure 12: 1st EU-SOLARIS Steering Committee Meeting, Seville. ........................................................ 77

Figure 13: 2nd EU-SOLARIS Steering Committee Meeting, Thessaloniki. .............................................. 77 Figure 14: 3rd EU-SOLARIS Steering Committee Meeting, Seville. ........................................................ 78 Figure 15: 4th EU-SOLARIS Steering Committee Meeting, Istanbul. ...................................................... 78

Figure 16: Screenshot of Smartsheet user-interface............................................................................... 80 Figure 17: Screenshot of Box internal collaborative tool ......................................................................... 81 Figure 18: Screenshot of Smartsheet user-interface with GANTT view.................................................. 82

Figure 19: YouTube video screen capture of the presentation of the European Commission Project

Officer for EU-SOLARIS, Piero De Bonis, at the SolarPACES Conference 2013 in Las Vegas, USA. .. 85


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Publishable Summary

EU-SOLARIS aims to create a new legal entity to explore and implement new and improved rules and

procedures for Research Infrastructures (RI) for Concentrating Solar Thermal (CST) and Solar

Chemistry technologies, in order to optimise RI development and Research and Technology

Development (RTD) coordination. It is expected to be the first of its kind, where industrial needs will

play a significant role and private funding will complement public funding.

It intends to:

Become a unique distributed RI for CST technologies.

Optimize RI development and RTD coordination by creating a new legal entity to explore and

implement new and improved rules and procedures for RI for CST technologies.

Ensure the alignment of the RI activities with the industry’s needs.

Maintain Europe at the forefront of CST technologies development.

EU-SOLARIS expects to provide the most complete, high quality scientific infrastructure portfolio at

international level and to facilitate researchers´ access to highly specialised research infrastructure

through a single access point. This will be accomplished by linking scientific communities, industry and

universities involved in the CST sector. Moreover, it is expected to increase the efficient use of the

economic and human resources required throughout the European research context. EU-SOLARIS will

provide efficient resource management to complement research and to avoid unnecessary

technological duplication and repetition.

EU-SOLARIS is currently under its Preparatory Phase. In this phase, the activity development is

distributed into eight Work Packages:

WP1 – Governance and financial issues.

WP2 – Legal status and user access policies.

WP3 – Capacity building and services.

WP4 – Innovation and contacts with industry.

WP5 – Distributed facility activity and logistical work.

WP6 – Dissemination and outreach.

WP7 – Technical design of STE research infrastructure and research activities.

WP8 – Management

The structure combines horizontal activities (management, legal consultancy, human resources,

communication) and vertical activities (knowledge breakdown, systems, project management,

measures). The project activities are further grouped according into four principal subjects, which are

the following:

EU-SOLARIS constitution and relationships strengthening.

EU-SOLARIS distributed facility and logistical activities.


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External activities to assess the EU-SOLARIS impact and outreach

Related technology activities

The following fifteen partners constitute the consortium that is executing the EU-SOLARIS Preparatory

Phase project:

CTAER: Advanced Technology Centre for Renewable Energies (Spain, Coordinator)

CIEMAT-PSA: Centro de Investigaciones Energéticas, Medioambientales y Tecnológicas-

Plataforma Solar de Almería (Spain)

MINECO: Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad (Spain)

CyI: The Cyprus Research and Educational Foundation – The Cyprus Institute (Cyprus)

ESTELA: European Solar Thermal Electricity Association

CNRS: National Center for Scientific Research (France)

DLR: German Aerospace Center (Germany)

APTL-CERTH: Centre for Research and Technology Hellas (Greece)

CRES: Centre for Renewable Energy Sources and Saving (Greece)

ENEA: Agenzia Nazionale per le Nuove Tecnologie, L’energia e lo Sviluppo Economico

Sostenibile (Italy)

WEIZMANN: Weizmann Institute of Science (Israel)

LNEG: Laboratório Nacional de Energia e Geologia, I.P. (Portugal)

U.EVORA: Universidade de Evora (Portugal)

GÜNAM: Middle East Technical University (Turkey)

SELCUK U: Selcuk Universitesi (Turkey)

These partners manage some of the best concentrated solar thermal research infrastructures in the

world and agglutinate an impressive amount of know-how and expertise in the field. They represent

nine countries, seven of them from the European Union.

Geographical distribution of EU-SOLARIS partners


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The figure above shows the geographical distribution of the EU-SOLARIS Preparatory Phase partners,

as well as an indication of the type of CST RIs they have.

During the first 18 months of the EU-SOLARIS Preparatory Phase a substantial amount of effort has

been devoted to:

Kick-starting the project and starting to address the main questions which are pertinent to the

setting up of EU-SOLARIS, such as:

What are the best governance and legal structure for EU-SOLARIS?

What should be the portfolio of services that EU-SOLARIS should provide to the industry and

the research community?

What is the best business model for EU-SOLARIS?

What is the role that it could and should play at the European an international level?

How the infrastructures of the EU-SOLARIS partners should be upgraded to adjust to the

future demands of the scientific community and the industry and to maintain relevance in the

mid and long term?

What new infrastructure should EU-SOLARIS built to support European excellence in

research in the CST field in the mid and long-term?

What mechanism should EU-SOLARIS develop to engage industry and to ensure that its

offerings are aligned with industry needs and priorities?

How can EU-SOLARIS target potential users and expand its users base beyond the current

users of the consortium partners?

Putting in place all the necessary project committees and structures.

Awarding the consultancy contract foreseen in the Description of Work.

Setting up all necessary collaboration tools and procedures, and providing support to the

consortium members regarding their appropriate use.

Analysing in detail the work programme, to structure it at a further level of detail and to identify

areas where the coordination of Work Packages was especially relevant in order to avoid

duplication of efforts and to guarantee the timely and appropriate execution of the EU-SOLARIS

preparatory phase project.

Achieving convergence among EU-SOLARIS consortium partners on the level of understanding

of the purpose and goals of the project, since not all of them had the same background and

trajectory in the CST field, and not all of them had the same level of sophistication in the design,

implementation, management and operation of large CST research infrastructure or even the

same level of infrastructures regarding scope, quality, and size.

Refining the concept of EU-SOLARIS as a European large scale distributed research

infrastructure and advancing in a common vision for EU-SOLARIS.

Drafting and agreeing on the EU-SOLARIS Preparatory Phase Communication plan.

Launching the EU-SOLARIS official website and regularly updating its content

(www.eusolaris.eu).

Expanding the project outreach and keeping all current and potential stakeholders and users

informed of the progress of the project and of how the EU-SOLARIS vision is being pursued.

Increasing the engagement with other FP7 and Horizon 2020 projects (e.g. CoPoRi, SFERA II,

and STAGE-STE).

In general, the most important milestones and deliverables scheduled for the first reporting period (M1-



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M18) of the Preparatory Phase of the EU-SOLARIS project have been fully achieved, and although

some minor reports have not been fully finalised on time, all project partners concur in the assessment

that the delays so far incurred are not substantial and they are to be expected in a complex project like

this, with multiple work packages, tasks and deliverables and with a relatively large number of partners,

some of which have not worked together in the past. During these first 18 months of the project, the

collaboration among all project partners has been relentlessly gaining momentum in an atmosphere of

collegiality and partnership, to the point that currently there is intensive collaboration among all project

partners on all WPs, and there is a lot of excitement about the project and the benefits EU-SOLARIS

will bring to the European CST technologies stakeholders and to the consolidation of the European

leadership in this very promising field in the world.


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1. Core of the report for the period:

Project objectives, work progress

and achievements

1.1. Project objectives for the period

EU-SOLARIS aims to achieve a real coordination of Research and Technological Development (RTD)

capabilities and efforts in Concentrating Solar Thermal (CST) technologies by the European Research

Centres, along with those from the neighbouring countries, in order to foster the technological

development of the Industry.

The EU-SOLARIS project activities are grouped according to four principal issues, all of them

coordinated and monitored by the management WP (WP8). The issues and the involved WPs are the

following:

1. EU-SOLARIS constitution and relationships strengthening: Governance & Financial Issues

(WP1), Legal status & User Access Policies (WP2), Innovation & Contacts with Industry (WP4).

2. EU-SOLARIS distributed facility and logistical activities: Distributed Facility Activity & Logistical

Work (WP5), Technical Design of STE Research Infrastructures (RI) and Research Activities

(WP7).

3. External activities to assess the EU-SOLARIS impact and outreach: Dissemination & Outreach

(WP6).

4. Related technology activities: Capacity Building & Services (WP3), Technical design of STE

Research Infrastructures and Research Activities (WP7).

For this reporting period, the EU-SOLARIS project aimed to explore and analyse both rules and

procedures to structure the multisite facility infrastructure, as the collaboration between the Research

Centres and Industry, and finally analyse and evaluated the appropriate governance and legal status for

the new entity.

In order to answer to their four principal issues and the most relevant needs above described, the

actions have focused on:

Studying and evaluating of an effective structure of governance and legal vehicles for the EU-

SOLARIS new organisation. This included statutes, management board, and decision making

procedures.


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Survey of rules and procedures existing in RTD centres regarding Intellectual Property Rights

(IPR) management and technology transfer (TT) policy.

Studying and evaluating of funding sources that may can applied to EU-SOLARIS, to ensure

sustainable financial resources for EU-SOLARIS.

Assessment of industrial need and demands in order to facilitate the collaboration to know the

prospective of the International technological development of CST technologies and creating of

spin off.

Assessment of user need and demands facilitating researcher’s access to highly specialised

research infrastructure through a single access point.

Survey of protocols and access rules existing in RTD centres to provide support to user.

Identify best practices to coordinate the efforts of existing infrastructures around CST

technologies in order to achieve a pan-European distributed research facility using innovative

methodologies.

1.2. Work progress and achievements during

the period

This section summarizes the work progress of Work Packages (WPs) 1-7, providing an overview of

completed activities and major achievements during the first 18 months of the project, within the context

of the broader objectives of each corresponding WP. Section 1.3 of this First Project Periodic Report

focuses solely on WP8 – Project Management.

1.2.1. WP1. Governance and Financial Issues

1.2.1.1. Objectives

The objectives of WP1 (Governance and Financial Issues) are to design and implement the governance

structure for EU-SOLARIS and analyse all the economic aspects to achieve financial sustainability in

the implementation phase of EU-SOLARIS.

To this end, different models of Research Infrastructure (RI) governance structures are being studied

and evaluated. A business plan is in the process of being developed, possible future financial schemes

will be proposed, as well as mechanisms to ensure fair return to all EU-SOLARIS partners be devised.

WP1 activities also focus on fomenting and nurturing relationships with funding bodies in order to

establish funding frameworks. It is in the scope of WP1 to analyse and propose new methodologies to


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improve interaction and communication between research partners and funding structures in order to

canvass a preliminary understanding of perceived needs, and therefore to foster research on

Concentrating Solar Thermal (CST).

1.2.1.2. Progress towards objectives

WP1 (Governance and Financial Issues), as well as WP2 (Legal Status and User Access Policies),

counts on the support of an external consulting firm subcontracted to devise financial, legal, and

governance frameworks for a future EU-SOLARIS. After a public call for tender, the contract was finally

awarded in July 2013 to the international legal firm “J&A Garrigues, S.L.P.” (Garrigues), in collaboration

with the Andalusian Institute of Technology (IAT). The signing of the contract constituted project

milestone MS6 (Consulting firm contract). Garrigues and IAT have since then been given access to the

project’s internal (online) collaborative workspace system, and are engaged through periodic

coordination meetings with CTAER, PSA, and the Spanish Ministry for Economy and Competitiveness

(MINECO).

In order to gather relevant information useful to WP1, and also WP2, the consultants prepared at the

end of 2013 a document entitled “First Information and Documentation Questionnaire” (hereinafter

referred to as “Check-list” 2), which was sent to all the partners of the project.

Bearing in mind the various duties assigned to the consultants Tasks 1.1 (Governance) 1.3

(Assessment of possible funding sources), 1.4 (Financial agreement models), 1.5 (Business plan and

financial plans), 1.6. (Fair return), 2.1 (Legal status), 2.2 (Legal status for the setting up, constitution

and operation of the new infrastructure), 2.3 (Draft agreements), 2.7 (Membership and incorporation of

new members) and 2.8 (IPR management, results protection and knowledge transfer -industry research

centres and user community), this Check-list was not merely limited to asking partners questions

relating to governance structure. The purpose of the Check-list was to gather relevant information and

documentation about each EU-SOLARIS partner institutions’, with regard to their legal form and

applicable legislation and/or internal regulations, their respective governance systems and their

environment (from very different perspectives), among other useful information and documentation, in

order to acquire in-depth knowledge of the EU-SOLARIS partners and their role within EU-SOLARIS.

This Check-list was divided into 4 sections:

1. General Information

2. Project Information- where each member’s view of the project is asked

3. Legal Information

4. Technical Information- where an analysis of sources of financing where asked to all partners

Consequently, this Check-list will be useful to perform many tasks, in particular for this reporting period,

Task 1.1 (Governance), Task 1.5 (Business Plan and Financial Plans) and Task 2.1 (Legal Status).

At a later point, each of the sections describing these tasks will list the questions that were included in

the Check-list with a view to achieve the relevant objectives.

2 Available upon request to the EU-SOLARIS Project Office ([email protected]).

mailto:[email protected]


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Task 1.1: Governance. (Leader: CTAER, Participants: All partners)

Task 1.1 aims at defining the governance structure for EU-SOLARIS. According to the contents of the

WP description, Garrigues, as legal adviser, is helping the EU-SOLARIS consortium to define the

governance structure for EU-SOLARIS.

The consulting firm as a legal firm with extensive experience in the area of corporate governance in

businesses and/or institutions, both public and private, defined the main objective to be achieved in this

Task 1.1 as that of identifying a governance structure for EU-SOLARIS that:

would be more efficient than the structures currently used by the other existing research

infrastructure bodies;

would allow EU-SOLARIS to interact speedily and efficiently with the industrial sector and

financing institutions, both public and private; and

would ensure that partners had an adequate presence and involvement in its administrative

bodies to ensure that their interests were sufficiently guaranteed, though without diminishing the

efficiency and agility of EU-SOLARIS.

Despite being configured as Task 1.1 in the project, the work relating to the governance structure for

EU-SOLARIS is closely related to the work of Task 2.1 (Legal status), the purpose of which is to

analyse and determine the legal structure that EU-SOLARIS is to adopt. In juridical terms, the legal

form adopted by an organisation and its governance structure are closely related. The relationship

between these two Tasks 1.1 and 2.1 is so important that, from a legal point of view, one could say that

they are inter-dependent. In some cases, it will be Task 1.1 that is dependent upon Task 2.1, since it is

clear that, in the event that the legal form eventually chosen under Task 2.1 makes it necessary to

endow the project with a specific form of governance, or restricts the freedom of the partners to be self-

governing in this regard, the analysis completed in this Task 1.1 will become an integral part of Task

2.1. However, the opposite may also be the case; the partners’ preference for establishing a specific

governance structure for EU-SOLARIS may make it necessary to adopt a legal form that is compatible

with that structure, rather than the form that is found to be most adequate following the work carried out

in Task 2.1.

This circumstance has made it necessary to perform Task 1.1 and Task 2.1 as if they were a single task

(even though the project differentiates between them as different tasks or deliverables). Despite

following different timetables within the project, the consulting firm has therefore been carrying out its

work on both tasks in parallel and in a coordinated way, as described in this section.

As already indicated, two different areas have been clearly distinguished in the examination and

analysis being carried out:

Identifying and evaluating the governance structures adopted by existing ESFRI (European

Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructure) projects.

Identifying the partners’ wishes in this area.

A joint analysis of these two areas will lead to identification of the most appropriate governance


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structure for EU-SOLARIS, since it will take advantage of experience accumulated in previous projects

and satisfy the partners’ requirements in this area.

Given that these are two distinct areas, the work being carried out is also different in each case.

On the one hand, in order to identify and evaluate the governance structures adopted by existing

ESFRI projects, we have used both national and international information sources from which practical

information can be obtained regarding the systems used in other initiatives. We have also paid attention

to the recommendations made by the European Union’s various organisations and working groups with

regard to research infrastructure, giving particular priority and preference to projects with characteristics

that are similar to those of EU-SOLARIS. This has also meant analysing the private and public

regulations that affect each of the partners, in order to ascertain the potential legal limitations on their

participation in this kind of supranational project.

The information gathered through the Check-list was used on the other hand. In order to achieve the

objectives set out in this Task 1.1, the Check-list contained three (3) questions which, though basic

(given the still embryonic status of the project), were sufficient to ascertain, from each partner’s point of

view, what role EU-SOLARIS should perform in the future and, as a consequence, the degree of

complexity that its governance structure should involve. Thus, by applying the consulting firm’s

experience and legal know-how to the responses given by each partner and their preferences and

opinions regarding the project, it will be able to situate these responses in a legal context, thus

identifying the governance structure that will be most appropriate for EU-SOLARIS.

The questions asked to the partners were the following:

What is each Member’s view of the project? What do you expect from EU-SOLARIS?

Specifically, what role do you think EU-SOLARIS should play in the future?

What should be its main goals?

In addition, being aware of the crucial importance of the future of the project beyond the current

Preparatory Phase, a brainstorming session on the vision of the future EU-SOLARIS was organised on

the 20th of February 2014, gathering all Steering Committee members. The conclusions from this

session constitute another source of information used in the development of the tasks of WP1. The

objective of this session was to invite all partners to share their visions and to exchange approaches

towards the future the project. An internal document has been circulated in the consortium and although

it is still work in progress, some preliminary conclusions are described below:

EU-SOLARIS should contribute to strengthen the collaboration among solar research centres

in a limited and difficult market, and to create new markets and commercial opportunities.

EU-SOLARIS should first and foremost provide RI-related services to its members, to the

European and international research community at large, the industry, the policymakers and

other stakeholders.

EU-SOLARIS should lead and coordinate the identification of present and future needs of its

users and translate those needs, through a systematic and well-structured process, into

definition and development of new services, identification of new requirements for the

enhancement of existing infrastructure, and creation of new infrastructures.

EU-SOLARIS should coordinate the optimization of all common RI-related operations among


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its members, and identify potential synergies and exploit best practises.

EU-SOLARIS should support the search for funding and creation of business opportunities in

all matters related to the improvement of the scientific research infrastructures in

concentrating solar thermal and solar chemistry technologies.

EU-SOLARIS should provide advice and support on issues related to the social, economic,

and environmental impacts of the RIs and their operation, trying to maximize positive impacts

and minimize negative ones.

Once constituted, EU-SOLARIS should start its operation managing the idle access capacity

of the RI of its partners. This initial operational strategy should evolve towards a more

comprehensive and integrated one, in which EU-SOLARIS members should put in common a

reasonable share of their external access capacity to be managed by EU-Solaris. In relation

to this reasonable share of access between the members and offered to external users, EU-

Solaris should take the coordination of the marketing of the RI-related services provided by

the different RIs in order to promote and increase the access. .

EU-SOLARIS should lead and coordinate the dissemination and outreach activities, and

generalization of “best practices” among its members.

EU-SOLARIS should promote the improvement of the public, scientific and commercial

image of its members, and contribute to promote the image of the European concentrating

solar thermal research community and the European industry. EU-Solaris should also help to

develop and implement the regional smart specialization strategies of each partner in order to

boost regional innovation and promote the use of regional public investment for the RIs.

EU-SOLARIS should contribute to the training of researchers and capacity building in the

field of concentrating solar thermal and solar chemistry technologies.

EU-SOLARIS should manage the expectations of its stakeholders and users

EU-SOLARIS should coordinate the implementation of quality standards, which guarantee

both the flexibility required to carry out research projects and the rigor in measurement

operations and the traceability required in trials for industry with commercial purposes.

EU-SOLARIS should coordinate strategic advice to its members on all issues relating to

scientific RIs in concentrating solar thermal and solar chemistry technologies.

EU-SOLARIS should coordinate the activities related to the access and use of e

Infrastructures, ensuring the implementation of common standards and procedures to

facilitate open access to data, virtual access to experimental set ups and laboratories to

facilitate the remote conduction of experiments, etc.

Notwithstanding the conclusions that may be reached as a result of an analysis of all of the above, and

the application of certain general structural principles which must in all cases be included in the

governance structure of an institution or initiative such as EU-SOLARIS, together with the precedents

identified in other research infrastructure projects, we can already say that it will be necessary for the

proposals put forward to the partners to include structures that establish various levels of governance

and responsibility: On the one hand, all the partners should have a balanced presence on a body that

brings them all together and through which they adopt all the decisions that, as partners, they believe to

be most relevant and important to the future development of the project. On the other hand, to ensure

that the decisions regarding the ordinary day-to-day management and coordination of the project can

be taken with the necessary facility and speed, the project must have an executive body (e.g. a General


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Manager, a Board of Directors or an Executive Committee). This executive body would not have to

include a presence from each of the partners but merely include those people that the partners

themselves deemed most appropriate (given their level, experience and professional know-how) to lead

EU-SOLARIS. This body would, for example, be responsible for coordinating the actions of the various

project infrastructure units, organising their media and resources, managing the research projects they

are pursuing, and directing their actions in all cases in order to achieve the greatest possible level of

efficiency. Finally, it is also considered reasonable that a project of this size should have a series of

committees or consultative or advisory bodies in specific areas (such as technical issues or financial or

strategic matters, etc.).

Figure 1 sets out a preliminary proposal for one of the governance structures being considered:

Figure 1: Preliminary proposal of governance structure

In line with the project schedule, the consulting firm’s conclusions regarding the most efficient

governance structure for EU-SOLARIS will be contained, along with the analysis supporting its

conclusions, and its recommendations, in Deliverable D.1.2, “Governance structure motivational report”.

Task 1.2 Innovative methodologies to foster STE research. (Leader: CyI,

Participants: CTAER, PSA, CNRS, DLR, APTL, ENEA, WEIZMANN,

LNEG, U.EVORA, GUNAM)

This task aims to scan the funding landscape of the partners and identify the behaviour of research

institutions towards funding calls. It plans to analyse the current driving forces of research initiatives

among the institutions, and it is particularly geared towards exploring the distinction between the


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reactive attitude of institutions towards funding opportunities and their true interests in and capabilities

for investigation. Ultimately, it aims to propose new methodologies to generate more proactive attitudes

from the researchers towards either the funding bodies or other institutions for possible synergies and

the submission of joint proposals. This task was scheduled to start in May 2014, although preparatory

work already started in April 2014 due to an upcoming workshop in June 2014 on financing aspects.

The first action within this task is the circulation of a questionnaire that will help to map the local funding

structures of all EU-SOLARIS partners. This questionnaire will take plenty of its inspiration from the

consulting firm’s Check-list already distributed among the consortium members that –even though of a

wider scope– dedicates a sizeable section to mapping funding structures for each member. This

questionnaire will be distributed by the end of June.

Subsequent subtasks will be engaged in mapping and analysing the methodologies of funding

structures, and assessing the effectiveness. This will be the bedrock for proposing new innovative

methodologies that will be presented in a report (together with the questionnaire results) in the

beginning of 2016.

Task 1.3: Assessment of possible funding sources. (Leader: MINECO,

Participants: CTAER, PSA, CyI, CNRS, DLR, CRES, ENEA,

WEIZMANN, LNEG, GUNAM, SELCUK U)

This task aims at analysing all funding sources that may apply to the development of the EU-SOLARIS

infrastructure.

An extensive research of funding schemes is currently being performed: private and public funding, at

regional, national, European and international levels.

The analysis must cover the most complete range of activities, such as research, infrastructure,

services, communication or training, as the services of EU-SOLARIS that are still to be defined inside

the scope of the project. In addition, other aspects are still under way at this stage of the project, like

the legal status for EU-SOLARIS. So, the research must be made independently of the legal status that

EU-SOLARIS adopts, and regardless of all the other features that are still under study.

The general approach to the methodology followed is described below:

Funding entities identification

Financing instruments within entities

Selection of parameters to classify funding sources, such as: topic for the funding, deadline, funding conditions, beneficiaries requirements, compatibilities

As a result, a comprehensive list, including all the above mentioned points, will be distributed and

revised by all the partners.

To complement this analysis, the Check-list distributed to partners served to collect preliminary

information and data about current financing sources in their respective countries.

To this respect, a first draft has been approached so far, on the basis of the information collected from


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partners and a preliminary research on the available sources of funding. However it has to be

emphasised this document entails a constant updating and reshaping bearing in mind the EU-SOLARIS

partnership is currently working on their constitution process. Any change and/or redirection in this

process will require an appropriate readjustment on the document.

In addition to above mentioned, it is worth mentioning the organisation of a Workshop on Financing

Sources in Madrid scheduled for 24th of June 2014.

Although this action is not specifically stated in the DoW, it has been considered appropriate in order to

gather “on-the-ground” information about different funding sources schemes that may be applied to EU-

SOLARIS activities, both public (at internationally, national and regional level). The workshop will

provide useful information towards the Task 1.3 (Assessment of possible funding sources) within WP1.

The workshop is seen as a very important event to present the project as well as collecting valuable

information and experiences related to public or private financing sources schemes that could be

suitable for the development of the EU-SOLARIS infrastructure in the future. The aim, therefore, is to

achieve the following objectives:

Give a formal presentation of the EU-SOLARIS project.

Present the potential finance sources for EU-SOLARIS.

Discuss the possibilities they offer for the project.

The workshop is planned to have the following speakers:

Representatives of the partners’ Member States of the EU-SOLARIS appointed to be members

of the Advisory Board for Funding and Administration;

Representatives from different regions reprensentated within the EU-SOLARIS consortium;

Main industrial players

The main recipients of the information will be the EU-SOLARIS Steering Committee members as well

as the EU-SOLARIS Project Office.

In order to organise this event, a strong collaboration with MINECO, the Spanish Ministry of Economy

and Competitiveness, has been set up in order to carry out the following actions:

Official communications addressed to the potential members of the Advisory Board for Funding

and Administration in line with the appointment proposed by partners.

Several preparatory meetings on the workshop organisation.

Preparation of a draft version of the workshop agenda including: potential speakers, topics to be

discussed, organisational and logistics arrangements.

The workshop is therefore planned to be a cornerstone in the formal constitution of the Advisory Board

for Funding and Administration.

The Advisory Board would be comprised of representatives from regional and national governments,

and funding bodies (public and private), that might share with the project valuable knowledge and

experiences on possible funding sources and schemes suitable for the future of EU-SOLARIS


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Task 1.4: Financial agreements models. (Leader: CTAER, Participants:

MINECO, CNRS, ENEA, GUNAM)

According to the WP description, this Task 1.4 aims at assessing and preparing the financial

agreements needed by EU-SOLARIS.

The execution of this Task has not started yet, as it depends on the result of others previous tasks,

especially Task 1.3 (Assessment of possible funding sources), Task 1.5 (Business plan and financial

plans) and Task 2.1 (Legal status).

Notwithstanding the foregoing, the analyses made up to this point (particularly as regards potential

funding sources, Task 1.3) indicate a need to distinguish between two types of financial agreement

models: financing that is formalised with public institutions and financing that originates from private

sources. As regards the former, it will be an a priori consideration that one must take note of the formal

and material conditions required under the financing programme in question. In agreements formalised

with private sources, there will be greater room for negotiation and, as a consequence, having a

financial agreement model will take on greater importance. As previously indicated, the analyses

completed to date have shown that, in these agreements it will be important to include detailed

regulation of basic clauses such as the following: rules governing guarantees (financial and technical);

repayment terms; early repayment (voluntary or compulsory); specific use of funds; rules for the

justification of investments; and rules governing breaches and their consequences.

Task 1.5: Business plan and financial plans. (Leader: CTAER, Participants:

All partners)

This task aims at developing the business plan for EU-SOLARIS.

The business plan must orderly evaluate in a predictable way, the risks and opportunities that EU-

SOLARIS must face as a new entity and study, among others, the following issues:

Market demand: what demand factors are there for an activity like EU-SOLARIS?

Competition: is there a strong competition between EU-SOLARIS and its rivals? Will it be

intensified?

Strategy: is EU-SOLARIS well positioned? How can EU-SOLARIS improve its position?

Resources: What resources are going to be assigned for the strategy launch?

Economic resources and previsions: Do you think previsions reflect realistically both external

market trends and internal competitively?

Risks: What are the main risks and opportunities according to previsions? What is the probability

and impact of each? Are the previsions sensitive to adverse circumstances?

A business plan mid-term prospective report, which corresponds to Deliverable D1.1 (Business plan


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mid-term prospective report), is currently in progress. It will be used as the basis for evaluation by the

Steering Committee (SC) on the meeting scheduled in November 2014 (M25).

It should be noted that the business plan mid-term prospective report, cannot be seen as the definitive

Business Plan, since many decisions have to be taken during the Preparatory Phase, such as: How

many countries will be in a position to join the initial legal entity?; Who will be the contributing funders?

For what period of time?, etc.

The contents of the business plan mid-term prospective report are summarised as follows:

1. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

The executive summary is section 1 of the plan and it is an amplified version of the conclusions. In this

section, it is considered all the parts of the preliminary business plan:

options for possible legal forms of the entity,

potential user needs,

analysis of the industry and trends,

portfolio of EU-SOLARIS services and partners,

target markets,

marketing strategy,

funding, financing and first evaluation of EU-SOLARIS financial viability.

The reasoning will be established as follows:

Activity definition: conclusions obtained from the analysis of:

o Sections 4.1.1 (Questionnaire for the initial Strategic Analysis of EU-SOLARIS - PESTEL Analysis) and 4.1.2. (Questionnaire for the initial Economic-Financial Analysis of EU-SOLARIS) of the consulting firm Check-list (FIRST INFORMATION AND DOCUMENTATION CHECK-LIST).

o WP3 (EU-SOLARIS Capacity Building & Services):

Task 3.1. (Assessment and monitoring of existing and all available services and existing infrastructures in each participating centre - Future Services) and Task 3.2 (Human resources). Within the framework of these tasks, milestone MS15 (Status report on existing capacities, technological and human resources), is being elaborated. The content and main conclusions drafted from this report will be strongly aligned with the preliminary business plan.

Task 3.6 (To define all the possible future services due to the creation of new infrastructures – with the current facilities and after new developments and upgrades). Within the framework of this task, MS16 (Report containing portfolio of existing available technical services of partner centres) and MS17 (Report containing the portfolio of available technical services as EU-SOLARIS), are been elaborating. Information gathered within this report will be also carefully considered for the preliminary business plan.

o WP4 (Innovation and Contacts with Industry)

Task 4.2. (Assessment of needs and demands from STE industry). Within the framework of this task, MS20 (First report on the prospective of the international technological development of the STE sector) is currently in the


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process of being approved by the Steering Committee. Draft content of this report is been carefully considered for the elaboration of the business plan.

o WP5 (Distributed Facility Activity & Logistical Work)

Task 5.3 (Assessment of user needs and demands). In this regard, the progress undertaken towards MS27 (Analysis of the result of the user questionnaire) will be also taken into consideration.

Options of legal forms Task 2.1 (Legal status): conclusions obtained from the analysis of:

o Section 3 (Legal Information) of the Check-list.

Company’s and promoters’ background: conclusions obtained from the analysis of:

o Sections 1 (General Information), 2 (Project Information), 3 (Legal Information) and 4.1 (Strategic-Economic Diagnosis of EU-SOLARIS) of the Check-list.

o Document “Capacities – Research Infrastructures FP7 – INFRASTRUCTURES – 2012-1”.

For the sub-sections Mission and Vision: conclusions obtained from the analysis of Garrigues-

IAT questionnaire and the deliverables related to:

o Section 4.1.1 (Questionnaire for the initial Strategic Analysis of EU-SOLARIS - PESTEL Analysis) of the Check-list.


Task 3.1, and the associated MS15.

Tasks 3.6 and 3.2, and the associated milestones MS16 and MS17.


Task 4.2 and MS20.


Task 5.3 and MS27.

For the sub-sections "Sector of activity, Competition, Target Market, Marketing and Sales Plan

and Operational Plan: conclusions obtained from the section analysis of Services Portfolio

Plan, Target markets, and Marketing strategy delivered by the pertinent partners:


Task 3.1 and MS15.

Task 3.2 and MS16.

Task 3.6 and MS17.


Task 4.2 and MS20.


Task 5.1 (Relations with related infrastructures or initiatives and possible synergies).

Task 5.2 (Relations with user communities).

Task 5.3.

MS27.


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For the sub-section “Human Resources”, conclusions will be made from:

o Task 3.2 and MS16.

o Section 4.1.2 (Questionnaire for the initial Economic-Financial Analysis of EU-SOLARIS) of the Check-list.

Economic-Financial Plan: conclusions about financial viability, evaluating EU-SOLARIS

capacity in the framework of three (3) operational scenarios during the five (5) years after

establishment, based on the estimations about Funding, Financing and Evaluation of EU-

SOLARIS financial viability.

2. TERMINOLOGY

The terms related to legal and financial concepts, etc. used in the document Preliminary Business

Plan will be transcribed.

3. OPTIONS FOR POSSIBLE LEGAL FORMS OF THE ENTITY

Conclusions obtained from the following information will be taken into account:

Section 3 (Legal Information) of the Check-list.

Task 2.1 (Legal status).

Task 1.1 (Governance).

4. POTENTIAL USER NEEDS (ALL PARTNERS)

It will establish the procedures that easily enable EU-SOLARIS works/services allowing/offering

different users/clients a quality product/service that fully answers their needs. It could be

elaborated analysing the conclusions from:

Task 5.3 will be also taken into consideration.

Section 4.1 (Strategic-Economic Diagnosis of EU-SOLARIS) of the Check-list.

5. ANALYSIS OF THE INDUSTRY AND TRENDS (WP PARTNERS)

This section is related to a foresight analysis about sectors/segments/market of interest for EU-

SOLARIS, identifying an evaluation of trends in matters of growing and chances of risks. This

section will be fed from:

Strategic Plan that ESTELA prepared.

Task 4.2 and MS20.


6. PORTFOLIO OF EU-SOLARIS SERVICES AND EVERY PARTNER’S PORTFOLIO. (ALL PARTNERS)

This section is about the service catalogue of every participant entity, performing an analysis of the

critical factors of success and entry barriers for any of the lines of business/services in which EU-

SOLARIS is going to develop its activity. It will be obtained from:

Task 3.1 and MS15.

Task 3.2 and MS16.


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Task 3.6 and MS17.


7. TARGET MARKETS (ALL PARTNERS)

Target markets at sectorial, technological and geographical levels are analysed. This section will

be fed from:

Strategic Plan that ESTELA prepared.

Task 4.2 and MS20.

Task 5.2 and MS27.


8. MARKETING STRATEGY (ALL PARTNERS)

The way of selling these services will be evaluated from the point of view of Marketing 4 P’s:

Product/Service presentation, Price, Place of selling and Promotion. For this section, the

conclusion of the Check-list designed by the consulting firm will be useful as well as the

deliverables related to:

o Section 4.1 (Strategic-Economic Diagnosis of EU-SOLARIS) of the Check-list.


Task 3.1 and MS15.

Task 3.6 and MS17.


Task 4.2 and MS20.


Task 5.1.

Task 5.2.

Task 5.3.

MS27.

9. FUNDING AND FINANCING

The basis for this section will be the reports from:

Task 1.3 (Assessment of possible funding sources) collecting the main conclusions according to the different suggested options.

Section 4.2 (Analysis of Sources of Financing) of the Check-list.

10. FIRST EVALUATION OF EU-SOLARIS FINANCIAL VIABILITY

With the aim of carrying out a financial analysis of the entity that will be useful to show its viability

in the long and medium term, all the gathered information will be studied in order to define and

quantify both the EU-SOLARIS’ start up and the provision of a service to clients/users during its


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first five years of life, in different scenes (optimist, most probably and pessimist).

o Initial investment costs o Implementation costs o Operational costs o Maintenance costs o Incomes:

Quantification of Clients/Service/Market. Projects Etc.

On the basis of that information, and for one of the 5 study periods, a simulated prevision will be

performed about:

1. Profits and losses 2. Balance Sheets 3. Budgets

On that basis, a financial analysis about EU-SOLARIS’ economic viability and financial solvency

will be done, based on margins and profitability ratios of the project during the past time (five (5)

years).

o Income and expenditure analysis o Result and Return analysis o General analysis o Investment analysis (Net Present Value (NPV), Internal Rate of Return (IRR), etc.)

These outcomes are important for the rest of the tasks, deliverables, and milestones in the EU-

SOLARIS Project for the development of the business plan.

Task 1.6: Fair return. (Leader: ENEA, Participants: CTAER, CRES, CyI)

According to the WP description, the purpose of Task 1.6 is to analyse the best way of developing a

methodology that can be applied in the event that EU-SOLARIS is provided with its own infrastructure,

to ensure that all the partners are remunerated or compensated in the fairest way possible during the

construction, start-up and operation of this infrastructure. This fair return methodology must ensure that

the countries and institutions that do not host to the future infrastructure are able to benefit from the

initiative in similar terms to the partner or institution that does eventually host to the resulting

technological centres or infrastructure.

Clearly, the content of the work to be completed in Task 1.6 will depend on a multitude of factors:

whether or not EU-SOLARIS actually would have its own infrastructure; the kind of services to be

offered by EU-SOLARIS; the contributions, financial or other, made by the partners. In this regard,

completion of Task 1.6 will require the prior definition of the variables mentioned above, since, for

example, in the event that EU-SOLARIS does not eventually have its own infrastructure and the

relevant research activities would be carried out at facilities owned by the partners in the project, the

definition of ‘fair return’ will not relate to the distribution of the profits generated or the intellectual

property rights obtained but it will instead refer to the methodology by which all the partners are entitled

to provide their services to EU-SOLARIS on equal terms.


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In the event that EU-SOLARIS would have its own infrastructure, then according to the fair return

models that are usually applied in business, and in particular at institutions similar to EU-SOLARIS, we

have found that it would be the degree of financial participation in the project that would normally define

the rate of return enjoyed by each partner, notwithstanding any other potential agreements that the

partners may reach in order to define other rules of distribution.

1.2.1.3. Partner contributions

As WP Leader, CTAER contribution to WP1 during the first eighteen (18) months of the project has

been mainly devoted to the overall WP1 coordination and management, preparing e.g. its detailed work

plan and a time schedule for each Task. Another important activity in this WP at the beginning of the

project was the process related to the subcontracting of the consulting firm, Garrigues and IAT. The role

of CTAER was the management of all the administrative process, and the issuing of the public call for

tender in 2013. PSA contributed largely to the review of the technical and administrative specifications

for the tender.

Garrigues and IAT have since been given access by the EU-SOLARIS Project Office (CTAER) to the

project’s internal (online) collaborative workspace system and informed about any relevant information.

Garrigues and IAT have been actively engaged in the project through periodic coordination meetings

with CTAER, PSA, and MINECO. In order to carry out the activities of WP1, Garrigues-IAT drafted and

circulated a Check-list among all partners, soliciting information relating to partner institutions’

commercial, administrative, fiscal, economic and financial structures and mechanisms. In tight

collaboration with CTAER, and together with all the partners, Garrigues-IAT drafted and reviewed

several times this Check-list in order to solve doubts and answer further questions. They followed-up

and monitored partners' feedback, assessed and filtered the information received, and finally are in the

process of preparing a summarizing table comparing all partners’ data and information.

All the project partners have essentially contributed to this WP1 answering to this Check-list and

providing Garrigues-IAT with any useful information about their institution, needed to carry out properly

the activities of WP1.


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1.2.2. WP2. Legal Status and User Access Policies

1.2.2.1. Objectives

The activities planned in WP2 (Legal Status and User Access Policies) have three main objectives:

Objective 1: selection of the most appropriate legal vehicle for EU-SOLARIS and the definition of

its internal law. Tasks 2.1 (Legal status), 2.2 (Legal work for the setting up, constitution and

operation of the new Infrastructure), 2.3 (Draft agreements) and 2.7 (Memberships and

incorporation of new members) are associated with this objective

Objective 2: definition of the boundary conditions and rules related to the access of users to the

EU-SOLARIS RIs. Once legally established the new entity will provide access to their partners’

Concentrating Solar Thermal (CST) and solar chemistry research facilities. This access must be

properly regulated to assure fair conditions to potential users. Tasks 2.4 (Project selection & peer

review), 2.5 (User support) and 2.6 (Access rules for interested researchers and other interested)

are related to this objective. The outstanding experience already gathered in the FP7 project

SFERA concerning the international access to CST RIs will be the basis for the activities to be

performed in these tasks.

Objective 3: definition of protocols and procedures to be implemented during the operational

phase of EU-SOLARIS to manage the Intellectual Property Rights (IPR), Technology Transfer

(TT) and exploitation of results associated to the activities that will be performed within the

framework of EU-SOLARIS. Task 2.8 (IPR management, results protection and knowledge and

technology transfer (industry research centres and user community) is fully devoted to this

objective. Since EU-SOLARIS will be the framework for an intense collaboration on RTD

activities not only among the partners but also with third parties and users, definition of efficient

procedures to regulate and manage the issues related to IPR, TT and exploitation of results

arising from this collaboration must be defined with the legal advice and guidance of the

consulting firm subcontracted in this EU-SOLARIS Preparatory Phase for legal issues


Task 2.1: Legal Status. (Leader: CTAER, Participants: All partners)

The objective of Task 2.1 is to define the legal framework for EU-SOLARIS.

As indicated in the section relating to Task 1.1 (Governance), the analysis and study carried out in

respect of that task, along with the conclusions reached, are closely linked to the performance of this

task. Indeed, as already mentioned in section 1.2.1.2, the work involved in both tasks is being carried

out in parallel, given the interrelation between them.

In this regard, with the aim of providing the partners with recommendations for the three (3) main and


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most suitable legal alternatives for EU-SOLARIS structure, the consulting firm is carrying out a detailed

in-depth analysis using the following methodology. Firstly, the Check-list issued by the consulting firm

and filled in by the partners included a series of questions aimed at determining the legal form used by

the partners, in order to make it possible to identify potential situations in which, due to its legal status

(e.g. association, foundation, university), an individual partner would not be allowed under the

applicable legal and internal regulations to form part of an organisation that took a specific legal form

(e.g. a capital company).

These questions were the following:

In the case of Members that are public agencies, details of the legal provision that regulates their

creation and/or their operating procedures

In the case of Members that are private entities, details of their bylaws, regulations, protocols or

other internal rules in force, attaching a copy

Where appropriate, publicly available sources of information that may be used to locate, request

and obtain information on each Member (public registries, government and/or corporate

websites, etc.)

Details of the legal representative of the EU-SOLARIS member (name, postal address, contact

telephone and fax numbers and e-mail), where applicable attaching a copy of the document

evidencing that representation (power of attorney, appointment to post at organisation, etc.)

These tasks will allow ascertaining whether any of the partners is affected by some kind of restriction or

disqualification from taking part in certain types of entity. In addition to this, a study and analysis of the

legal forms which, given the individual characteristics of EU-SOLARIS, are considered most appropriate

to the project and will therefore be recommended to the partners have been carried out. In this regard,

some of the more important of these individual characteristics are as follows: a large number of

partners, the institutional nature of some of these partners, a project requiring long-term stability, and

the need to adopt a legal form that is recognised and accepted both by financial institutions and the

industrial sector and that offers a certain flexibility with regard to the structuring of its governing body

(attention is drawn to the importance of this last item in order to avoid the result described in the

foregoing Task 1.1, in which the selection of a rigid legal form could eventually prevent the adoption of

the governance structure that the partners deem most appropriate).

This study is being approached from two angles:

An analysis of the main legal forms permitted in law, in accordance with both Spanish and EU

legislation, always bearing in mind the nature and pan-European scope of the project.

The individual characteristics of the project listed above, along with the aims and objectives of

EU-SOLARIS, have made it advisable to focus analysis on legal forms of an international nature,

which are more suitable for projects of the size and ambition of that of EU-SOLARIS.

The first and principal advantage of selecting an international structural form would be that one

could overcome the usual restrictions or handicaps involved when foreign institutions take a


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share in organisations from other countries (such as, for example, restrictions on shareholding

percentages, the need to comply with formal requirements such as the entry in national registries

of the appointment of national representatives, the application of specific taxes, etc.)

An analysis of the legal structure used by existing ESFRI projects that could serve as

precedents, which will allow us to ascertain whether they have found an appropriate vehicle to

perform the duties and attain the objectives with which they were originally entrusted.

Bringing together all these aspects will allow us, through a global and comprehensive analysis, to

complete an elimination process designed to define the three (3) alternative legal structures that are

most suitable for EU-SOLARIS.

All the consulting firm’s conclusions regarding the most suitable legal form to host EU-SOLARIS, along

with the analysis and reasoning supporting these conclusions and the consulting firm’s

recommendation, will be contained in Internal Deliverable (ID) ID.2.1 (Motivational report on the legal

organism selected to host EU-SOLARIS) to be delivered in M24.

Task 2.2: Legal work for the setting up, constitution and operation of the

new Infrastructure. (Leader: PSA, Participants: CTAER, MINECO,

CNRS)

The aim of Task 2.2 is to draw up the internal laws governing EU-SOLARIS and legalise it so that it

may commence operation after this Preparatory Phase.

Task 2.2 is sub-divided into clearly differentiated actions:

drawing up the internal laws that will govern EU-SOLARIS,

legalising it so that it may commence operation, and

carrying out all the specific operation procedures relating to the nature of the organism, in order

to begin its operation.

As regards drawing up the internal law by which EU-SOLARIS is to be governed, we should stress that

this will necessarily be dependent upon the conclusions reached in Tasks 1.1 (Governance) and 2.1

(Legal status), since the internal regulation of EU-SOLARIS will merely represent the reflection or

implementation of the legal form and governance structure eventually chosen by the partners

In this regard, and notwithstanding the fact that the development of this task will be conditioned by the

foregoing, the analyses carried out as part of Tasks 1.1 and 2.1 have shown that the approximate

contents of these internal regulations may be as follows:

Definition of the rules governing contributions in cash and/or in kind by the partners.

Definition of the company’s governing bodies.

Participation of each of the partners in these bodies.

Operating system for each of the governing bodies, establishing the rules for convening

meetings, the format of meetings, etc.

The rules for granting powers of attorney (defining, where applicable, the existence and operating


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procedure of an Executive Committee).

Definition of the consultative technical bodies deemed necessary, where appropriate, and their

rules.

Rules for the adoption of resolutions. Definition of qualified majorities for particularly relevant

resolutions.

System for the inclusion of new shareholders in the project. Rules for the admission of new

partners.

Rules governing the exit or separation of shareholders from the project.

Policy for the distribution of economic profits that may be generated by the new entity to be

created.

Internal and external control and auditing policies for the entity.

Rules prohibiting competition between members and the new entity, where appropriate after the

relevant review.

Legal system and legislation applicable to the new entity.

System for the resolution of disputes between members of the new entity and the entity itself or

its directors and/or managers. Possibility of submitting dispute to the International Court of

Arbitration.

Any other statements that may be necessary to ensure the optimum operation of the entity to be

created.

Criteria for deciding the location of any new infrastructure items that may be added in future to

those initially contributed by the shareholders.

The second part of this Task 2.2 (the entity’s legalisation in order to commence operations) represents

the culmination of the project’s Preparatory Phase, since this will be the moment when all the analyses

and studies carried out in Task 2.1 (Legal Status) and Task 2.1 (Governance) will be implemented and

put into practice, resulting in the formal implementation of EU-SOLARIS as a legal entity.The work to be

carried out in Task 2.2 is a purely formal and executive duty and does not require or involve any kind of

prior work. Consequently, it will not be until the culmination of the project’s Preparatory Phase, after the

partners have agreed the project’s legal form and structure, that this task will be carried out.

Task 2.3: Draft Agreements. (Leader: MINECO, Participants: CTAER, PSA,

CNRS)

Task 2.3 aims at drawing up the agreements that may be developed, such as specific collaboration

agreements between the partners or specific agreements with interested third parties.

As with Task 2.2, the completion of this Task 2.3 will depend on the results obtained from other tasks in

the project, particularly: Task 1.1 (Governance), Task 2.1 (Legal Status) and Task 2.2 (Legal Work for

the Setting Up, Constitution and Operation of the new Infrastructure).

However, working from the responses given by the partners to the Check-list prepared by the

consulting firm and the comparative analysis of other research structures similar to EU-SOLARIS which

we are making as part of Task 1.1 (Governance) and Task 2.1 (Legal Status), a model for the

agreements to be implemented could take the following form, though this will always be conditional

upon the agreements eventually adopted between the partners:


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In the event that EU-SOLARIS would not have its own infrastructure but is instead configured as a

centre that coordinates the services supplied by the individual partners, there will still be a need to

formalise bilateral agreements between EU-SOLARIS and each of the partners or, where applicable,

the technological centres or institutions run by each partner (in the event that they have separate legal

status). Such agreements would govern issues such as: the way in which the partner will give EU-

SOLARIS access to its facilities (exclusivity, timetables, with or without human resources), the

payments obtained by the partner in this regard, the partner’s obligations vis-à-vis EU-SOLARIS and

the other partners and the grant of access to infrastructure by clients of EU-SOLARIS.

By contrast, in the event that EU-SOLARIS would not have its own infrastructure, there will be a need to

regulate the potential access by partners to this infrastructure and to establish the terms and conditions

under which the industry and other third parties may use it.

Task 2.4: Project selection & Peer review. (Leader: CNRS, Participants:

CTAER, PSA, ESTELA, DLR, WEIZMANN)

This task is coordinated by CNRS and it should define methodologies for the project selection and peer-

review for the access projects to be hosted at EU-SOLARIS. Methodologies defined in this Task will

include the definition of the management process and evaluation criteria for project selection and the

methods for making public the announcement of the opportunity for access to the partners’ RIs. The

internal deliverable for this action (Report on Criteria for project selection) is expected in M30 but during

the first reporting period, CNRS has already started to investigate the existing procedures set up by the

FP7 project SFERA I and II (Solar Facilities for the European Research Area), which is a project within

the EC’s ‘CAPACITIES-Research Infrastructures’ scheme promoted and developed by European RTD

centres devoted to solar concentrating systems (sfera.sollab.eu). Since some of the infrastructures of

EU-SOLARIS already provide access to their installations within the framework of SFERA and a system

has already been put into place for the selection and review of the projects, the experience gained by

SFERA partners on this subject will be valuable for EU-SOLARIS. CNRS has contacted SFERA

partners to collect the already existing schemes and procedures for project selection and peer review of

proposals to get access to their RIs.

The planned work for the next months will consist in analysing and improving the methodologies used

by the partners already providing access to their RIs.

Task 2.5: Users support. (Leader: PSA, Participants: CTAER, ESTELA,

CNRS, WEIZMANN)

This task is coordinated by PSA and is planned to start in the second year of the project. Its objective is

the definition of a common protocol to provide EU-SOLARIS Users with the support they may require to

perform their activities in an efficient manner when staying and working at the EU-SOLARIS RIs.

A survey of the existing protocols is being carried out by PSA and a common system will be developed

and jointly agreed upon, based on the extensive previous experience of the EU-SOLARIS partners with

trans-national access. So, according with the first activity planned in this task (Survey of protocols


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existing in RTD centres to provide support to Users), EU-SOLARIS partners have been contacted by

PSA to collect their protocols regarding the support they give to the external Users of their RIs. Since

most of the partners have replied that they do not have a specific protocol for users support PSA is

preparing a first draft document containing a proposal that will be discussed with the other partners to

take into consideration their comments in the elaboration of the protocol for support to external Users.

The first draft document currently under preparation by PSA will be sent to the other partners for

comments and thus prepare its final version

Task 2.6 Access rules for interested researchers and other entities.

(Leader: PSA, Participants: CTAER, CNRS, DLR, ENEA, WEIZMANN,

LNEG, SELCUK.U)

This task is aimed at preparing the access rules and procedure to be implemented for users or entities

wanting to get access to EU-SOLARIS RIs.

This task is also coordinated by PSA and was started during the second year of the project. As planned

PSA is elaborating a draft version for the Internal Deliverable ID2.6 (Report Access Rules), with the

collaboration of CTAER. This first draft will be a starting point for comments and discussions with the

other partners. First of all, PSA has performed a survey of access rules already existing for the EU-

SOLARIS partners’ RIs. With the information collected from the other partners and the own access

rules existing at PSA, a first draft is being prepared for comments. For this first draft PSA is also taking

into account the guidelines given in the draft document “European Charter for Access to Research

Infrastructures” issued by the European Commission in February 2014 setting out non-regulatory

principles and guidelines to be used as reference when defining Access rules and conditions for Access

to Research Infrastructures. This first draft document with the proposed access rules will be finished

late in June or early in July 2014, and it will be then sent to the other partners for comments in order to

prepare a second version of the document.

Task 2.7 Membership and incorporation of new members. (Leader: PSA,

Participants: CTAER, MINECO)

The objective of this Task 2.7 is to define the terms and conditions of membership. This task is directly

related to task 1.1 (Governance) and Task 2.1 (Legal Status).

From a legal point of view, the contents of this Task 2.7 are very similar to those of Task 2.2 (Legal

work for the setting up, constitution and operation of the new Infrastructure), since they refer in both

cases to the internal regulations for EU-SOLARIS. As a consequence, we will refer back to the remarks

made in that regard in order to avoid any unnecessary repetition.

Notwithstanding the foregoing, it should be stressed that as part of this task a preliminary analysis of a

procedure is being undertaken, in order to be quick and at the same time balanced and legally stable, in

a way that will prevent the emergence of any restrictions or contingencies associated with the entry and

exit of members that could endanger the normal development of the project.


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Task 2.8 IPR management, results protection and knowledge and

technology transfer (industry research centres and user community).

(Leader: DLR. Participants: CTAER, PSA, MINECO, CyI, ESTELA,

CNRS, CRES, ENEA, LNEG, U.EVORA, SELCUK U.)

Since EU-SOLARIS will be the framework for an intense collaboration on R+D activities not only among

the partners but also with third parties and users, definition of efficient procedures to regulate and

manage the issues related to IPR, TT and exploitation of results arising from this collaboration must be

defined. This is the objective of Task 2.8, which is fully devoted to it, with the legal advice and guidance

of the consulting firm subcontracted in this EU-SOLARIS Preparatory Phase for legal issues. The

development of this task also, will depend to a great extent on the results of other tasks, such as Task

2.1 (Legal Status), since, depending on the structure adopted by EU-SOLARIS, the nature of the work

to be carried out as part of this task.

Task 2.8 is coordinated by DLR and its activities have been started in the second year of the project.

During the period covered by this report DLR started a survey of rules and procedures existing in

European R+D centres regarding IPR management in order to gain an overview of the IPR

Management situation in other partner centres of EU-SOLARIS and external centres. Furthermore

relevant information from other ESFRI projects and EU recommendations for IPR management are

being collected and analysed. DLR internal regulations and recommendations regarding this matter

have been discussed with the legal and technology transfer departments. In addition, in bilateral

consultations to EU-SOLARIS partners their existing regulations or recommendations on this matter

have been assessed. These contacts have been initiated specifically with CNRS and CIEMAT in a first

step as large RI operating centres with relevant experience to contribute to a future EU-SOLARIS IPR

regulation system. Further specific exchange has been conducted with Partner LNEG to coordinate with

IPR relevant activities in Task T4.5 (To establish the confidentiality and research development activities

for private entities). To establish the confidentiality and research and development activities for private

entities, At the time of writing, the intermediate result of these consultations during the reporting period

is that there is normally not a defined set of rules for IPR management, comparable to an “internal law”

of an organisation, but rather recommendations that have to be adapted on a case by case basis to

different services and contract.

Furthermore EU-SOLARIS external information has been gathered by DLR, e.g. a European Expert

group report regarding Management of intellectual property in publicly-funded research organisations

aiming at the creation of European Guidelines. Further valuable information regarding this topic was

gathered from a Workshop held in June 2013 (attended by ESTELA) titled “Technology Transfer and

Industrial Relations in Research Infrastructures” organised by ERF, the European Association of

Research Facilities. Finally, the exchange with other ESFRI projects is established through the CoPoRI

(Communication and Policy Development for Research Infrastructures in Europe) project to obtain

specific ESFRI related experience regarding IPR and TT management policies.

Task 2.8 is a particularly important task, given the significance and importance that the IPR generated

by EU-SOLARIS will have for the project, since such rights will play an important role in:

The controlled and supervised development of EU-SOLARIS and its activities in the future.


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The financial sustainability of EU-SOLARIS in the future.

The protection and coverage of the results generated by EU-SOLARIS’s activities in the future.

The reciprocal connections between EU-SOLARIS and the industrial sector, which may be

offered access to EU-SOLARIS’s IPR under the terms deemed appropriate.

It will also be especially important in this task to identify suitable mechanisms to ensure the proper

protection of IPR and to verify the procedures and the national, EU and international bodies through

which protection for EU-SOLARIS rights should be sought.

Notwithstanding the foregoing, in order to obtain information on the precedents that may exist at other

research facilities, the consulting firm is currently analysing the contents of the bylaws of ESFRI

projects similar to EU-SOLARIS. This information will provide a practical perspective with regard to the

reality of this kind of initiative in this area.

For the remaining period, the bilateral consultations on partners IPR management policies will be

extended to all project partners and a first complete overview of the situation in different partner centres

will be compiled in a report. Together with the evaluation of the gathered documents and exchange with

other ESFRI projects first draft recommendations for EU-SOLARIS will be prepared (internal deliverable

ID.2.8.1 (Survey of IPR policies in other ESFRI projects and a proposal for EU-SOLARIS, M24), Later

on, the internal deliverable ID.2.8.2 (Report on existing and new TT & IPR best practices) will be issued

in M28. This activity will be also coordinated with the work of Garrigues as a legal specialist for the

assessment of such regulations in EU-SOLARIS, because the IPR policy implemented in EU-SOLARIS

could be somehow restricted, at least partially, by the nature of the legal entity finally adopted.

1.2.2.3. Deviations, use of resources and corrective actions

The detailed work plan and time schedule for each Task in WP2 was revised during the first months of

the project by the coordinator of WP2 (PSA) and the task leaders. Some minor modifications

considered suitable to achieve the WP2 objectives were introduced. These minor changes neither

modified the project deliverables and resources nor affected the activities planned in the other work

packages. They will only help achieve the objectives defined in WP2 in a more reasonable and efficient

way. The change of the starting date of Task 2.8 (IPR Management, results protection and knowledge

and TT - industry research centres and user community) from M8 to M13 is an example of these minor

modifications. The resources and commitment in WP2 remain unchanged.

There is no important deviation in WP2, but only minor delays in some activities that do not affect the

fulfilment of the planned objectives in time. For instance, activities in Tasks 2.5 (User support) and 2.6

(Access rules for interested researchers and other interested entities) were started by PSA with a 3-

month delay, but they are progressing well and the deliverables will be issued in time and without

affecting to other tasks or work packages. The same happens in Tasks 2.4 (Access rules for interested

researchers and other interested entities) and 2.8 (IPR management, results protection and knowledge

and technology transfer industry research centres and user community). So, no corrective action is

considered necessary.


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CTAER contribution to WP2 during the first 18 months of the project has been mainly devoted to the

coordination of Task 2.1 (Legal status) preparing its detailed work plan, and to the contracting of the

consulting firm undertaking the ground work of legal issues concerning the implementation of EU-

SOLARIS as a legal entity. CTAER managed all the administrative process for the contracting of the

consulting firm in 2013.

Since PSA is the coordinator of WP2, they have performed the overall WP2 coordination and

management, reporting directly to CTAER and participating in all the Project Management Committee

meetings held during the first 18 month of the project. During the first months of the project PSA, in

collaboration with CNRS, CTAER and DLR, prepared a detailed work plan and time schedule for each

Task included in WP2. As explained in section 1.2.2.3, some minor changes were introduced during

this process without affecting the expected deliverable items and resources allocated to WP2. PSA has

closely collaborated with CTAER during the contracting process of the consulting firm, reviewing the

technical and administrative specifications for the public tender issued by CTAER as Project

Coordinator. PSA has also been preparing the first draft documents for “Users support” and “Access

rules”.

The main activity of CNRS in WP2 during the first 18 months of the project has been the investigation of

the existing procedures set up in the European project SFERA II concerning project selection and

review, which is the scope of Task 2.4 (Project selection & peer review).

DLR contribution to WP2 has been mainly devoted to Task 2.8, which is devoted to IPR management,

results protection and knowledge and technology transfer. DLR has collected regulations and

recommendations regarding this matter, not only by means of bilateral consultations to EU-SOLARIS

partners, but also gathering external information concerning this issue searching for related documents

and attending the Workshop held by ESTELA in June 2013.

Additionally to the contributions of CNRS, CTAER, DLR and PSA already explained, all the other

project partners involved in WP2 (CyI, U.EVORA, CNRS, DLR, APTL, CRES, ENEA, WEIZMANN,

LNEG, GUNAM SELCUK U.) have contributed to this WP giving their inputs to the surveys performed

by PSA regarding existing protocols for external users support and access rules for their RIs.


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1.2.3. WP3. EU-SOLARIS Capacity Building and Services

1.2.3.1. Objectives

WP3 (EU-SOLARIS Capacity Building and Services) will respond to the relevant gaps in CST

technologies. It is therefore necessary and imperative to evaluate, make changes, upgrade and readapt

the current research facilities to the present situation, and future challenges, with close collaboration

and synergy between EU-members and the involved industries and future to come.

Furthermore, part of the EU-SOLARIS vision of the future is to provide the most advance Research

Infrastructure facilities and technical services. In this regard, all the research facilities and the widest

range of technical services under the umbrella of EU-SOLARIS and around the world will be monitored

for the development of CST technologies. WP3 will rationalise the offer of technical services and the

investments to be carried out further by the partners in order to develop such offerings.

On the other hand, certification and reliable standards provision of different CST components is

absolutely necessary in order to provide plant promoters with the right tools to compare the different

products available in the market and also to have a certainty on their performance features. This is EU-

SOLARIS motivation to add the necessary tools and training programs to their RIs.

To achieve the WP3 goal -analysis of current state of research facilities and conclude the future needs-,

a detailed questionnaire, which includes informative questions about facilities capacities, available

services, human resources and recommendations for future needs upgrade and new facilities, was

elaborated. The questionnaire contains tables, in all range of facility properties, to be filled by the

contact person in the RI facilities. For this reporting period, the questionnaire has been sent to all

contact people in EU-SOLARIS partner’s facilities and to other 16 contact people in RI facilities around

the world. Also in this reporting period the detailed information from the tables filled by the partners that

describe the facilities types, their capacities and the human resources in the questionnaire responses

was used to develop MS15 (Status report on existing capacities, technological and human resources).

The tables that describe technical services are the source of MS16&17 (Report containing the portfolio

of available technical services as EU-SOLARIS). Milestones MS15 and MS16&MS17 accomplish Task

3.1 (Assessment and monitoring of existing and new capacities and all available services and existing

infrastructures in each participating centre), Task 3.6 (To define all the possible future services due to

the creation of new infrastructures), Task 3.7 (Monitoring other facilities and following their technology

development) and Task 3.2 (Human resources).

The partner’s recommendations for upgrade and new facilities in the tables questionnaire responses

with additional update discussions with the partners will be used to accomplish MS18 (Report on

recommendation plan for development and upgrade, complementarities & synergies), MS19 (Report on

the viability of the new services to be offered based on users’ demands), Task 3.3 (Recommendation

plan for development and upgrade, complementarities & synergies), Task 3.4 (To define the needs for

the new infrastructures), Task 3.5 (Methodology selection and planning for the location of the new

facilities) and Task 3.8 (Analysis of users and science programs, development of guidelines for the EU-

SOLARIS Strategic Research Agenda (SRA) roadmap).


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MS18 (Report on recommendation plan for development and upgrade, complementarities & synergies)

and MS19 (Report on the viability of the new services to be offered based on users’ demands) are part

of WP3. MS18 is in preparation. MS19 will start after the approval of MS19.


Task 3.1: Assessment and monitoring of existing and new capacities and

all available services and existing infrastructures in each

participating centre. (Leader: Weizmann, Participants: PSA, CyI,

CNRS, DLR, APTL, CRES, ENEA, LNEG, GUNAM, SELCUK U).

The objective of this task is to assess and monitor existing and new capacities as well as all available

services and existing infrastructures in each participating centre. In order to achieve this, the first step

was to define all the information needed to accomplish most of WP3 tasks. Based on this, the definition

of a questionnaire draft was built. This questionnaire was circulated to all partners. The approved

questionnaire version included detail informative questions about: facility type (central tower, parabolic

dish etc.), number of facilities, facility properties, the facility optic system, measurements devices,

recommendation for upgrade current facilities and new facilities, available services, human resources

and a number of facilities properties. The completed revised questionnaire can be found in the project’s

document repository tool Box3. The approved questionnaire was filled by the EU-SOLARIS partners.

After gathering the questionnaire responses from the partners MS15 (Status report on the existing RI

capacities, technological and human resources) was prepared. MS15 describes the facilities type, the

differences between the facilities, facilities size, facilities heat capacities, working temperature range,

reflective area and other details related.

MS15 (Status report on existing capacities, technological and human resources) describes all the

existing RI facilities types as EU-SOLARIS and their properties. RIs facilities properties include facility

type, capacities and the human resources to operate the infrastructure. The data from questionnaire

response tables was the source to accomplish this report. MS16&MS17 (Portfolio of the available

technical services as EU-SOLARIS), describes all the technical services divided in groups in a way to

help customers to find the location of the service they require. MS15 and MS16&MS17 accomplish the

objectives of this task cataloguing EU-SOLARIS partners’ RI facilities. The main conclusion of MS15 is

the importance of new young human resources for the development and continuity of CST. During this

reporting period, the updating necessities of MS15 and MS16&MS17 have been discovered to be very

essential.

To be the leader in CST technologies and facing Horizon 2020, the EU-SOLARIS consortium has to

monitor the latest RI facilities and the best available services throughout the world for the partners. To

achieve this vision the questionnaire was sent also to RI facilities around the world. All partners helped

to create the non-EU-SOLARIS partners RI facilities list and contact to the relevant person to persuade

them to complete the questionnaire. The questionnaire responses will be used to monitor the latest

CST technologies and to update MS15 and MS16&MS17.




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MS15 and MS16&MS17 will serve the EU-SOLARIS partners to find the best available services for

future development’s needs.

Task 3.2: Human resources. (Leader: Weizmann, Participants: CNRS,

CRES, LNEG, GUNAM, SELCUK U).

This task includes the definition of the human resources requirement to cope with the new challenges in

the various involved skills and levels, including: management, scientists, technicians, etc.; the relevant

scope for each of these groups and estimation of the number of people needed for each facility;

establishing the human resources needs and long term interdisciplinary education plan.

The information provided by the tables completed by the partners in the questionnaire responses

regarding human resources and their recommendations were included in MS15 (Status report on

existing capacities, technological and human resources). Human resources are the key point to achieve

the future objectives to be the main European research facilities and source for laboratory certification

and reliable standards provision. Only with appropriate human resources can EU-SOLARIS be the

European research facilities leader, to be able to give laboratory certification and to develop reliable

standards. The main conclusions in this report are the necessity of new human resources and the

development of a special training program for CST. New human resources are also important for

dissemination the CST. A lack of new human resources in the long term will cause RTD to be held back

and for CST technology to stagnate. WP6 (Dissemination & Outreach) would be one way to increase

the human resources by exposing the CST technology to new students and other professionals.

Task 3.3: Recommendation plan for development and upgrade,

complementarities & synergies. (Leader: Weizmann, Participants:

CyI, LNEG).

The recommendation plan for development and upgrade, complementarities and synergies is currently

in progress. The plan will be built based on the partners’ recommendations. The questionnaire

completed by the partners already includes these recommendations. Based on partner

recommendations and MS15 and MS16&17, a priority plan for upgrading and development of research

facilities will be elaborated. This plan will serve as a basis for the RI designs developed in WP7, with

prior approval from the SC. These goals will be accomplished in the middle of Q4 2014. This task will

be summarised and reported in MS18 (Recommendation plan for development and upgrade,

complementarities & synergies). During this reporting period the partner recommendations were

collected. Weizmann has started to organise and to analyse the recommendations.

Task 3.4: Define the needs for the new infrastructures to guarantee

excellence. (Leader: Weizmann, Participants: CyI, CNRS, DLR, APTL,

CRES, ENEA, LNEG, GUNAM, SELCUK U).

The objective of this task is to define and assess the needs of the various functional and auxiliary

subsystems in new infrastructures to guarantee excellence and this task is in preparation. The definition

of “needs” will be based on the partners’ recommendations in the responses to the questionnaire. This


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definition will be used for monitoring the development programme for new infrastructural systems that

are currently not available. These task goals will be accomplished in at the middle of Q4 2015. During

this reporting period and based on the partner recommendations Weizmann started to define the

parameters to guarantee excellence. The definition of “needs” will be summarised in the internal

deliverable ID.3.4 (Report on definitions and needs of the new concepts in order to guarantee

excellence).

Task 3.5: Methodology selection and planning for the location of the new

facilities. (Leader: Weizmann, Participants: CNRS, DLR, ENEA,

LNEG, GUNAM).

The objective of this task is to build the criteria and a methodology for selection of the site and location

of the new facilities, taking into account the conclusions from the environmental and social impact study

to be elaborated within WP6 (Dissemination and Outreach), Task 6.2 (Socio-economic impact

assessment and territorial development) and all partners’ recommendations. Some recommendations

would be included in the questionnaire responses. More detailed recommendations will be discussed

with the EU-SOLARIS partners. The discussion with the EU-SOLARIS partners will elaborate the

methodology for selection of the site and location of the new facilities. The methodology will include the

definition of all legal, certification and permit processes required from the local and federal authorities

for new facility. The new facilities’ environmental and social impact studies will be carried out in WP6.

This task’s goal will be accomplished in the middle of Q3 2016.

Task 3.6: Define all the possible future services due the creation of new

infrastructures – with the current facilities and after new

developments and upgrades. (Leader: PSA, Participants: CNRS,

DLR, APTL, CRES, ENEA, WEIZMANN, SELCUK U).

The objective of Task 3.6 is the preparation of a complete list with the description of services which the

EU-SOLARIS partners might offer, taking into consideration not only the existing facilities, but also the

upgrades and improvements to be defined in this Preparatory Phase of EU-SOLARIS. PSA is leading

this task. As a first step to prepare the completed list of services to be offered by EU-SOLARIS in the

future, during the 18-month period covered by the first progress report PSA has prepared the list of

services that EU-SOLARIS RTD partners can offer at present and with the existing facilities. PSA has

made a survey of the services described by the partners in their web pages and brochures, and a

preliminary list of services currently offered by EU-SOLARIS partners was compiled, written in a

document and distributed by PSA for comments. After several iterations with the partners, the final

version of this complete list of services currently available was issued in May 2014 as MS16&17

(Portfolio of available technical services as EU-SOLARIS).

Services currently offered by the partners have been classified following approximately the sequence of

key steps in the energy transfer through solar concentrating systems from the Solar (and

Meteorological) Resource to the Electricity Production (see Figure 2). This classification results in a

total of 16 categories of services covering the different key subsystems of STE, the other applications of

Solar Concentration and the associated horizontal activities. Several sub-categories are defined within


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each category, taking into consideration the characteristics and specifications of each service.

Figure 2: Classification of available services proposed in this report

During the next period PSA will prepare the list of additional services that will be offered with the

upgraded or new facilities that will be proposed in this Preparatory Phase of EU-SOLARIS. This list of

future new services will be distributed within the project partners for comments and the final version will

be thus prepared and issued. The list of new services will be elaborated taking into consideration the

information delivered by the Leader of Task 4.2 (ESTELA) (Needs and demands the STE industry), and

the Leader of Task 5.3 (CNRS) (Assessment of User needs and demands) because the new services

to be offered by EU-SOLARIS should meet the demands of potential users, rather than duplicating

capacities within the Consortium.

Both lists, current services available and future services, will be periodically revised during the next

phases of the project to keep them current.


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Task 3.7: Monitoring of other facilities and following their technology

development. (Leader: DLR, Participants: PSA, CNRS, CRES).

The objective of Task 3.7 is the assessment of other STE and CST related RI facilities outside Europe,

both operating and under development at present. A listing of such facilities is under preparation and

will be continuously updated. Based on the acquired information on the equipment and

capabilities/services of these facilities, a methodology proposal for benchmarking will be developed. In

this reporting period the listing of facilities has been initiated and is close to finalisation, based on

information gathered to a large extent from SolarPACES, as an international network including many

countries with relevant activities and available RI facilities worldwide, and furthermore internet research

and follow-up of different information services. Based on the information obtained on these facilities

outside Europe, parameters for a comparable monitoring of their operation and services will be defined,

in order to prepare ID 3.6 (Report describing the measures to be taken for benchmarking of similar

facilities existing in the world).

Task 3.8: Analysis of users and science programs, development of

guidelines for the EU-SOLARIS Strategic Research Agenda (SRA)

roadmap. (Leader: PSA, Participants: CTAER, CNRS, DLR, APTL,

ENEA, WEIZMANN, U.EVORA, GUNAM).

The objective of this task is to provide recommendations and guidelines for the future EU-SOLARIS

Strategic Research Agenda (SRA) considering the partners’ individual SRAs. Since the planned starting

date of this Task is M18, it has been just started by PSA, the leader of Task 3.8, with an analysis of the

SRA of ESTELA, which includes the priorities of the STE industrial sector. After analysing ESTELA’s

SRA, PSA will request the participants in this task to deliver their individual SRA in order to analyse and

merge them into a single document containing all the strategic RTD topics defined by the EU-SOLARIS

partners. This document will be a first draft for discussion of the EU-SOLARIS proposed SRA.


There was a delay in producing the report of milestone MS15 (Status report on existing capacities,

technological and human resources) due to a late design of the questionnaire and collecting the

responses. The main reason was that the questionnaire covers Tasks 3.1, (Assessment and monitoring

of existing and new capacities, and all available services and existing infrastructures in each

participating centre), Task 3.2 (Human resources), Task 3.3 (Recommendation plan for development

and upgrade, complementarities & synergies), MS16&MS17 (The portfolio of available technical

services as EU-SOLARIS) and the starting of MS18, (Recommendation plan for development and

upgrade, complementarities & synergies). It was therefore difficult to get the questionnaire approval and

to collect the responses especially from the non-members’ RI facilities on time. The reason to build one

questionnaire is to get all the necessary information in one request.

The combination of MS16 and MS17 is the second deviation. MS16 is a portfolio of existing available

technical services of partner centres and MS17 is portfolio of available technical services as EU-

SOLARIS, building one portfolio will be easier to use by the EU-SOLARIS partners. The work needed


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for the two portfolios are parallel and they have the same format so it was considered reasonable to

combine them. Changes and updates of the portfolio will be easier in the combined version. The

combined portfolio will not cause any obstacles on upcoming tasks and deliverables, and on the

contrary it will help at least with MS19.

The current version of MS15 monitors only EU-SOLARIS partners’ RI but no other RI’s because of the

difficulties to convince their contact people to complete the questionnaire. MS15 will be updated in the

course of the project. With finalising this version of MS15, WP3 is back on the originally planned

schedule.


In order to accomplish most of WP3 tasks, the first step in WP3 was to establish a list of technological

equipment parameters to be monitored. All partners have contributed to create the full monitoring

parameters list. These parameters list was the basis of the first questionnaire draft. The draft was sent

to the EU-SOLARIS partners for comments. CTAER in collaboration with PSA advised to build the

questionnaire as tables to be filled by the contact people at the RI facilities. CNRS helped to define the

parameters to be monitored. Garrigues and IAT (the project subcontracted consulting firms) added

valuable comments. The partners’ advices and comments led to the last arrangement of the

questionnaire, approved finally by all WP3 partners. All EU-SOLARIS partners filled the approved

questionnaire. The partners’ questionnaire responses assisted to accomplish the goals of Task 3.1

(Assessment and monitoring of existing and new capacities, and all available services and existing

infrastructures in each participating centre) and Task 3.2 (Human resources). APTL CTAER, CNRS,

CyI, ENEA, E.UVERA, LNEG, GUNAM and PSA recommended their necessity for upgrading their

current facilities and for new infrastructure. These partner recommendations will be used for Task 3.3

and MS18 (Plan for development and upgrade, complementarities & synergies). Partners’

recommendations and collaboration will ensure the accomplishment of the WP3 objectives. Using the

recommendations in the right manner will guarantee technology Excellency and will bring EU-SOLARIS

consortium to the front of the CST technology.

PSA is the leader of Task 3.6 (To define all the possible future services due the creation of new

infrastructures – with the current facilities and after new developments and upgrades) and Task 3.8

(Analysis of users and science programmes, development of guidelines for the EU-SOLARIS Strategic

Research Agenda (SRA) roadmap). DLR is the leader of Task 3.7 (Monitoring of other facilities and

following their technology development).

A large effort of this WP has been devoted to the elaboration of the questionnaire and MS15 by the

partners PSA and GUNAM.

Weizmann prepared and applied to a list of contact people in non-partners RI facilities around the world

to fill the questionnaire. The WP3 objectives will be missing if EU-SOLARIS does not have the

knowledge about RI facilities around the world. Weizmann as a WP leader asked the WP partners and

the PO to use their personal contacts to convince non-partners RI facilities, both on and not on the

Weizmann list, to complete the questionnaire. Convincing non-partners RI facilities to complete the

questionnaire is not easy and is a long term assignment. All partners are actively working to achieve

this assignment.


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1.2.4. WP4. Innovation and Contacts with Industry

1.2.4.1. Objectives

As the technology development in this sector is mainly driven by industry, the main purpose of WP4

(Innovation and Contacts with Industry) is to find effective relationships and new collaboration models –

technical and financial– between industry and EU-SOLARIS in order to enhance both the faster

advance of the technology and the increased contribution of research centres in achieving this goal. In

this sense the partnership participation of industry, through ESTELA, will contribute to reaching this

objective. The specific objectives are the following:

To develop systematic mechanisms to maintain an updated status of common understanding on

Centre capabilities and industry needs: this objective is covered by Task 4.1 (Contact with the

industrial sector). ESTELA is leading the task and all the other partners have a passive role, i.e.

to respond to questionnaires and provide comments on methodologies and outcomes.

To identify the current existing barriers and present new ideas in order to overcome this situation

and reach a deeper collaboration: this objective is covered by Task 4.2. (Assessment of needs

and demand from STE industry). ESTELA and PSA are leading the task and CTAER has a

stronger involvement than the other partners. All the other partners have a passive role, i.e. to

respond to questionnaires and provide comments on methodologies and outcomes. This

objective is fulfilled through the set-up of Delphi panels and questionnaires targeted to industrial

and researchers to identify technical and political bottlenecks in the future.

To secure a more stable financial environment to cover the running expenditures and the new

investments of the centres: this objective is covered by Task 4.4. (Establishment of the EU-

SOLARIS participation procedures for the private sector and industry). ESTELA is leading the

task and all the other partners have the role of responding to an interview and to provide

comments on methodologies and outcomes. This objective is fulfilled by ESTELA through the

setup of an interview with each of the EU-SOLARIS partner, regarding their experience of

collaboration with the industry. This will lead to the drafting of a report defining the participation

formulas for industry in the operational phase of EU-SOLARIS.

To identify formulas in which joint research results may have a wider and more public exploitation

than at the moment, provided that the necessary Intellectual Property (IP) agreements are

respected: this objective is covered by Task 4.5 (Establishment of the confidentiality and

research development activities for private entities). LNEG is leading this task and all the other

partners have a passive role, i.e. to respond to questionnaires and provide comments on

methodologies and outcomes. This task is cross cutting Task 2.8 (IPR management, results

protection and knowledge and technology transfer - industry research centres and user

community) led by DLR and dealing with the same issues, but for research centres. In the case

of Task 2.8, a parallel approach will then be undertaken. This objective is also covered by Task

4.3: this task is focused on spin-offs and aims at identifying the best model for the creation of

spin-offs within the EU-SOLARIS platform. CTAER is leading the task and all the other partners

are providing comments on CTAER’s findings.


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To align the new EU-SOLARIS infrastructures with the technology development needs/demands,

provided that their own fundamental research objectives are also covered: this objective is

covered by Task 4.6. PSA is leading the task and ESTELA is also contributing by providing the

results of the questionnaires undertaken in Task 4.2. All the other partners have a passive role,

i.e. to respond to questionnaires and provide comments on methodologies and outcomes.

Task 4.1: Contacts with the industrial sector. (Leader: ESTELA,

Participants: CTAER, PSA, CNRS, DLR, APTL, CRES, ENEA, LNEG,

U.EVORA, GUNAM, SELCUK U., WEIZMANN)

Task 4.1 aims at showing the state-of-the art of the existing relations between research centres and

industry, and at maintaining and reinforcing the information exchange between both sectors. In this first

period, different questionnaires were planned: on one hand, a questionnaire was sent to the industrials

in order to assess the quality of their relations with research centres. This questionnaire has been done

by ESTELA and is repeated every year at the end of the summer. The first questionnaire took place in

the summer 2013. Another activity consisted in listing the collaboration agreements existing between

industry and research centres. This listing was provided by the consortium itself. Those two activities

gave birth to the first Annual report of RTD centre industry contact. This report will be updated on an

annual basis.

On the other hand, a constant information exchange took place during the different events along the

first period: we can name the Solar Paces Conference in September 2013, the CSP (Concentrated

Solar Power) Today conference in November 2013, the ESTELA annual workshop in June 2013 –

where a presentation of EU-SOLARIS was made to the audience – and other CSP-related conferences

in Europe, where at least one of the EU-SOLARIS partners was represented. Some coordination took

place in this frame with WP6 in charge of communication. Leaflets have been printed by ESTELA at the

beginning: they were targeted to industry. Then CRES created more general leaflets that can be

distributed at any event.

Regarding the events where the EU-SOLARIS project was represented and promoted, four

international conferences could be counted up:

Workshop on Concentrating Solar Power (CSP), 10th of February, 2014, Organized by GÜNAM

at Middle East Technical University – Ankara, Turkey.

ICRI 2014 – 2nd International Conference on Research Infrastructures – 2-4th of April, 2014- Co-

organised by the European Commission and the Greek EU Presidency of the EU – CRES,

CNRS, CIEMAT-PSA and CTAER attending – Athens, Greece.

Industrial Technologies 2014 – Smart Growth through Research and Innovation – 9-11th of April,

2014 – Greek Presidency 2014 event under the auspices of the General Secretariat of Research

& Technology (GSRT) – APTL and Selcuk University attending - Athens, Greece.

Rines – Research and Innovation in the service of Economy and Society European

Neighbourhood – 29-30th of May, 2014 – Co-organised by the General Secretariat for Research

and Technology (GSRT), Ministry of Education and Religious Affairs, Centre for Research and


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Technology Hellas (CERTH), and the Hellenic Centre for Marine Research (HCMR) – APTL,

ESTELA attending – Thessaloniki, Greece.

These activities have contributed establishing a foundation for collaboration improvements with

industry, defining its existing state-of-the-art. This is the necessary basis to take before the next steps

of the project. For this task, the first annual report on RTD centre industry contacts was released on

time and approved. An external deliverable is expected in M38 and will compile all the pieces of

information gathered during this preliminary period.

Task 4.2: Assessment of needs and demands from STE industry. (Leader:

ESTELA, Participants: CTAER, PSA, CNRS, DLR, CRES, ENEA,

GUNAM)

This task intends to assess the needs and demand from the industry, in order to better set up the

modalities of the future EU-SOLARIS platform. The activities that have been achieved so far are on the

one hand the estimation of the forthcoming technology development through a Delphi panel, and on the

other hand the assessment of RI needs for industry in the coming years through a questionnaire. Both

activities were achieved on time.

The first activity – Delphi panel – was a survey targeting both industry and researchers and was raising

technical issues, bottlenecks and constraints hindering the STE technological development. From this

survey, milestone MS20 (Intermediate report on the prospective of the internal technological

development of the CST sector) could be drafted. It has been submitted for official approval on time, in

June 2014 (M20). This survey will be repeated in 2 years’ time.

Regarding the second activity, a questionnaire assessment of RI needs for industry in the coming years

was distributed to a large public at the end of 2013. The outcomes of this survey will be provided to

PSA, as a contribution to their ID foreseen at the end of the project and belonging to Task 4.6. More

details are provided in Task 4.6 section.

In parallel, the follow up of innovative projects is ongoing. The associated Internal Deliverable (Report

of the follow up of industry innovative projects) is expected to be completed in M40. ESTELA has

already begun to gather information on the matter thanks to the elements found on the news websites

and a database has been created in view of the future drafting of the Internal Deliverable. This activity

is cross-cutting with the other activities of the task, as it will contribute to provide a global overview of

the STE future development, both in terms of perceptions (through the Delphi panel) and in terms of

facts (existing innovative projects).

This task is then essential in the global implementation of EU-SOLARIS, since the different views of the

STE industrial development is essential to give the right research and development direction to the

future platform.


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Task 4.3: Spin-offs. (Leader: CTAER, Participants: PSA, ESTELA, CNRS,

CRES, ENEA)

This task led by CTAER, has as a main and final objective the elaboration of a methodology that allows

to spread widely the positive environmental conditions and proactive elements to foster the creation of

spin-offs from the centres during the EU- SOLARIS operative phase.

In order to achieve this objective, a preliminary work has been planned comprising the identification and

analysis of best practices and success stories on New Technology Based Enterprise (NTBE) spin-offs

at the world level as well as a research of prior experiences from the EU-SOLARIS partners.

The results obtained throughout these research actions will strongly contribute to the internal

deliverable (ID.4.3.4) Report of previous experience of spin-off activity, and applicable conclusions

(being drafted and expected by M21).

Within the period covered by this report, main efforts have been focussed on gathering information

about CST-related spin-offs. In order to do so, the following actions have been carried out:

1. Review of the main international studies about spin-offs. Particularly, four relevant studies have

been identified and analysed due to its international relevance. The results obtained from this

analysis have allowed the establishment of a comparison of the number of spin-off created in the

last years offering a general overview of the international scenario.

2. Analysis of CST Technology Spin-offs at European and worldwide levels, leading to the

elaboration of a list of Concentrated Solar Power Spin-offs.

3. Identification of key success and failure factors for the creation and consolidation of spin-offs.

4. In parallel to these research actions, a questionnaire has been elaborated to be distributed

among all EU-SOLARIS partners. The objective of this questionnaire is to gather the most

relevant information from spin-offs identified by the partners, with particular emphasis on the key

success/failure factors already identified

The replies obtained from this questionnaire along with the information from the research phase will

contribute strongly to the identification of the proactive elements that feed the final objective of the task,

which is the elaboration of a methodology to create new spin-offs. The methodology proposed will also

be an important asset for the elaboration of the Report on an improved system for spin-off activities

(MS21 expected by M24).

Activities within this task are being done with the strong collaboration from all partners, and their

contribution will feed also the WP2. Legal status and use access policies, which will be informed of the

analysis and main issues regarding these aspects to be taken into account in the legal establishment of

the new organism.


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Task 4.4: To establish the EU-SOLARIS participation procedures for the

private sector and industry. (Leader: ESTELA, Participants: CTAER,

PSA, CNRS, DLR, CRES, ENEA, WEIZMANN, LNEG, U.EVORA,

GUNAM, SELCUK U.)

The first part of the task is to interview the EU-SOLARIS partners on their previous experience with

industry in order to establish the EU-SOLARIS participation procedures for the private sector and the

industry. The suggestions of the participation procedures will be drafted through the MS22 (Report on

the new mechanisms for increasing future collaboration between research centres and industry) due in

M32 and through the MS24 (Definition for the participation formulas for industry in the operational

phase of EU-SOLARIS) due in M35. A final ID will be released in M42 (Report on recommendations of

industry regarding new IR and research lines).

This preliminary activity consisting in interviewing the partners is under elaboration and the interviews

are undertaken by ESTELA. It has been decided to do the interviews throughout the year 2014. So far,

more than half of the partners have been interviewed, either face to face at the same time as other

meetings, or by Skype conference. The partners interviewed as of today are: LNEG, Evora University,

DLR, ENEA, PSA, CIY, GUNAM, and WEIZMAN institute.

This task is then running normally with respect with timing and contents. Its contribution to the project

as a whole is important, as the rules of participation for the private sector are a pillar of the future

platform.

Task 4.5: To establish the confidentiality and research development

activities for private entities. (Leader: LNEG, Participants: CTAER,

PSA, ESTELA, CNRS, DLR, CRES, ENEA, U.EVORA, SELCUK U)

Task 4.5 is managed by LNEG and intends to establish the confidentiality and research development

activities for private entities. As previously mentioned, this task is similar to Task 2.8. This Task 2.8 (IPR

management, results protection and knowledge and technology transfer - industry research centres and

user community), led by DLR, aims in particular at establishing the protection of the intellectual and

industrial property rights against third parties. The two task leaders decided to unify forces and agree

on a common strategic approach with Task 2.8 dealing with IPR management and results protection

and Task 4.5 with the procedures to ensure confidentiality of the RTD activities.

Task 4.5 activities are scheduled to start during May 2014, thus all the activities related with this task

will begin after the first reporting period. However, during the last 18 months, LNEG coordinated with

ESTELA the definition of the detailed work plan of the task and also with DLR, in order to avoid work

overlaps between Tasks 2.8 and 4.5. Additionally information on practices related with industrial

property in industry and research infrastructures has been exchanged between these three partners in

order to prepare for and enrich the work ahead, which will start on time with no delays forecasted.

The outcome of this task is a milestone, MS23 (Case studies and breakdown of typologies on

confidentiality issues) and is expected in M33.


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Task 4.6: To define ways in which to align the needs of EU-SOLARIS in

order to answer Industry needs. (Leader: PSA, Participants: CTAER,

ESTELA, CNRS, APTL, CRES, ENEA, WEIZMANN, LNEG, U.EVORA)

Task 4.6 is led by PSA and is achieved in close contact with Task 4.2. Indeed, its aim is to define the

ways to align the needs of EU-SOLARIS with the industrial needs. A related ID will be released in M38.

For the first 18 months, the subtask objective was the elaboration of a first draft document about

possible ways to align EU-SOLARIS new research infrastructures and strategy with industrial needs.

During this first reporting period, a First Draft on the recommended ways to Align EU-SOLARIS new

Research Infrastructures and Strategy with Industrial Needs has been developed by PSA. This first

draft of the study proposes a simple structure in three main parts, each focusing on identifying:

1. The needs of the CST industry (to perform this task, the study has started a review of the

strategic RTD agendas of the STE sector, the constraints and incentives in international markets

as well as European Industrial Initiatives already initiated);

2. The already existing alliances, programmes and projects that are intended to contribute to the

improvement of European RTD infrastructures related with CST technologies (among those

considered in this first draft are: EERA-CSP, ESFRI, STAGE-STE, SFERA II, SOLLAB and EU-

SOLARIS);

3. The tools to maintain and / or strengthen the alignment between the needs of industry and

infrastructure development (this task has been initiated by surveying the existing communication

tools such as SETIS or ERKC, but its completion constitutes the real challenge of the Tasks 4.2

and 4.6).

In parallel a tick-box questionnaire was distributed by ESTELA to its associates to identify the priority

fields for the development of RIs for the industry, according to a given list of RTD items that will be

thoroughly detailed in the following subchapters, in order to better align the activities of the EU-

SOLARIS project with the needs of the industry. The answers of 41 persons related to CST sector were

analysed and its results are being incorporated in the first draft document on alignment. This first draft

document will be sent to the partners for comments during June 2014.


There are no deviations from the Annex I as regards the content of this WP.


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Each task leader provided so far the main contribution for its own task. Deliverables and reports are

generally drafted by the task leader related and the other partners reviewed and commented on each

document, according to the approval procedure.

Apart from the documents issued by the WP leader (ESTELA), CTAER did the entire Task 4.3

investigation regarding spin-offs and drafted alone the first version of ID.4.3.4, LNEG is currently putting

its efforts in defining confidentiality issues for industry (although the task begins only after the first

periodic report), and PSA dedicated its efforts in the first draft proposing the alignment of the industry

needs with EU-SOLARIS.

All partners interviewed kindly spent some time to answer to the questions related to their past

experience with industry.


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1.2.5. WP5. Distributed Facility Activity and Logistical Work

1.2.5.1. Objectives

WP5 (Distributed Facility Activity and Logistical Work) aims at preparing the implementation of the EU-

SOLARIS infrastructure through the development of synergies with other ESFRI projects, and other

CST projects within and outside the EU. Additionally, WP5 aims to foster communication with the user

community and particularly to assess their requirements and expectations and determine how to cater

EU-SOLARIS services to meet these needs and expectations. Finally, relevant activities will be carried

out in order to establish effective working methodologies for the EU-SOLARIS infrastructure during its

implementation and operation phase, consisting in identifying the methodology for internal and external

communication, a risk/contingency management and quality control mechanisms, guidelines for the

logistical support for researchers, and e-infrastructure design for data storage and management.

WP5 (Distributed Facility Activity and Logistical Work) deals with aspects focused on the

Implementation phase of the project, in order to facilitate and optimise the scientific user community in

CST sector.

As part of the distributed facility activity of EU-SOLARIS, it is of primary importance to identify the

stakeholder community and build synergies with other ESFRI projects (Task 5.1), research/science

infrastructure facilities or any other related initiatives regarding CST in order to best prepare the

implementation/management of the European CST infrastructure within the European Research Area

(ERA).

One of the fundamental outcomes of EU-SOLARIS will be to provide access to its facilities to the

scientific community in Europe and beyond. For this purpose and to best prepare the creation of the

EU-SOLARIS infrastructure dedicated to its users, one objective of WP5 is to foster communication with

the user community (Task 5.2) and especially to assess their requirements and expectations (Task 5.3)

so that EU-SOLARIS is in line with the user community and can improve the services offered to users.

Additionally, this WP will focus on the establishment of a good working methodology for the EU-

SOLARIS infrastructure during its implementation and operation phase (Task 5.4).


Task 5.1. Relations with related infrastructures or initiatives and possible

synergies (Leader: CNRS, Participants: CRES, GUNAM)

The aim of Task 5.1 is to identify best practices for EU infrastructure projects, identify possible

synergies/collaboration within the EU on CST specifically and identify possible synergies/collaboration

outside the EU on CST specifically. The work will help to enhance/manage the integration of EU-

SOLARIS into the landscape of EU large scale infrastructures.


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The work for this task started in December 2013 with a meeting with the partners involved in this task

(CNRS, CRES and GUNAM). The aim of the meeting was to start working on the first expected Internal

Deliverable ID.5 (Guide of best practices for the implementation of EU-SOLARIS). Different approaches

to deliver the document were detected. Mapping of relevant ESFRI projects already implemented with a

legal structure have started (ECRIN, DARIAH, etc.) to check what are the best practices to follow for the

implementation of EU-SOLARIS. The assessment of the projects on the ESFRI roadmap done by the

Assessment Expert Group (AEG) in 2012 has also been taken into account for the draft of these best

practices and the different fields to evaluate. Following this, direct contact (email or phone) will be made

with the ESFRI projects to check with them their best practices. Work is still being done for this internal

deliverable.

Task 5.2. Relations with user communities (Leader: CyI, Participants:

CNRS, CRES, ENEA)

The aim of Task 5.2 is the creation and maintenance of a database of existing users of CST

technologies, the exploration of new potential users of CST technologies, and the consolidation of these

in a commercial database.

The first action carried out in Task 5.2 was to identify and make an inventory of STE existing users,

collecting the contact details of the existing users of CST and Solar Chemistry Technologies into a

consolidated database. The list of users was broken down into primary (immediate, direct users) and

secondary (those with an indirect connection to CST technologies) that eased the distinction amongst

different entries, all of which have come in contact with the EU-SOLARIS patterns. The data was

collected through an online questionnaire that was distributed amongst the partners between April and

June 2013. The online form can still be accessed online though the following URL:

http://goo.gl/YE95wP. 104 responses were collected from EU-SOLARIS partners at the time of writing.

Their replies were later merged with the results of similar surveys performed for mapping the users of

CST technologies, most notably the work done for the SFERA project. The final database was

formatted, cleaned up and checked by CyI in collaboration with CNRS, and contains around 800

entries.

Further to this inventory of users, the second action undertaken under Task 5.2 was to make an

inventory of CST potential new users, which started in November 2013. This action emphasises on

mapping the potential users of CST technologies. Data collection however did not start during this first

reporting period due to diverging opinions on the definition and methodology of collecting potential

users, and due to the fact that the results of this exercise are dependent on the results of WP3, itself

facing some delays. Nonetheless, the approach taken for Internal Deliverable ID5.2.2 (Report of new

potential users in the EU and worldwide) was to map the potential context / locations for use of CST

technologies, and from that try to derive the most probable users. The data collection for this task was

different to Internal Deliverable ID5.2.1 (Reporting of existing users amongst the EU-SOLARIS

partners) which tapped into already existing knowledge and work performed by other complementary

projects. The potential user landscape was assessed firstly on the basis of mediums (steam, water,

etc.), the conversion technology, the end users and the context. This has led to the creation of a matrix

that was used to produce a list of possible areas in which CST technologies could tap potential users

from. The database collection is still a work in progress.

http://goo.gl/YE95wP


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Finally, the creation of a user database was undertaken, aiming at consolidating the findings of the two

preceding actions and create an online database accessible at first internally to the partners of EU-

SOLARIS. Several Customer Relationship Manager (CRM) solutions were considered with a diverse

array of characteristics. Those included Microsoft Dynamics CRM, Sage Act and On-Contact; some of

the determining factors for choice were:

Ease of use

Import compatibility with Excel-based databases

Web-bases vs premises-based

Cost

In the end Insightly, an online CRM tool was chosen as it fulfilled most of the requirements set, resulting

in the completion of Milestone MS26 (Creation of user database). The database can be accessed at the

following URL: https://8o3e1vsq.insight.ly/. Access is restricted to consortium partners for the time

being.

Task 5.3. Assessment of user needs and demands (Leader: CNRS,

Participants: CyI, CRES, ENEA)

The aim of Task 5.3 is to distribute a questionnaire at European and global levels to assess user

requirements and how they think EU-SOLARIS services should be improved and in which directions, so

that it best fits their needs.

In order to draft the questionnaire, it was necessary to have the list of existing services available and

offered by the partners of EU-SOLARIS. In this sense, this task was strongly linked to Task 3.1

(Assessment and monitoring of existing and new capacities, and all available services and existing

infrastructures in each participant centre) of the WP3 (Capacity building and services). However, the

status report on existing capacities was only expected in M12 in WP3 though the sending of the

questionnaire had to take place in M7. In this sense, CNRS decided to send in June 2013 a basic table

to fill in by all partners and that would list all services and equipment of the partners. The gathering of

this table from each partner took more time than expected and the final table was received in December

2013. Further to that, the questionnaire was finalised in March 2014, which corresponds to the Internal

Deliverable ID.5.3 (Questionnaire: EU-SOLARIS user requirements/needs) and was sent in April 2014

with the platform Survey Monkey (an online survey software). So far, 181 replies have been received.

Further to this questionnaire, another action in this task is to analyse the replies to the questionnaire.

This corresponds to Milestone MS27 (Analysis of the result of the user questionnaire). This work is still

being done.

Task 5.4 Working Methodology for EU-SOLARIS (Leader: CNRS,

Participants: CRES, SELCUK U.)

The aim of Task 5.4 is to focus on the establishment of a good working methodology for the EU-

SOLARIS infrastructure during its implementation and operation phase (internal and external

communication, risk/quality control, logistical support, e-infrastructure).

https://8o3e1vsq.insight.ly/


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The results of this task are expected at the end of the project and so far, no activities are to be reported

for this first periodic report.


Internal Deliverable ID.5.3 (Report questionnaire: EU-SOLARIS user requirements/ needs) which

was expected in M6 and was finally delivered in M17. This is due to links with WP3 and the need

to have results from WP3 but that were planned after the month planned for the questionnaire,

hence generating some delays in the planned schedule of WP5.

Internal Deliverable ID.5.2.1 (Report (listing) of existing users amongst the EU-SOLARIS

partners) which was expected in M7 and was finally delivered in M19 though already created M9

but updated since then. The work was done with only a 2-month delay. All contacts were

received from the partners by M9. Work carried on since then has consisted in updating the

database with new information.

Internal Deliverable ID.5.2.2 (Report (listing) of new potential users, EU and worldwide) which

was expected in M7, postponed to M18 and will finally be delivered during the second reporting

period. Delays is explained here by the difficulties to agree properly on the definition of “New

potential users”.

Milestone MS25 (Sending of user questionnaire) which was expected in M7 and finally delivered

in M18. Delay is explained here by the fact that the drafting of the questionnaire has been

delayed. See previous explanations.

Milestone MS26 (Creation of user database) which was expected by M10, was created in M10

and officially delivered to the consortium in M19. The initial software Insightly was already chosen

in M10 following numerous tests of different platforms. However, further investigations were done

to potentially buy a more advanced software which has delayed slightly the process, since seeing

the price, the choice could not be made rapidly. In the end, the first approached software was

chosen due to its simplicity.

Milestone MS27 (Analysis of the results of the user questionnaire) which was expected in M10

and will finally be delivered during the second reporting period. Delays is explained here by the

fact that the drafting of the questionnaire has been delayed. See previous explanations.


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Within the framework of this WP, collaboration of partners has been quite notable, especially in the

distribution and collection of data from questionnaires. Several internal meetings have been also

arranged among participants towards to a better organization and resources optimization.

In particular, CNRS, CRES and GUNAM physically met and exchanged emails for the task 5.1 leading

to a consolidated action plan. Regarding Task 5.2, CyI, CNRS and ENEA physically met and

exchanged emails further to the meeting to define properly the objectives of the task and the activities

of each partner. CRES was also included in the task force for this Task 5.2 though this partner was

absent from the meeting. All partners from the project have contributed to this task for the gathering of

information on users. CNRS, CyI and ENEA also met in order to carry out Task 5.3. CRES was absent

but included in the further email exchanges. CNRS collaborated with WP3’ partners in order to get

information on the list of services and equipment available at each partner. All partners from the task

contributed to define the activities and actions for this task and helped with the review.

In addition, all partners of the project have contributed to provide all the information on their services

and equipment necessary for the questionnaire.


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1.2.6. WP6. Dissemination and Outreach

1.2.6.1. Objectives

The objectives of WP6 (Dissemination and outreach) are to disseminate EU-SOLARIS results to the EU

community, key professionals, scientific communities, private sector, policy makers and the general

public, and to assist market penetration of the developed technology. To make a complete

dissemination and outreach to a wide audience, the assessment of RI devoted to STE technology

impact is imperative, EU-SOLARIS will analyse the understanding of the conditions necessary to

maximise the impact on employment at local and regional levels, highlighting environmental benefits

wrought by the future distributed research infrastructure and highlighting its responsibility towards

interest groups and stakeholders.

Dissemination of knowledge, which is a component of knowledge translation, focuses on

communicating research results by tailoring the findings and the message to a particular target

audience. Knowledge translation is defined as a dynamic and iterative process that includes synthesis,

dissemination, and exchange of knowledge to improve, in our case, the understanding, the usage and

the benefits of CST technology. This process takes place within a complex system of interactions

between researchers and knowledge users; these interactions may vary in intensity, complexity and

level of engagement depending on the nature of the research and the findings, as well as the needs of

the particular knowledge user. In this context, “knowledge dissemination” involves identifying the

appropriate audience (for research results, implications, etc.) and tailoring the message and medium to

that audience. Public outreach efforts are designed to provide the public with balanced and objective

information to assist them in understanding the problems, alternatives, and/or solutions in a given

situation. Often they are designed to reach a wide audience in order to provide information about

something and/or to acquaint the public with a fact.

When it comes to knowledge dissemination, the following considerations are key points to keep in mind.

Dissemination activities should be considered and outlined in a dissemination plan that focuses on the

needs of the audience that will use the knowledge (and considers how and when knowledge users want

to receive the information). Thus, deliverable D.6.1 (Report on communication plan) will be a detailed

plan of the communication activities that will be carried out in the PP. The approval of the plan will

constitute milestone MS30 (Approval of communication plan for the PP). The plan will be regularly

reviewed on the basis of the project’s evolution and of the acquired new knowledge that will allow

adding new dissemination opportunities, deliverable D.6.3 (Final report on communication plan). The

dissemination tools that will be used to communicate the project’s results are the objectives of the Task

6.1 (Website creation) and Task 6.4 (Dissemination material pack, events and workshops). Primary

dissemination tools include the project’s dedicated web site, milestone MS31 (Creation of website).

Specific dissemination activities that aim in creating maximum awareness of the project’s objectives,

goals and benefits will be produced and internally reported through two internal deliverables: ID.6.4.1

(Report of design, elaboration and production of dissemination material pack) and ID.6.4.2 (Report on

events organised). These include the workshops that will be organised by the project’s consortium, as

well as external events to which partners intend to participate and communicate project outcomes and


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the project European Conference, which constitute the milestone MS33 (EU-SOLARIS Conference). A

dissemination plan/strategy should include a plan to evaluate the impact of the chosen approach and

ways to measure success, thus Task 6.2 (Socio-economic impact assessment and territorial

development) will be focused on the assessment of socio-economic impact of existing/upgraded/future

research infrastructure in the region where it will be located. The milestone MS32 (Impact assessment

on socio-economic and territorial development and fair return) is scheduled. Outreach ensures that the

results of the project and their broader impact are communicated to a larger audience involving the

general public and the society, thus Task 6.3 (Relations with member countries) is concentrated on

information for citizens and relations with member countries and devising the internal deliverable

ID.6.3.1 (Report summary of relations with member countries). Finally, to obtain the most benefit from

the capacity building methodology, training programme development represents the main goal of Task

6.5 (Training). Within this task, one external and three internal deliverables are planned: D.6.5 (Report

on Training Activities), ID.6.5.1 (Survey of existing offer of training on STE and proposal of an EU-

SOLARIS course schedule), ID.6.5.1 (Procedure for an internship programme) and ID.6.5.1 (Proposal

of a framework agreement with several Universities for a doctoral education programme).


During the first eighteenth months of the project, much of the work carried out in WP6 has centred on

devising communication plans to enhance the visibility of EU-SOLARIS. To this end, the EU-SOLARIS

website has been created, within the scope of Task 6.1 (Website creation and web portal development

for the widespread dissemination of EU-SOLARIS) and is accessible at the following address:

www.eusolaris.eu. The creation of the website constitutes project milestone 31, which was achieved

with only minor delay (in M12, or October 2013, instead of M10, August 2013). Although the website is

“live”, the content and structure will see further development and elaboration as the project progresses.

As regards devising the project’s external communication and dissemination strategies, a

communication plan for the Preparatory Phase of EU-SOLARIS was devised and elaborated as part of

Task 6.4 (Dissemination material pack, events and workshops), led by CRES. Results of this task

formed the basis for project deliverable D6.1 (Report on Communication Plan), which was submitted to

the European Commission in October 2013.

Preliminary work related to identifying existing training on STE technologies in Europe has also been

undertaken within the context of Task 6.5 (Training), a survey of existing training programs is currently

(at the time of writing) being conducted with EU-SOLARIS partners, led by U.EVORA. The information

collected will highlight the breadth and scope of prospective training EU-SOLARIS could provide on

STE technologies in Europe and propose an EU-SOLARIS course schedule, and will form the basis for

the internal deliverable (A survey of existing offers of training on STE and proposal of an EU-SOLARIS

course schedule) to be submitted in October 2014 (M24).

Activities to be undertaken in the remaining project lifetime will largely consist in the commencement of

work related to assessing the socio-economic impact of a future EU-SOLARIS, to fostering relations

with member countries, and furthering the development of prospective training programs to be offered

by EU-SOLARIS. As regards work to be carried out in assessing the socio-economic impact of existing

research infrastructures, the activity started in February 2013 (M13), being connected to project

milestones MS15 (Status report on existing capacities, technological and human resources) and MS16

(Report containing portfolio of existing available technical services of partner centres), are both



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scheduled to be achieved in M12. Thus the project milestone MS32 (Impact assessment on socio-

economic and territorial development and fair return) will be reached with only a minor delay (in M24, or

October 2014, instead of M21, July 2014). Work in devising a development plan for the local integration

of new research infrastructures will start after achieving the project milestone MS17 and MS18, namely

in February 2015 (M26). As regards fostering relations with member countries, work will focus on

initiating dialogues between EU-SOLARIS and national, regional, European, and international

authorities.

Task 6.1: Website creation (web portal development for the widespread

dissemination of EU-SOLARIS). (Leader: CRES, Participants: CTAER,

ESTELA, ENEA)

CRES has elaborated the website of the project according to the description of task 6.1 in the DoW

(see Figure 4). A draft template was prepared by CRES and it was sent to all partners for comments.

For this scope, CRES had started a discussion in Smartsheet, the project’s internal collaborative

workspace system (see section 1.3 Project Management for more information) asking from partners

their opinion on the website template and content. The current version, available in www.eusolaris.eu,

is the outcome of the abovementioned discussion.

Project website relevant issues were discussed at all project meetings, where all partners contributed

with their opinion. Currently, the website is activated and running, since 15th October 2013, and its

content is being continuously updated On April 2014, a Google Analytics’ account was created in order

to monitor the number of visits and enhance, by the results, the dissemination of EU-SOLARIS. During

the period 1st April – 8th June 2014 there were 463 visits, distributed in different countries as shown in

Figure 3 and in



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Table 1.

Figure 3: EU-SOLARIS website visits during April-May 2014


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Table 1: EU-SOLARIS website visits in the “top 10” countries with the highest number of visits

# Country/Territory Visits % of total

1 Spain 115 25%

2 Greece 109 24%

3 Germany 23 5%

4 Brazil 18 4%

5 France 18 4%

6 Italy 16 3%

7 Portugal 16 3%

8 Belgium 15 3%

9 United States 14 3%

10 Australia 8 2%

Total visits 352 76%

The website is of crucial importance in order to enhance the visibility of EU-SOLARIS as it will serve as

the main communication tool for the wide dissemination of the project deliverables and outcomes. This

portal will be a reference for the sector, providing original content to the scientific communities, policy

makers, professionals, academic and researchers, market actors and general public.

Although full functionality of the website will be fulfilled during the Implementation phase of the project,

the website is already active and continuously updated since it is improving and adding new content

and pages.

CRES has recently prepared a progress report on the website, where certain issues were set for

discussion/decision. The progress report was sent to all the involved partners at this task and within the

following period it is expected to lead to further improvement of the website.

So far, the website includes information on the project scope, activities and partners, the RTD potential,

and the project outcomes. The structure of the website contains the following sections:

Home page

Welcoming page and description of EU-SOLARIS

About EU-SOLARIS

Objectives, Partners, EU-SOLARIS activities, project publishable outcomes (so far project leaflets

and project presentation)

Technology

Solar Potentials, technologies of Parabolic Trough, Central Receivers, Linear Fresnel Collectors,

Parabolic Dishes, Solar Chemistry / Solar fuels

RTD Infrastructures

Library


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Reports, Legislation, CST links, Multimedia gallery

Contact

Most of the above pages are already activated and the rest of them will also be available, after all

partners agree on their content. So far, the website includes:

Information on the project, work progress and achieved results.

A map of research centres in EU-SOLARIS

Statistical data and studies, related to Renewable Energy Sources (RES) and solar thermal

technologies

News and announcements

Project deliverables (for now no publishable deliverable is available but a dissemination material

pack, such as leaflets, is already uploaded)

Partners will discuss within the next period website content, such as radiation maps, financial

information, project toolkit, best practices in field of CST technologies and photo gallery of them, etc.

Figure 4: EU-SOLARIS website homepage

Concluding, Task 6.1 (Web-site creation) was carried out successfully and according the plan described

in the DoW of the project. CRES, as task leader, has coordinated the actions needed for the elaboration

of the task and created the website, as described above. CTAER and ESTELA have contributed in the

task, by their comments and by exchanging knowledge and information on the website content. All

partners have also given their comments on the website template and content.


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Task 6.2: Socio-economic impact assessment and territorial development.

(Leader: ENEA, Participants: CTAER, CRES)

The work within this task is mainly concentrated during the last two years of the project life. It can be

divided in two main activity lines:

To analyse the social, economic and environmental impact of research infrastructures (existing,

upgraded and future) in the regions where they are located

To develop a plan for the harmoniously local integration of new research infrastructure, and the

upgrading of the existing ones, in the region where they will be implemented, prioritising the local

training and employment and information programmes for local industry on CST technology

opportunity in order to supply the nearby infrastructure

The first line of the activities started in February 2014. Indeed, to identify a socio-economic impact

assessment of the existing research infrastructures within EU-SOLARIS consortium a map of those

entities is needed. Thus the work associated to this task have started just after the elaboration of the

reports Status report on existing capacities, technological and human resources, and Report containing

portfolio of existing available technical services of partner centres, which constitute the project

milestones MS15 and MS16 respectively, achieved on M12. An analysis of the above mentioned report

emphasised the extreme unbalancing of geographically distribution of RIs devoted to CST technology.

More than 90% is located in Spain. Thus to evaluate the impact it has been decided to focus the

attention on that country, with a small contribution from Italy and France. The data needed to perform

the assessment will be extrapolated by ESTELA, SolarPACES and International Energy Agency

publications. In parallel information’s from CTAER, MINECO and other Spanish institutional entities that

can provide data on employment trend in the region where the RIs are located will be needed. The work

associated to the second line of the activity will begin on M26 and again is strictly connected to WP3.

Indeed the reports Report containing the portfolio of available technical services as EU-SOLARIS and

Report on recommendation plan for development and upgrades, complementarities and synergies,

which constitute the milestones MS17 and MS18 respectively, will serve as a starting point.

Task 6.3: Relations with member countries. (Leader: ENEA Participants:

CTAER, APTL, CRES)

This task should contribute to the increase in the deployment of CST technology as an important

instrument for the reduction of European energy dependence and development of employment, notably

in depressed areas. Thus, as part of the dissemination and outreach activities within the project, and

with the aim of approaching the non-scientific community in order to present them with the main

concepts and implications of EU-SOLARIS, meetings, relationships and discussions between EU-

SOLARIS and national, regional, European and International authorities will be arranged. As results a

consequential dissemination methodology has to be approached. Indeed, within this task a more

intensive knowledge dissemination is involved, by using activities such as stakeholder briefings,

educational sessions with decision or policy makers and exchange discussions by engaging scientific-

technological advisory services for public authorities and industrial organisations.


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The work within this task is manly concentrated during the third year of the project life and as an

internal deliverable, ID.6.3.1 (Report summary of relations with member countries) will be elaborated

and submitted in M34.

Task 6.4: Dissemination material pack, events and workshops. (Leader:

CRES, Participants: All partners)

CRES has prepared the leaflet of the project, described in task 6.4 (Dissemination material pack,

events and workshops) of the DoW (see Figure 5). For this, a draft version was initially created by

CRES and distributed to the partners for comments through a Smartsheet discussion and e-mails. All

partners gave their comments and finally approved the leaflet which is now available in high resolution

electronic format in the project’s document repository tool Box in order to be able to print it “in-house”.

Moreover all partners are about to receive 100 printed copies in recycled paper. The delivered project

leaflet provides general information about EU-SOLARIS, such as scope, activities, objectives, vision,

involved key actors, project details and partners of the project. It is addressed to industry’ stakeholders,

key professionals, scientific communities, policy makers, general public and students.

The project leaflet is uploaded in the project website (http://www.eusolaris.eu/About/Outcomes.aspx)

and it has been already distributed in several project events. The leaflet was actually prepared earlier

than the foreseen month in the DoW, in order to be widely disseminated throughout the project period.

Figure 5: EU-SOLARIS project leaflet

Another leaflet for industrial dissemination was also created during the project (see Figure 6). This

leaflet, which was named as “EU-SOLARIS Industry Leaflet”, was prepared by ESTELA with the

contribution of all partners and it also available in the website of the project. This leaflet is more oriented

http://www.eusolaris.eu/About/Outcomes.aspx


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to the industrial audience. For this, the leaflet strengthens the expected benefits for industry from the

EU-SOLARIS project. It also includes project details, the scope of the project and information on how to

participate in the project.

Figure 6: EU-SOLARIS project industry-oriented leaflet

Included in the dissemination material pack available so far is a PowerPoint presentation of EU-

SOLARIS which is used in the conferences and in the workshops of the project (see Figure 7). This

presentation includes:

EU-SOLARIS scope, vision,goals and the suitable governance model

Project details for the Preparatory Phase and Operational Phase

The EU-SOLARIS Consortium ansdthe Geographical distribution of EU-SOLARIS partners

EU-SOLARIS Governance structure and brief summaries of each WP of the project

Description of the Concentrating Solar Thermal (CST) and Solar Chemistry technologies

Visual material of EU-SOLARIS partners’ infrastructures/facilities


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Figure 7: Extract of the EU-SOLARIS PowerPoint presentation template

For dissemination purposes a roll-up4 of the project was also created by CTAER within the first months

of the project. All partners gave their feedback before the final version of it was available. The roll-up

includes basic information of EU-SOLARIS, such as the scope of the project, partners logos and

pictures of partners’ infrastructures/facilities (see Figure 8). The EU-SOLARIS roll-up is widely used in

the project events and workshops described in the following paragraphs.

4 Roll-up template available in the project’s document repository tool Box and upon request to the EU-SOLARIS Project Office

([email protected]).



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Figure 8: EU-SOLARIS roll-up

EU-SOLARIS partners have attended several events and workshops so far (see Table 2 and Figure 9).

During these events and workshops, EU-SOLARIS partners have focused on the following points:

Definition and assessment of the EU-SOLARIS active and voluntary contribution to social,

economic and environmental improvement, emphasising the societal benefits brought by the

project, which will bring added value in terms of sustainability. This includes specific issues such

as the assessment of land-use, water use, etc., as well as other relevant matters such as existing

life-cycles studies.

To maximise the social and environmental benefits brought by EU-SOLARIS and highlight the

organisation’s responsibility towards interest groups and stakeholders.

To foster the role of EU-SOLARIS as a facilitator of coordination and collaboration of related


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interests and stakeholders.

Table 2: EU-SOLARIS Events/Conferences

#

Event Title Date Called by

EU-SOLARIS attending partner(s)

Place Website

1 CSP Today Seville

2013

12-13th of

November,

2013

CSP Today CIEMAT-PSA,

ESTELA,

CTAER

Seville,

Spain

www.csptoday.com

2 Workshop on

Concentrating

Solar Power (CSP)

10th of

February,

2014

GÜNAM GÜNAM Ankara,

Turkey

www.gunam.metu.ed

u.tr/cspworkshop

3 ICRI 2014 - 2nd

International

Conference on

Research

Infrastructures

2-4th of

April, 2014

Co-organised by the EC

and the Greek EU

Presidency of the EU

CRES, CNRS,

CIEMAT-PSA

and CTAER

Athens,

Greece

www.icri2014.eu/

4 Industrial

Technologies 2014

- Smart Growth

through Research

and Innovation

9-11th of

April, 2014

Greek Presidency 2014

event under the

auspices of the General

Secretariat of Research

& Technology (GSRT)

APTL and

SELCUM U

Athens,

Greece

www.industrialtechnol

ogies2014.eu/

5 CSP Today Cape

Town, South Africa

9th of April,

2014

CSP Today. Solar

Thermal Energy

Research Group.

Stellenbosch University

CTAER Cape Town,

South Africa

www.csptoday.com/s

outhafrica/

6 Rines - Research

and Innovation in

the service of

Economy and

Society European

Neighbourhood

29-30th of

May, 2014

Co-organised by the

General Secretariat for

Research and

Technology (GSRT),

Ministry of Education

and Religious Affairs,

Centre for Research and

Technology Hellas

(CERTH), and the

Hellinic Centre for

Marine Research

(HCMR)

APTL, ESTELA Thessaloniki

, Greece

www.rines.gr


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Figure 9: EU-SOLARIS booth in the Event: ICRI 2014

For better dissemination of the events three tools have been created:

Events Calendar: CTAER has created an “Events Calendar” in Smartsheet, in which all EU-

SOLARIS partners are asked to fill in the required information of the event, in order to coordinate

the different possibilities to attend each event and to agree which will be the best representation

for EU-SOLARIS (see Figure 10).

Figure 10: EU-SOLARIS Smartsheet Events Calendar


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Events Report: Partners that have attended an event are then asked to fill in a template of a

report on the event. This template was created by CTAER and consists in two sections (before

and after events). It is available in the project’s document repository tool Box. Its purpose to have

a monitoring and control events at which EU-SOLARIS partners are attending.

Events webpage: A webpage has been created by CRES. It is periodically updated with input

from the “Events Calendar” on Smartsheet and the created “Events Reports” for past and

forthcoming events. Within the following period, a calendar will also be available in the home

page of the website (see Figure 11).

Figure 11: EU-SOLARIS Events webpage

The next steps for the Task 6.4 (Dissemination material pack, events and workshops), include actions

like the creation of a project poster and the participation in future events and workshops, in order to

disseminate EU-SOLARIS results as broadly as possible to the EU community, key professionals,

scientific communities, private sector, policy makers and the general public.

CRES, as lead beneficiary for deliverable D6.1 (Report on communication plan)5 has created a report

on the communication plan for the project. The report on Communication Plan offers the project plan for

dissemination activities of the EU-SOLARIS scope and results in the framework of the WP6




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(Dissemination & Outreach). The overall objectives of this WP are to disseminate the EU-SOLARIS

results to the EU community, key professionals, scientific communities, private sector, policy makers

and the general public and assist the market penetration of the developed technologies. This report

includes a detailed plan of the communication activities that will be carried out in the Preparatory Phase

of the project. The deliverable was prepared according to the foreseen procedures of the project and its

final version was approved by the Coordinator and the EC).

Concluding, Task 6.4 (Dissemination material pack, events and workshops) was carried out

successfully and according the plan described in the DoW of the project. CRES, as task leader, has

coordinated the actions needed for the elaboration of the task and created the foreseen dissemination

material pack, as described above. It has also coordinated and collected the information from all

partners on the conducted events/conferences during this reporting period. The elaboration of the

outcomes of the events is scheduled for the next period report, when it is expecting to have more

reports on the conducted events.

Task 6.5 Training (Leader: U.EVORA, Participants: All partners)

Within this task, U.EVORA conducted a survey on existing CST training offers. An online questionnaire,

whose contents were approved by the WP leader (ENEA), was created and distributed among EU-

SOLARIS partners, aiming at a preliminary mapping of the available STE related training actions. By

January 2014, the questionnaire had 26 entries (regarding mostly European countries, but including

also non-European actions in Egypt, USA, Dubai, Mexico or South Africa), classified according to:

Type of action: 1% seminar/workshop; 31% technical training; 58% university course; 8% other;

Target audience: 4% Industry; 12% Engineers; 4% Technicians; 69% Students; 12% other;

STE Focus: 38% devoted STE actions; 62% actions with STE related contents;

Online action: 23% online training; 77% on site training;

Duration: 27% up to 1 week; 19% up to 3 months; 15% up to 1 year; 38% more than 1 year;

Attendance costs: 4% free; 96% not free;

Access to qualification: 31% no qualification; 12% professional; 8% University degree; 38%

Master Degree; 8% PhD; 4% other.

The questionnaire served as the basic structure to a Training Offer Database, being permanently fed by

partner’s contributions of course announcements gathered from different supports (mailing lists,

journals, websites, etc.). It constitutes an internal deliverable, ID.6.5.1 (Survey of existing offer of

training on STE and proposal of an EU-SOLARIS course schedule), which has to be submitted by M24.

Beside the training offer survey, U.EVORA already outlined the contents of a long duration Pre-Doctoral

EU-SOLARIS course, including:

Module 1: Solar Resource (solar radiation, available databases, site measurement);


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Module 2: Solar Concentration Optics (Definition of concentration, Concentration limits, Ideal

concentrators, Line-focus systems, Point-focus systems, Secondary concentrators);

Module 3: Solar Concentrator Materials (Absorbers, Mirrors, Glazing, Optical properties, Thermal

properties);

Module 4: Heat Transfer Fluids (Water, Thermal oil, Molten Salts, Other HTF’s, Thermal

properties, Operating pressure, Safety/operation issues);

Module 5: Power Block (Thermodynamic cycles, Working fluids, Expander efficiency, Cooling dry,

water, Power generator);

Module 6: Thermal Storage (Solid storage, Molten-salt storage, Vapour storage, Storage

dimensioning);

Module 7: Grid Connection (Dispatch ability, Power Grid analysis);

Module 8: Plant Simulation and In-line Prediction (Simulation models, Simulation tools, Plant

simulation and dimensioning, Real time production prediction);

Module 9: Plant Layout and Hybridisation;

Module 10: Plant Operation and Maintenance;

Module 11: CSP Overview (Existing plants, New projects, Incentive schemes, National programs,

Component cost trends).

These contents, under discussion with WP leader (ENEA) are also the base for the definition of a more

specific (and deepened) Doctoral Program.

These actions will fulfil the contents of deliverable D.6.2 (Training activities).


Each task leader provided so far the main contribution for its own task. The task leader generally drafts

the related deliverables and reports and the other partners reviewed and commented on each

document, according to the approval procedure. Apart from the documents issued by the WP leader

(ENEA), CRES did the entire work devoted to the web site creation as well as the elaboration of the

project leaflet and poster alone. The contractual deliverable D.6.1 (Report on communication plan), was

drafted by CRES and elaborated by ENEA. U.EVORA designed the questionnaire to conduct a survey

on the existing training offer by itself and is currently cooperating with ENEA to define an EU-SOLARIS

course schedule. ENEA is putting its efforts in defining the suitable methodology to assess the socio-

economic impact of CST related RIs with a strong support from CTAER. All partners interviewed kindly

spent some time to answer to the questions related to their past experience with dissemination and

outreach activities.


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1.2.7. WP7. Technical Design of STE Research

Infrastructure and Research Activities

1.2.7.1. Objectives

The objectives of WP7 (Technical design of STE research infrastructure and research activities), are to

analyse and assess possible innovations in software, research tools and processes as they relate to the

technical design of CST Research Infrastructures and research activities, in addition to developing a

roadmap for implementation and validation. WP7 also aims to define and design optimised high

performance test facility components to provide top-level experimental opportunities for RTD to both

industry and the scientific research community. Ultimately, this WP will undertake the conceptual

development of prioritised projects.


WP7 is due to start in M20. As such, and for the purposes of this First Project Periodic Report,

information pertinent to the progress of WP7 is not applicable and has been intentionally omitted. This

notwithstanding, projections for WP7 are briefly explained below.

WP7 will start to prepare the planning for future new and upgraded facilities in the second half of the

second project year (in M20). In collaboration with the ongoing activities in WP3, WP4 and WP5, in

Task 7.1 (Innovative processes and software), the analysis and assessment of possible innovations in

software, research tools and processes in CST technology development will begin. An overview on

present dominating methodologies and processes for CST system sizing, component and system

performance testing and evaluation as well as system configuration, operation and maintenance will be

prepared. This will serve as basis for the analysis of improvement and innovation potential, leading in

the following project phases to the development of a roadmap for the implementation of such

improvements.

The work in Task 7.2 (Technical design for new or upgraded research facilities) will start with the

reviewing of the analysis of current RI infrastructure capabilities and the identified needs of user

communities from industry and research communities, in close collaboration with the respective

analysis and developed questionnaires of WP3, WP4 and WP5. The first phase of Task 7.2 will

contribute to complete all information on possible new and upgraded designs to prepare the SC election

of a prioritized list of initial conceptual designs of infrastructure upgrades for further elaboration during

the following project phases. The initial designs shortlisted after SC selection for further elaboration will

than be developed in further detail under consideration of cost, specific local factors and technical

requirements to develop conceptual designs for detailed planning of their realization in the following

project phases.


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1.3. Project Management

The management activities throughout the Preparatory Phase are integrated within WP8

(Management). For this first reporting period, the management activities have been focused on the

overall project management and coordination activities, establishment of internal communication

procedures, communication with the EC and reporting, establishing quality control mechanisms and a

risk and contingency management plan for the EU-SOLARIS Preparatory Phase.

1.3.1. Consortium management tasks and achievements

A central Project Office, established in Seville at CTAER’ premises, is responsible for all aspects of the

financial, administrative and general management aspects of the project. The Project Office serves as

the central contact point for all project partners and is the main contact with the EC, acting as liaise

between the EC and partners.

The major tasks and achievements fulfilled within this WP during these eighteen (18) first months of the

project can be described as follows:

Efficient management and scheduling of the work carried out in the project;

Development of the Consortium organisation for the Preparatory Phase;

Production of an EU-SOLARIS Preparatory Phase Quality Plan at the beginning of the project

and maintaining the project activity plan according to the stated procedures, to ensure the

efficient and timely achievement of the project milestones. This Plan includes a mid-term decision

of go or no-go according to the viability of the project in accordance with the governance, legal

status and economic aspects related to the implementation phase;

Ensuring the correct administration of the project finances, including the preparation of budgets

and regular financial monitoring and reporting;

Transparent financial management, including financial allocation amongst each partner and

resource justification;

Regular and timely interfacing communication with the EC regarding deliverables, milestones and

reporting;

Efficient and smooth internal communication, information flow and relevant documentation;

Coherent preparation of major reports encompassing multiple WPs, in particular of the final

reports regarding the implementation and operation of EU-SOLARIS;

Preparation of documents for forum meetings and reports of these meetings, as well as relevant

public relations:

Establishment of the decision making rules for the project technical design assessment and

selection to be developed during the EU-SOLARIS Preparatory Phase.


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In line with Milestone MS4 (Quality Assurance (QA) Plan)6 objective, within the framework of this WP, a

series of standards and procedures to assure the quality of communication and documentation have

been developed from an early stage of the project, being fully running and used by the consortium. A

brief summary of the main tools generated is described below:

Tool and procedures to assure the quality of communication:

Email distribution lists

Online collaborative environment (Smartsheet and Box)

Voice-video conferencing (Webex)

Online meeting coordination (Doodle)

Mailing documents to coordinating entity

Stardards and procedures to assure the quality of documentation.

Templates for Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents (see below for more information)

File-naming convention (see below for more information)

Project logos

Standardized statement of financial support

Procedures to manage contractual documentation

Some other major achievements to be highlighted for this reporting period are described below:

Constitution of the EU-SOLARIS Advisory Board for Technical and International Cooperation:

The Advisory Board for Technical and International Cooperation is comprised of senior

experts/scientists with international experience in research related to Concentrating Solar

Thermal technologies at large, including Solar Chemistry, and aims to offer the project the added

value of knowledgeable peer guidance and review. In addition to being kept abreast of significant

project-related developments, Advisory Board members will take part in the EU-SOLARIS

Steering Committee meeting, once a year, with a view to contributing their expertise and insights

to relevant discussions. Considering the limited availability of the prospective members, the

project will aim to convene meetings via electronic means, or in conjunction with major

international CST events.

Below are listed the institutions from to which belong the members of this Advisory Board:

Solar Thermal Energy Research Group, Stellenbosch University, South Africa

Renewable Energy Division, International Energy Agency

University of Chile

Concentrating Solar Power. Program Manager. Sandia National Laboratories

CSIRO Energy Technology

Constitution of the EU-SOLARIS Advisory Board for Funding and Administration:

Steps towards the establishment and constitution of the EU-SOLARIS Advisory Board for

Funding and Administration have been implemented in this period. The Advisory Board is

comprised of representatives from regional and national governments and funding bodies of the

EU-SOLARIS partners. MINECO, the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness,


http://blogs.sun.ac.za/sterg/about/

http://www.iea.org/aboutus/faqs/renewableenergy/

http://ingenieria.uchile.cl/departamentos/87714/ingenieria-mecanica

http://energy.sandia.gov/?page_id=2445

http://www.csiro.au/Organisation-Structure/Divisions/Energy-Technology.aspx



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officially invited the national nominees to participate as members of this Board, in line with the

appointments communicated by each partner represented in the consortium. Official

communications from MINECO have been done with slight delays due to different circumstances

mainly related to political restructuring decisions which have affected some of the previous

nominees appointed by partners. This unexpected circumstance has led to new nominations and

consequently some delays in the communication from the Ministry.

The first meeting of this Advisory Board took place in Madrid, coinciding with EU-SOLARIS

Workshop on Financing Sources held in Madrid, on the 24th of June. CTAER closely worked with

MINECO in all communication and logistic arrangements requested by this important action.

Brainstorming session on the vision of the EU-SOLARIS project:

After a first discussion held during the 2nd SC meeting, held in June 2013 in Thessaloniki, all

partners were invited to send a summary of their perspectives on the future EU-SOLARIS. A first

list of considerations regarding what EU-SOLARIS should be and what functions it should seek to

exercise once it is constituted was subsequently drafted by the project Coordinator and circulated

to all partners. The project Coordinator called afterwards all SC member to a brainstorming

session, conducted on the 20th of February 2014 via Webex, in order to provide a more focused

opportunity for each EU-SOLARIS partner to articulate their vision of the future EU-SOLARIS.

The proposed activity aimed to identify points of convergence and divergence, with the view to

reaching consensus, as a Consortium, on what the future EU-SOLARIS will be. The conclusions

of this brainstorming are summarised in section 1.2.1, in the description of the progress of work

in WP1.

1.3.2. Problems and envisaged solutions

In the framework of the elaboration of MS4 (Quality Assurance Plan), a Risk Analysis and Contingency

Plan7 has been drafted. The management, assessment and contingency planning are seen as matters

of crucial importance. They are essential to ensure that risks would be identified, prevented and

mitigated, and where risk mitigation is not feasible, to reduce the impact on the timetable that has been

laid down. Effective risk management increases the likelihood of success of a project. Based on this

argument, risks and threatens already identified during this reporting period are already being tackled

by the project Coordinator and the Project Office, as explained below:

As observed in sections described above, some minor delays have been identified particularly in certain

tasks within the framework of WP3 (EU-SOLARIS Capacity Building and Services) and WP5

(Distributed Facility Activity and Logistical Work). These delays have only slightly hindered the desirable

overall running of the project and it is not considered they have generated a significant impact on other

tasks and, consequently towards the main objectives for the period and future endeavours.




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In terms of communication management and information exchange among partners, some difficulties in

the proper use of the communication tools created with the aim of offering a centralised platform of

information were identified at the beginning of the project. Extra technical support has been given by

the Project Office at any time during the project in order to provide additional information as well as

partner-personalised clarifications that helped to meet the quality standards established at an early

stage of the project.

Another key factor to be strongly supervised is the interaction between WPs. In this regard, the Project

Office, using the communication tools, is assuming a supervisor role in order to monitor and foster

narrow collaboration among partners. Efforts in this particular aspect will be kept, since strong

collaboration is seen as a crucial factor for the success of the project.

1.3.3. Changes in the consortium, if any;

For this first reporting period, no change in the consortium has been identified.

1.3.4. Project meetings

Steering Committee meetings:

The Steering Committee (SC) is the highest decision making body during the Preparatory Phase of EU-

SOALRIS. It is comprised of a representative from each of the partners and chaired by the Coordinator.

The SC meets biannually in order to guide/steer and vote/discuss all important matters in EU-

SOLARIS. The SC is informed of all relevant issues, and presented reports for their approval, during

the whole Preparatory Phase by the Coordinator.

During this reporting period, and in line with the contractual obligations to hold SC meetings biannually

as outlined in the Consortium Agreement (Section 3.2.2 Decision making in the Steering Committee)

and Grant Agreement (Section 2.1.3, Decision making and responsibilities, p.18 of 59), the Coordinator

convened four (4) such meetings on the following dates:

Kick off meeting and 1st SC meeting: 4th of December 2012, held Seville, Spain, hosted by

CTAER (a photo of the meeting appears below);


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Figure 12: 1st EU-SOLARIS Steering Committee Meeting, Seville.

2nd SC meeting: 20th of June 2013, held in Thessaloniki, Greece, hosted by APTL (a photo of the

meeting appears below);

Figure 13: 2nd EU-SOLARIS Steering Committee Meeting, Thessaloniki.


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3rd SC meeting: 15th of November 2013, held in Seville, Spain, hosted by CTAER (a photo of the

meeting appears below).

Figure 14: 3rd EU-SOLARIS Steering Committee Meeting, Seville.

4rd SC meeting: 20th of March 2013, Istanbul, Turkey, hosted by GUNAM (a photo of the meeting

appears below).

Figure 15: 4th EU-SOLARIS Steering Committee Meeting, Istanbul.

The main topics discussed at the SC meetings during the reporting period have been:

The cooperation between EU-SOLARIS partners’ institutions and their contribution to the project;

The management of the work plan and the available resources, as well as the general progress

of the Preparatory Phase of EU-SOLARIS;

The definition of a common vision of the future EU-SOLARIS infrastructure;

The communication with the EC, the cooperation with other projects, and the dissemination of

foreground.

Although the SC had the possibility to take its decisions by voting, this has not been necessary during


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the reporting period since all the debates led to consensus positions among SC members. Some of the

major issues addressed and decisions taken by the SC included:

Review and approval of all official document and reports and fundamental project actions;

All budget-related matters;

Planning of major contributions to dissemination events;

Structure and restructuring of the WPs, tasks and subtasks.

Project Management Committee meetings:

The Project Management committee (PMC) is the executive body of the project. It is comprised of all

WP leaders, chaired by the Coordinator and assisted by the Project Office. The main objective of the

PMC is to ensure adequate communication and understanding across WPs and to provide a platform

for critical technical appraisal.

In the first 18 months of the project, and in line with the EU-SOLARIS consortium’s contractual

obligations to hold PMC meetings at least every six months as outlined in the Grant Agreement (Annex

I, DoW, p.19 of 59), the Coordinator has convened four (4) such meetings on the following dates:

1st PMC meeting: 9th of April 2013, via Webex (tele-conference);

2nd PMC meeting: 13th of June 2013, via Webex (tele-conference);

3rd PMC meeting: 14th of November 2013, Seville, Spain, hosted by CTAER.

4rd PMC meeting: 19th of March 2013, Istanbul, Turkey, hosted by GUNAM

The main topics discussed at the PMC meetings during the reporting period have been:

The monitoring of the work plan, as well as the technical progress of the project’s tasks and

results (milestones, external and internal deliverables);

The changes in the work plan and rescheduling or redefinition of Milestones and Deliverables

when necessary;

The coordination between consortium partners and their technical contribution to the project;

The coordination of technical solutions across all WPs;

The bottlenecks identified to achieved the expected results, identifying areas of particular

technical risk;

The schedule of the upcoming activities and tasks;

Other meetings:

In addition to physical meetings, several conference calls between WP leaders and the EU-SOLARIS

Project Office and Coordinator, or with small groups of partners were organised in order to address

urgent technical issues. The combination of regular physical meetings with conference calls to address

urgent ad hoc issues has proven to be an efficient way of managing the project at a higher level. This

practice will therefore be continued during the subsequent reporting periods.


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1.3.5. Communication between beneficiaries

As explained in the project Deliverable 8.1 (First Annual Management Report)8, in order to facilitate the

internal management of work as well as to ensure the consistency and information transparency among

the consortium, a number of internal collaborative tools and procedures have been established from the

beginning of the project, which can be summarised as follows:

Email distribution lists:

The Project Office created specific email distribution lists to facilitate appropriate and efficient email

correspondence. All project partners are able to send email correspondence to each distribution list.

Internal collaborative workspace system (Smartsheet and Box)

The Project Office established an internal collaborative workspace system for the secure exchange of

project information, project results, deliverables, meeting minutes, etc. The online collaborative

environment is based on Smartsheet, an enterprise-ready cloud application for project management

and collaboration which uses a spreadsheet-like user-interface to track and facilitate the management

of task lists, information, and event schedules. The Smartsheet-based collaboration environment, as

previously mentioned, serves all EU-SOLARIS partners as a clear reference and rapid indicator of the

work progress and its degree of completion. It also serves as a central point for orderly discussion of

project issues. A screenshot can be found in Figure 16 below:

Figure 16: Screenshot of Smartsheet user-interface

The online document storage and retrieval tool of the EU-SOLARIS project is Box, which allows for

storing of project documents in a single online location, facilitating document exchange without having

to exchange emails. By default each partner’s main project contact and SC contact are given access

rights to the document repository in Box. A screenshot can be found in Figure 17 below.




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Figure 17: Screenshot of Box internal collaborative tool

Voice-video conferencing

The video and tele-conferencing tool that used for the EU-SOLARIS project is Webex. The Project

Office is responsible for scheduling and convening all meetings conducted via Webex. Examples of

meetings convened thus far via Webex are the 1st and 2nd PMC meetings, and individual meetings with

consortium’s partners.

1.3.6. Project planning and status

With the aim to facilitate close monitoring and supervision of WPs’ progress by the Project Office, each

WP leader has elaborated in detail the planning of their WPs and the Coordinator, assisted by the

Project Office, has integrated these detailed WP plans into one consistent Project Activity Plan.

To this end, the Project Office designed a standard Detailed Work Plan template, requesting WP

leaders to provide a more detailed and concise schedule of expected work to be carried out by breaking

down task activities, as they appear in the DoW, into sub-task levels and providing corresponding dates

for completion of each sub-task. Detailed Work Plans for each WP were submitted in February 2013,

providing the basis for the information to be transferred into Smartsheet, the online collaborative

environment of the EU-SOLARIS project, which now serves all EU-SOLARIS partners as a clear

reference and rapid indicator of the work progress and its degree of completion. Information appearing

in Smartsheet is updated by the Project Office upon request of WP leaders, so as to reflect any

proposed changes to the schedule. A screenshot of the Smartsheet EU-SOLARIS Project user-

interface, in GANTT view, appears below in Figure 18.


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Figure 18: Screenshot of Smartsheet user-interface with GANTT view.

This First Periodic Report aims to provide an account of progress in each WP during the first eighteen

(18) months of the Preparatory Phase. It carefully describes the progress achieved for each of the tasks

comprising the different WPs, project results achieved (internal and external deliverables and

milestones) along with possible deviations identified and the measures implemented in order not to

jeopardize the projects’ expected outcomes.

In this regard, due to the strong correlation among tasks, deliverables and milestones, it is crucial to

meet the schedules planned for each of the outcomes to be accomplished during the lifetime the

project. Based on this commitment, the Project Office has implemented a tracking system in order to

consistently and constantly monitor the progress of the different outcomes with the objective to early

identify possible delays that might hinder the successful completion of the project along with putting in

practice measures to tackle and minimize the deviations produced in the desirable development in the

project.

Some of the actions carried out by the Project Office during this reporting period are described as

follows:

Day-to-day monitoring via the internal collaborative workspace systems (Smartsheet and Box)

described above, which were established at an early stage of the project, with the aim to offer

comprehensive, fully-accessible and updated information to all partners in the consortium.

Counselling and supporting partner-personalised communication mainly addressed to the proper

use of these communication tools, revision and approval methodology established, periodic

report contributions as well as financial reporting procedures.

Organisation of personalised Webex meetings with WP leaders as well as with any other partner

asking for any further information, clarification or queries to be solved.

All of these monitoring and supporting actions have considerably contributed to the smooth running of

the project enhancing the exchange information among partners and the Project Office, which is


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considered as a crucial factor to be maintained during the project lifetime.

This notwithstanding, it is the commitment of the Project Office to continuously improve the

communication tools at disposal of the consortium in order to meet their needs and concerns. With that

in mind, an additional sheet has been added to Smartsheet so all partners could include their own

dissemination actions as well as being duly informed about the actions in which the rest of partners

have taken part in. This measure is further explained within WP6 (Dissemination and Outreach section).

Furthermore, based on the experience gained in this reporting period and bearing in mind the

increasing number of deliverables (internal and external), milestones to be accomplished for the next

months, and information to be elaboration toward the Mid Term Review (scheduled in November 2014),

the Project Office is determined to intensify the monitoring and supporting measures implemented so

far and make available to the consortium an updated and centralised platform of comprehensive

information to offer an overview of the current status and pending task for each of “key” subjects of the

project.

In order to do so, the internal communication tools will be used, so all partners can easily check at any

time, which is the status of the main outcomes of the project, with particular emphasis on the revision

and approval of deliverables and milestones. This information is available to all partners and is

constantly updated by each WP leader in charge of the corresponding outcomes.

1.3.7. Impact of possible deviations from the planned

milestones and deliverables, if any

All milestones and deliverables scheduled for this reporting period within the framework of WP8 have

been achieved and are already fully implemented in the consortium, being listed as follows:

Deliverable D.8.1. First annual management report

Milestone MS1. Kick off meeting

Milestone MS2. EU-SOLARIS PP govenance implementation

Milestone MS3. Set-up of the internal collaborative workspace system

Milestone MS4. Quality and Assurance Plan defined and implemented

1.3.8. Any changes to the legal status of any of the

beneficiaries

No changes in the legal status have occurred during this first reporting period.

1.3.9. Development of the project website

During this reporting period, the website was launched and is being regularly updated by including new

content in line with the outcomes and achievements of the project. In the periods to come, it is intended


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to add new material (both technical and informative) addressed to a broad audience. It is the

commitment of the consortium to considerably increase the visibility of the project and maximize its

outreach. In doing so, the official website is considered the main communication platform and a

powerful dissemination tool. All partners are highly involved in including update information to the

website and making it available to the audience.

Comprehensive information regarding the development and changes implemented in the website can

be found the section 1.2.6, WP6 (Dissemination and Outreach), of this report.

1.3.10. Project external representation

Management activities during this reporting period, that are not directly associated to a specific task,

have involved relevant public relations endeavours and initiatives, entailing representation of the EU-

SOLARIS project at meetings, workshops, and conferences. A summary of these activities undertaken

by the Preparatory Phase Coordinator and/or Project Office is provided below.

European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures (ESFRI)

In the first half of 2013, the EC started to review the progress towards implementation of all projects

currently on the 2010 ESFRI Roadmap. To this end a group of high level experts was appointed with

the objective of evaluating the financial and managerial maturity of the projects. The experts evaluated

six major non-scientific aspects of the implementation of the Roadmap projects: costs and financial

commitments; governance, scientific and legal management; human resources policy and project

management; R&D policy and engagement with stakeholders; user strategy; feasibility and risks. These

experts identified any specific bottlenecks and made recommendations on how to best address them,

as well as indicating how best to proceed for each project to ensure their implementation.

In October 2012, the Directorate General for Research and Innovation of the EC made contact with the

EU-SOLARIS Project Manager requesting a progress update on the project by filling in a questionnaire.

The information provided in this questionnaire would form the basis for the subsequent assessment,

which took place in Brussels in February 2013. In this instance, EU-SOLARIS was invited to attend an

interview with the Assessment Expert Group, and the EU-SOLARIS Project Manager, Sol Luca de

Tena, was accompanied by CTAER’s President Dr Valeriano Ruiz, and Project Management Officer,

Alessandra Pecci. A final report, collating the recommendations made by the Assessment Expert Group

to the projects that were evaluated, was published in August 2013.

In the report, several recommendations to the EU-SOLARIS project were made, which can be

summarized as follows:

The planning for the Preparatory Phase should ensure the creation of a government commitment

and engagement. This issue needs to be afforded as high priority and therefore measures need

to be taken.

For EU-SOLARIS to become a truly European research infrastructure is seen as essential that

the institutes transform their facilities to be open to external use. In addition, the central facility

should be constructed so that it exercises effective authority over the nodes (single point access


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and review, quality assurance, access rules, etc.) including the steering of investments in order to

enhance cost effectiveness.

Legal issues should be taken seriously as soon as possible since it takes a long time to negotiate

a final solution. An issue for special consideration is the degree to which individual centre retain

their independence.

Engagement with the industry and with a wider research community is crucial to be considered

for the success of the project and therefore should be addressed in this Preparatory Phase.

Potential and suitable funding at national and international level should be considered.

Dealing with industry-orientated, proprietary research compatible with open-access, peer-

reviewed activities is also a major challenge. A number of international industrial bodies should

be involved at an early stage in the design of the EU-SOLARIS business plan, governance

model, Key Performance Indicators (KPI), etc.

Fully engagement of the user community is strongly recommended, in order to get knowledge

and develop the user access to the facility and procedures for handling IPR questions.

EU-SOLARIS might benefit from exchanging experience with ECCSEL, due to its similar

characteristics.

External evaluation of the activity plan, business plan, governance model, user access model,

KPIs, risk analysis is recommended.

SolarPACES,

On the 17th and 20th of September 2013, some partners of the EU-SOLARIS consortium attended the

International Energy Agency’s “SolarPACES” Conference in Las Vegas, which is one of the main

international events about Concentrating Solar Power technologies. Leaflets about EU-SOLARIS were

distributed.

Figure 19: YouTube video screen capture of the presentation of the European Commission

Project Officer for EU-SOLARIS, Piero De Bonis, at the SolarPACES Conference 2013 in Las

Vegas, USA.


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CSP Today Seville, Spain

On the 12th and 13th of November 2013, a few partners of the EU-SOLARIS consortium attended the

event “CSP Today”, organized in Seville, Spain. This international summit on solar thermal power

plants covers technical, scientific, management and financial issues related to solar thermal power

plant. Leaflets of the project were distributed to the audience.

CSP Today Cape Town, South Africa

On the 9th April 2013, during the international event “CSP Today”, organized in Cape Town, South

Africa. A brief information of the project was included in the presentation carried out by Paul Gauché

from the Solar Thermal Energy Research Group (STERG), Stellenbosch University, and member of the

EU-SOLARIS Advisory Board for Technical and International Cooperation, focused on the following

topic: Increasing performance and reducing cost.

1.3.11. Co-operation with other projects and programmes

In terms of collaboration with other projects, it should be mentioned that during this first reporting

period, coordination between EU-SOLARIS and the FP7 projects SFERA II9 and STAGE-STE10 has

been established in order to find synergies and open future collaborations taking advantage of the

commonalities shared by both projects.

In addition, having in mind that EU-SOLARIS is one out of 44 selected ESFRI RI projects, the FP7

project CoPoRI has been specifically monitored by the EU-SOLARIS Consortium. CoPoRI is a service

tool for ESFRI, which supports a coherent and strategy-led approach to policy making on RIs in Europe

and facilitates multilateral initiatives for the better use and development of RIs, at EU and international

level. As many of ESFRI RI Preparatory Phase projects are confronted with similar problems, a number

of initiatives have been taken to bring the RIs together and to discuss issues of common interest

(please refer also to activities carried out in the frame of WP1). Therefore, on various occasions EU-

SOLARIS representatives have been invited to attend the Workshops on Exchange of Experience

(EoE) and Best Practices organised in the framework of the CoPoRI project11.

2nd CoPoRi Workshop on Exchange of Experience and Best Practice “Sharing experience by ESFRI

RIs”

On the 12th and 13th of February, 2013, the EU-SOLARIS former Project Manager, Sol Luca de Tena,

attended the 2nd CoPoRI Workshop on Exchange of Experience and Best Practices “Sharing

experience by ESFRI RIs” held in Brussels The purpose of this meeting was to continue the successful

exchange of experience between the ESFRI infrastructures during their preparatory and implementation

phase.

9 Solar Facilities for the European Research Area; www.sfera.sollab.eu

10 Scientific and Technological Alliance for Guaranteeing the European Excellence in Concentrating Solar Thermal Energy;

www.stage-ste.eu

11 Communication and Policy development for Research Infrastructures in Europe. www.copori.eu

http://www.sfera.sollab.eu/

http://www.stage-ste.eu/

http://www.copori.eu/


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The workshop was carried out in the structure of presentation by experienced ESFRI projects combined

with Q & A sessions. The topics of this second EoE workshop were:

Perspectives and New Developments for ESFRI Projects;

ERIC: Experiences and New Developments;

Exchange of Experiences on:

Setting up and start a legal entity;

Financial sustainability;

Operational issues of a European RI.

Although the experiences shared largely focused on projects well into their implementation phase, the

information presented served to highlight subject matter to pro-actively focus on in the Preparatory

Phase of EU-SOLARIS’ case, so as to ensure a smooth and effective transition into the implementation

phase. The workshop presented EU-SOLARIS with exposure and networking opportunities, in addition

to securing EU-SOLARIS presence in successive CoPoRI meetings.

CoPoRI Workshop on Research Infrastructure and Structure Funds

On the 15th of May 2013, the EU-SOLARIS former Project Manager, Sol Luca de Tena, attended the

CoPoRI Workshop on Research Infrastructure and Structure Funds, held in Brussels. The purpose of

this meeting was aimed at raising awareness on potential of Structural Funds for the Research

Infrastructures.

The structure of the workshop was organized in different sessions:

The development of Research Infrastructure within the European Research Area and expected

Synergies with Cohesion Policy. The importance of Smart Specialisation Strategy;

The role of ESFRI and the perspectives for the next Roadmap update

Structural Funds in support of Research Infrastructures

Smart Specialisation Strategies

Successful use of Structural Funds. Perspective for the development of RPFs and nodes of

Distributed Research Infrastructures

ELI-NP: An example of the use of Structural Funds for the construction of an ESFRI structure

Experiences in working towards using Structural Funds for the operation of ESFRI projects

Ideas for setting up Regional Partner Facilities

The main conclusions from this workshop are related to the potential of European Structural Investment

Funds (ESIF) for building research and innovation capacity, including research infrastructures: thematic

concentration and ex-ante conditionality. The regional issues should be addressed as an integral part of

the future ESFRI strategy. Consequently, EU-SOLARIS as a project included in the ESFRI roadmap

should carefully analysed the possible use of Structural Funds beyond the preparatory phase.

3rd CoPoRi Workshop on Research Infrastructure and Structure Funds

On the 4th and 5th of December, 2013, the current Project Manager, Isabelle Seigneur, attended the 3rd

CoPoRI Workshop on EoE, held in Brussels. The purpose of this meeting was to continue with the

successful exchange of knowledge and experience within the framework of ESFRI projects, in order to

increase knowledge and foster collaboration among participants.


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The meeting was structured in different presentations devoted to HORIZON 2020 European Research

Infrastructures as well as a number of sessions grouped in thematic sessions described as follows:

How to reach financial and managerial maturity?

What is the added value of going Pan-European for distributed RIs?

ERIC: Experiences and New Developments

Role of e-infrastructures and the data challenge in operating European RIs?

Aligning national roadmaps and the ESFRI roadmap, funding commitments, clustering and

synergies

From the point of your project and based on the recommendation of AEG what should be the role

of ESFRI and the funding agencies

Feedback on Exchange of Experience since 2007

In addition, different working groups focussed on ESFRI activities namely social and humanity,

environmental, bio and medical, energy and physics were invited to explore synergies and

commonalties.


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2. Deliverables and milestones

tables

Information removed for the publishable version.


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3. Explanation of the use of the

resources and financial statements

The financial statements have been provided within the Forms C for each beneficiary.


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List of abbreviations and definitions

CoPoRI Communication and Policy Development for Research Infrastructures in Europe

CSP Concentrated Solar Power

CST Concentrating Solar Technologies

D Deliverable

DoW Description of Work

EC European Commission

EoE Exchange of Experience

ERA European Research Area

ESFRI European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructure

EU European Union

FP Framework Programme

FP7 Seventh Framework Programme

ID Internal Deliverable

IPR Intellectual Property Rights

KPI Key Performance Indicators

M Month

MS Milestone

NTBE New Technology Based Enterprise

RI Research Infrastructure

RTD Research and Technological Development

SFERA Solar Facilities for the European Research Area

SRA Strategic Research Agenda

STAGE-STE Scientific and Technological Alliance for Guaranteeing the European Excellence in Concentrating Solar Thermal Energy

STE Solar Thermal Electricity

TT Technology Transfer

WP Work Package

Documents

First Project Periodic Report - EU-Solaris...FP7-INFRA-312833 First Project Periodic Report 4 of 92 requirements and their views on how EU-SOLARIS services should be improved. Analysis