Research

The liberalisation of the electricity market, the foreseeable capacity gap in particular in the base load and the environmental and climate protection, create new demands on the European power generators. Many of the new challenges arising from this are to be coped with a substantial reinforcement of research and development.

In view of competition the resultant costs and risks cannot always be borne by single companies.

To solve these tasks, a joint research is offered to bundle the specific know-how and the financial resources of manufacturers such as operators of power and heat generation, universities, research institutes and public authorities.

Organisation

VGB offers its member companies a neutral platform to co-operate in the field of joint research. All research activities are steered by the experts of the member companies with support of the respective person in charge organised in the specialised VGB committees .

The specialised VGB committees formulate the need for research in the respective fields of activity or examine external research proposals regarding their relevance in practise and short- and medium-term practicability in plant operation. The VGB experts and the committee members supervise the handling of the project and the transfer of the results.

The allocations of the member companies are the major contributions to finance the projects. Apart from project-related allocations from single member companies, a general research fund is to be paid by the ordinary members. The VGB Board of Directors decides on the use. Research projects of public interest are mainly financed by public means.

Research for nuclear power plants

Research activities for nuclear power plants usually deal with mission oriented research closely connected to the plant operation.

Research in non-nuclear fields of work

The joint research projects in the three non-member fields of work of VGB are mainly supported by the VGB-FORSCHUNGSSTIFTUNG (Research Foundation):

The relevant research projects are introduced topic-related.

Heinrich-Mandel Prize

The Research Foundation annually awards the Heinrich-Mandel Prize to young engineers of all fields of power and heat generation for outstanding achievements.