Scotland Europa

Great to meet with colleagues in SSE plc in Brussels last week! Thanks to CEO Alistair Phillips-Davies and Elisa Fenzi for joining us to discuss EU-UK cooperation in the energy field at such an important time.

Our next ecosystems session will take place on January 8, 2025! Kindly hosted by UHI and Highlands and Islands Enterprise, the session will focus on ecosystem development across the Highlands and Islands, bringing together stakeholders from the region who are interested in taking part in Horizon Europe project partnerships. The session aims to bring together people with different levels of familiarity with Horizon Europe (and its predecessor Horizon 2020): both those who are experienced with particular parts of the programme, as well as aspiring bidders who are less familiar – with the overall aim being that all can get to know and learn from each other, and hopefully spark ideas for bids for the next wave of Horizon Europe calls. If you're a researcher, company, or otherwise interested stakeholder based in the Highlands and Islands region, please register via the following link ➡️ bit.ly/3OB5bFf #HorizonEurope #innovation #research

What's your connection to Scotland? 🤔 This year, to mark 25 years of Scotland House Brussels, Scotland Europa are changing our usual approach to our St Andrew's Day celebrations. Instead of our annual lecture, we are delighted to welcome Scotland's community in Brussels and beyond for an evening where we can share thoughts, personal experiences and develop connections with Scotland. This will take place on Tuesday 26 November (18-20h) in Scotland House Brussels. To join us, you can register at the link below - and please do let us know your own personal tie to Scotland! 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 Please be aware that places are limited, and we will confirm your registration directly by the end of the week. ➡ bit.ly/4fteiDO

What's your connection to Scotland? 🤔 This year, to mark 25 years of Scotland House Brussels, Scotland Europa are changing our usual approach to our St Andrew's Day celebrations. Instead of our annual lecture, we are delighted to welcome Scotland's community in Brussels and beyond for an evening where we can share thoughts, personal experiences and develop connections with Scotland. This will take place on Tuesday 26 November (18-20h) in Scotland House Brussels. To join us, you can register at the link below - and please do let us know your own personal tie to Scotland! 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 Please be aware that places are limited, and we will confirm your registration directly by the end of the week. ➡ bit.ly/4fteiDO

What's your connection to Scotland? 🤔 This year, to mark 25 years of Scotland House Brussels, Scotland Europa are changing our usual approach to our St Andrew's Day celebrations. Instead of our annual lecture, we are delighted to welcome Scotland's community in Brussels and beyond for an evening where we can share thoughts, personal experiences and develop connections with Scotland. This will take place on Tuesday 26 November (18-20h) in Scotland House Brussels. To join us, you can register at the link below - and please do let us know your own personal tie to Scotland! 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 Please be aware that places are limited, and we will confirm your registration directly by the end of the week. ➡ bit.ly/4fteiDO

We are looking forward to welcoming stakeholders from Scottish Development International, Scottish Enterprise, The Scottish Government and Aberdeen City Council for European Hydrogen Week. Find us at the Expo from Monday to Thursday to learn about our hydrogen projects, supply chain, investment opportunities and much more. 📍Hall 7 - Scottish Pavilion L70

#EURegionsWeek took place this week and we have been delighted to participate in a host of insightful sessions. On Monday, our Head of Office, Sarah English, gave the closing remarks at an event hosted by our colleagues in Norway House to kick off EU Regions Week. After several really interesting project presentations from our Norwegian colleagues, Sarah reflected on the importance of being a reliable partner for our European colleagues. She also noted the value of sharing Scotland and Norway's experience around key issues such as energy and regional development. On Tuesday, we were delighted to continue our long-standing collaboration with the Northern Sparely Populated Area Network, hosting a workshop titled 'Building smart, resilient communities: adapting sparely populated areas to a digital & green future'. Professor Andrew Rae, from UHI, spoke about the work happening across the Highlands and Islands on multi-modal transport and sustainable aviation. He presented some of the work of the SATE project, which is the UK's first low-carbon aviation test centre. Andrew was part of a wider panel with colleagues from North Sweden European Office, North Norway European Office, and East & North Finland EU Office, where they discussed some of the shared challenges facing the Arctic and the Highlands and Islands as they undertake the green and digital transition, particularly around infrastructure and climate change. The panel also discussed the opportunities these regions have in terms of being hubs for renewable energy and having significant natural resources available to aid the long-term transition to a greener, more digitalised society. On Wednesday, alongside our Scottish Government Brussels colleagues, we welcomed the Vanguard Initiative to discuss 'Regions Innovating for a Just Transition to a Hydrogen Economy'. The panel highlighted the importance of innovation and collaboration to overcome challenges such as the skills gap and investment in the hydrogen industry. A key takeaway was that regions across Europe each face their own challenges in transitioning to a hydrogen economy and, despite this, there is a mutual interest in sharing best practices - adopting a place-based approach to face regional challenges can be useful learning for other parts of Europe. It was also great to be able to attend the EU Regions Week session on the European Circular Innovation Valley (ECIV), where project partners presented an overview of ECIV. Scotland is one of the regions which has been selected to take part in two of these Regional Innovation Valley (RIV) projects, and we are looking forward to developing these exciting innovation ecosystems with our European partners in the coming years. It's been a pleasure to be able to participate in discussions over the week. Thank you to our colleagues across the different offices for another great year of collaboration.

Last Thursday, we held our first Horizon Europe Ecosystem Session in Aberdeen. Hosted by the University of Aberdeen at the Sir Duncan Rice Library, the session gave an overview of the key opportunities of interest for the Aberdeen City and Aberdeenshire region. We welcomed 25 stakeholders from across the region - both those who are experienced with Horizon Europe as well as aspiring bidders who are less familiar - to explore how to best use ecosystem approaches to navigate the opportunities and challenges available under Horizon Europe.   The session kicked off with a broad discussion about the Horizon Europe programme itself, highlighting the key opportunities for the Aberdeen ecosystem. This was followed by a more facilitated discussion, where the group split into three based on their area of interest - energy, environment, and digital health - which served as an opportunity for networking and partnership building. These discussions emphasised the importance of using the existing expertise that Scotland has when it comes to EU funding to build strong ecosystems in regions such as Aberdeen City. Another recurring point surrounded the transferring of knowledge and experience from late-career researchers to early-career researchers with less EU funding experience.   With Aberdeen known as the "Energy Capital of Europe", there was quite detailed discussion in the energy group, particularly on hydrogen. A key takeaway from this was that Aberdeen City region has a wealth of experience in the hydrogen area, and sharing learnings with European stakeholders can be extremely valuable in terms of partnership building.   We'd like to thank our hosts, and to everyone who joined us for the session.

On Wednesday, we held our Members Meeting at the Aberdeen Art Gallery, kindly hosted by Aberdeen City Council and the University of Aberdeen. Councillor Christian Allard, Co-Leader of Aberdeen City Council, and Professor Nick Forsyth, Vice-Principal (Research) at the University of Aberdeen, kicked off the meeting, highlighting the strong European links of the Aberdeen City and Shire Region. The meeting focused on "Transition and Transformation: Evolving approaches to regional economic development". We delved deep into this topic with two brilliant panels sharing their insights on the key challenges and opportunities in the EU and Scotland's regional economic development and innovation policy. The first panel, moderated by our Head of Office, Sarah English, explored the changing dynamic of the regional economic landscape. Policy and Communications Executive, Lucie McAnea and Deputy Director of the Scottish Government EU Office Nick L., provided an overview of the current institutional and policy changes at the EU and UK level. This set the stage for Senior Policy and Funding Executive, James Sharples, Frank Moeschler MBE (Head of Research and Innovation, Scottish Government EU Office), and Irene McMaster (Senior Research Fellow, University of Strathclyde's European Policies Research Centre) to discuss changes to funding instruments, Framework Programme 10, and how EU policy changes will shape future engagements with our European partners. The second panel, moderated by our Policy and Funding Manager, Valentine Willmann, featured Laura Paterson (Team Leader, External Funding, Aberdeen City Council), our Scottish Enterprise colleague Terry Hogg (Team Leader, Innovation Ecosystems, Scottish Enterprise), and David Miller (Knowledge Exchange Coordinator, The James Hutton Institute). This session built on the earlier discussion, highlighting how our members are leveraging new opportunities in the regional policy and funding landscape. From regional innovation valleys and ecosystem approaches to missions-based perspectives, this session underscored the value of collaboration, partnership, and innovation. We'd like to once again thank our hosts, and all our members who joined us in Aberdeen.

Are you developing a green hydrogen project which will help to scale up Scotland's hydrogen economy? Businesses are being invited to apply for a share of £7 million funding to help kick start green hydrogen projects across Scotland. The funding will help cover development costs for projects that focus on the low-cost, efficient and sustainable production of renewable hydrogen, with production capacity of between 5 and 400 megawatts. Additionally, projects which could help develop the hydrogen supply chain may also be eligible. These include, but are not limited to, the design and manufacture of electrolysers or other core components for activities such as hydrogen transport and storage. Interested companies and projects should complete an Expression of Interest (EOI) form by 27 September. Visit our website for full information and to download an EOI form ⏩ https://ow.ly/WEN950TmXOj #Hydrogen #Funding