Clean Energy Transition Partnership Call 2024

Overview and objectives

Created under Horizon Europe, the co-funded CETPartnership aims to accelerate the transition to clean energy and contribute to the goal of climate neutrality by 2050, bringing together national and regional funding in Research, Technological Development and Innovation (RDI) for a wide variety of technologies and system solutions necessary for this transition.

The CETPartnership supports the implementation of the European Strategic Energy Technology Plan (SET Plan) and builds on existing initiatives under the SET Plan (ERA-Nets, IWGs, ETIPs, etc.). It also aims to contribute to achieving the European Union's (EU) decarbonization objectives, as well as supporting the implementation of EU strategies and plans in the fields of energy and climate.

Together with the European Commission, CETPartnership aims to support with the co-funded call 2024, transnational R&I projects around the seven Transition Initiatives (TRI).

Eleven topics are defined within the seven Transition Initiatives (TRI). FCT funds the eight topics marked in bold, namely:

• CM2024-01 - Data spaces & interoperability (this topic is not funded by FCT)
• CM2024-02 - Energy system flexibility: renewables production, storage & system integration
• CM2024-03A (ROA) - Advanced renewable energy (RE) technologies for power production

• CM2024-03B (IOA) - Advanced renewable energy (RE) technologies for power production (this topic is not funded by FCT)

• CM2024-04 - Carbon capture, utilization & storage (CCUS)
• CM2024-05 - Hydrogen & renewable fuels
• CM2024-06 - Heating & cooling technologies
• CM2024-07 - Geothermal energy technologies
• CM2024-08 - Integrated regional energy systems

• CM2024-09 - Integrated industrial energy systems (this topic is not funded by FCT)

• CM2024-10 - Clean energy integration in the built environment

1. The following are individual or co-promotion beneficiaries:

a) Non-entrepreneurial entities of the R&I system, namely:

    i. Higher education institutions, their institutes and R&D units;

   ii. State, Associated or International Laboratories with head office in Portugal;

  iii. Private non-profit institutions whose main object is R&D activities, including Collaborative Laboratories (CoLab) and Technology and Innovation Centres (CTI);

  iv. Other non-profit public and private institutions developing or participating in scientific research activities.

b) Companies of any nature and in any legal form.

The information contained in this section does not exempt you from consulting Article 3 of the Regulation of projects financed exclusively by national funds, Regulation no. 5/2024, of 3 January, which amends and republishes Regulation no. 999/2016, of 31 October (see FCT Regulation, available in the 'Call Documents' area).

The Call has two phases, the submission of pre-proposals (1st phase) and full proposals (2nd phase). Only the pre-proposals submitted by the transnational consortia in the 1st phase and selected by the Call Steering Committee, made up of the participating funding agencies (PFA), based on the ranking list proposed by the external evaluators, will be invited to submit full proposals in the 2nd phase.

Each Proposing Institution (PI) that is part of a transnational consortium can only apply for funding from the PFA of its country or region. See national annexes (under 'Call documents'), for information on the eligibility rules of each PFA and on the transnational eligibility rules. For a proposal to be eligible, it must comply with the national and transnational eligibility rules.

To submit their application, each Portuguese PI wishing to apply for funding from FCT must:

1. consult the 'Call documents' area;
2. consult the FCT eligibility rules (see National annexes);
3. submit, through the coordinator of the transnational consortium, the proposal form on the application submission platform (see 'Important links') by 13:00 GMT (Portugal mainland) on the 21st of November 2024;
4. send to FCT, within 10 working days after the deadline for submitting the application, a Statement of Commitment completed and signed by the Researcher in Charge identified by the PI and by a qualified representative of the PI. The Statement of Commitment should be sent to the emails indicated in 'Contacts'. 

Please note:

• Failure to send the Statement of Commitment to the FCT on the date referred to in paragraph 4, or the unjustified delivery after that deadline, or the delivery of an incomplete Statement of Commitment, without one of the two parts – Researcher in Charge and PI  – that make it up or without the signatures of the Portuguese Researcher in Charge and/or a qualified representative of the Portuguese PI, will result in the application being declared ineligible.
• If two or more Portuguese PI from the same transnational consortium apply for funding from FCT, each must send a completed and signed Statement of Commitment.
• One Statement of Commitment must be sent to FCT for each application submitted by the same Research in Charge and PI.
• The Portuguese partners that do not apply for funding from FCT do not need to submit the Statement of Commitment.
• The digital signature of the representative of the PI must contain professional attributes that identify the functions performed by the representative.
• The IP stamp or white seal is only required on manually signed Statement of Commitment.

The information on this page is only a summary of the information of the call, does not exempt the candidates from carefully reading all the call documents available on this page and on the call website (see ’Important links’) and refers only to FCT's participation in this call, unless expressly indicated.

Eligibility

The eligibility check of proposals is carried out at both stages of the call (pre-proposal submission stage and full proposal submission stage):

• The national/regional funding agencies check the national eligibility of applications, ensuring compliance with the formal requirements in the applicable national/regional regulations and other applicable documents (see FCT regulation, FCT financial implementation rules and the information regarding FCT in the National annexes, available in the 'Call documents' area).
• The transnational eligibility check of applications will be performed by the call secretariat, according to the transnational eligibility criteria presented in the call text (see Call text, available in the 'Call documents' area).

Please note:

• For a proposal to be declared eligible it must fulfil both the national and transnational criteria.

Evaluation

The call includes two evaluation phases:

• Pre-proposal evaluation stage.
• Full proposal evaluation stage.

Proposals will be evaluated according to the evaluation criteria described in the call text in the ‘Call documents’ area.

The Call Steering Committee (CSC), formed by national/regional funding agencies, will decide - according to the stage the call is at, which 1) pre-proposals to invite to submit a full proposal and which 2) proposals to recommend for funding.

• FCT financial commitment for the call: 500 000,00€
• Maximum requested funding for a consortium with Portuguese coordination: 200 000,00€
• Maximum requested funding for a consortium with Portuguese participation: 125 000,00€

Please note:

• Portuguese institutions funding must follow FCT’s ’Regulation on projects funded solely by national funds’, Regulation of projects financed exclusively by national funds, Regulation no. 5/2024, of 3 January, which amends and republishes Regulation no. 999/2016, of 31 October (see FCT Regulation and Normas de Execução Financeira FCT, both available in the ’Call Documents’ area).
• If more than one Portuguese applicant from the same transnational consortium applies for funding from FCT, the combined budget requested from FCT by the Portuguese applicants may not exceed the maximum funding limit for a consortium with Portuguese coordination (200 000,00€) or with Portuguese participation (125 000,00€). The Portuguese applicants of the same transnational consortium will have to share the funding that will be granted by FCT.
• The dedication (FTE) in transnational projects is not considered for the 100% (FTE) dedication to national projects.
• Under the terms of number 2 of Article 7 of the Regulation on projects funded solely by national funds, payments made directly or indirectly to companies through the Proposing Institution cannot exceed 50% of the total cost of the company’s participation.

• Call website
• Matchmaking platform
• CETP website
• Partnership page on the FCT website

Joana Pinheiro
joana.pinheiro@fct.pt
Tel: (+351) 213 911 567

Alexandre Maurício
alexandre.mauricio@fct.pt
Tel: (+351) 213 917 648