Technology

“With this investment,” says Iberdrola in its press release, “the company strengthened its commitment to research and innovation in the areas of production processes and technical skills”.

The company reveals that the increase in R&D and innovation resulted from the company's “commitment to carry out research in areas such as the environment, offshore technologies, energy efficiency and nuclear fusion, further advancing the work completed during previous years”.

Furthermore, the multinational adds in its press release that “it began new research projects tackling strategic R&D and innovation areas such as smart grids and CO2 capture and storage”. It concludes that it also carried out on “the internal development of new skills in both technological areas and in the improvement of efficiency”. The Spanish multinational has reported “investments in R&D and innovation worth €10.5 million during 2011”.

Offshore wind and CO2
Among the existing projects “that saw significant activity during 2011”, Iberdrola Engineering highlights the Ocean Lider project, now in its third year. The company reports that this project has begun to provide “highly important” results on the planning and installation of offshore generating plants and their environmental impact. In its round-up, Iberdrola also mentions the application for two patents relating to innovative methods for capturing CO2 (as part of the Cenit Vida project).

Within the same field – carbon capture and storage – Iberdrola’s engineering subsidiary collaborates with the University of Salamanca and the Centre for Ultrashort Ultraintense Pulsed Lasers “on the development of a modular and extendible model for the separation and capture of CO2 from the exhaust gases at thermal plants”.

European projects
In the smart grids sphere at European level, the engineering division makes particular reference to the submission, jointly with Iberdrola Distribution, of the iGreenGrid projects headed up Iberdrola’s Networks Business, Advance and Discern, “which have been positively received during the preliminary selection process”. Among the initiatives undertaken with the company's own financing, as well as continuing with the development of engineering tools for generation plants, networks and renewables, third generation nuclear plants, accelerators and fusion, etc., Iberdrola Engineering highlights “the developments aimed at the enhancement of HVDV lines for both offshore and land-based facilities, for the connection and monitoring of AC power lines”.

According to Iberdrola, “the combination of all these initiatives means that the company continues to maintain a portfolio of R&D and innovation projects covering all the areas for technological development that are of strategic interest to the company”. (Iberdrola Engineering is a solely-owned subsidiary of Iberdrola.)

For additional information:
www.iberdrola.es