EMPORIA4KT Receives Atlantic Awards Recognition at the 9th Atlantic Stakeholders Platform Conference
Press release: 8 December 2022
The EU-funded project, EMPORIA4KT received the 2022 Atlantic Project Award for the category Blue Skills and Ocean Literacy.
Presented by the Atlantic Strategy Committee at the 9th Atlantic Stakeholders Platform Conference, the award recognises EMPORIA4KT’s outstanding initiative, successful collaboration and achievement related to the implementation of the Atlantic Action Plan 2.0. The award ceremony came after the co-located and highly productive InnovAzul Conference, at which EMPORIA4KT had earlier held a dedicated workshop.
EMPORIA4KT project manager, Sofia Dinis-Esteves accepted the award and dedicated the trophy to the entire project consortium:
“The EMPORIA4KT project and its results are only possible due to the collaboration and complementarity created by the consortium partners and its extended network. This award belongs to all those that were and continue to be highly involved and committed to the creation of more solid and fruitful collaboration between the actors of the quadruple helix of innovation [academia, industry, policy making and civil society] and to enhancing the capabilities of early-stage career researchers to perform innovation and technology transfer within the blue economy.”
The award reinforces the validity of the project’s knowledge transfer approach to promoting innovation within the blue economy at the regional level. This support is particularly encouraging as EMPORIA4KT enters its final half-year. Noted Dinis-Esteves:
“This award will facilitate and contribute to the capitalisation of the results achieved so far by the EMPORIA4KT project and the current application of these tools to transform and revitalize a region affected by a natural disaster [the Canary Islands]. Together, these approaches will enhance the potential of the project’s expected impacts of promoting innovation and technology transfer activities within the blue economy.”
The award came after a busy day for the project consortium who also hosted a parallel session at InnovAzul entitled “Blue Economy Technology Transfer Programme as a Driver to Increase the Industry Innovation Capacity.” This forum brought together policy, industry and research stakeholders and demonstrated how EMPORIA4KT’s processes can help foster greater connections and cooperation, allowing blue economy stakeholders to develop and capitalise on innovative and valuable products and ideas.
The workshop also featured a presentation from Júlia Machado, NUI Galway, and Ken Russell, Atlantic Technical University, who were voted the best performers in EMPORIA4KT’s Blue Economy Technology Transfer Programme. Their work involved the development of an innovative commercialisation plan for their partnered early-stage technology, Solar Marine Energy. Their presentation highlighted how the EMPORIA4KT approach benefits both industry and academia and offers valuable and highly relevant lessons for translating good ideas into effective impact.
For more information on the project, please visit emporia4kt.com or follow @EMPORIA4KT on twitter.
Notes for editors
For press enquiries, please contact Communications and Press Officer, Keegan Porter at keegan@aquatt.ie, or contact coordinator, António Grilo at emporia4kt@campus.fct.unl.pt for more information on the project.
The EMPORIA4KT project will run from 2019 – 2023 with an overall budget of approximately €2.8 million. EMPORIA4KT is funded by the European Union’s Interreg Atlantic Area European Regional Development Fund.
EMPORIA4KT is coordinated by Universidade Nova de Lisboa – Faculdade de Ciências e Tecnologia (Nova School of Science and Technology). AquaTT is the project communication and dissemination partner. The project involves partners from Portugal, Ireland, France, Spain and the United Kingdom. Working collaboratively across these countries will enable the share of resources and knowledge by five countries with significant interest in the sustainable exploitation of marine resources.
The views in this press release are the views of the author and do not reflect the views of the European Union.
