Nine Companies Compete for EEEGR Energy Innovation Award

Nine finalists will line up to compete for the East of England’s top awards for new ideas in the energy industry.

Companies from across all aspects of the energy world are challenging for the 2014 Energy Innovation Awards to be staged by EEEGR, the East of England Energy Group, at Norwich City Football Club’s Top of the Terrace on July 2nd.

Each entrant will make a Dragon’s Den type presentation in front of judges and an audience during the afternoon with the winners announced at a gala dinner in the evening where Norwich City chief executive David McNally will be guest speaker.

“For the second year running we’ve had a record number of applications for the event,” said Johnathan Reynolds, Nautilus Associates director and Awards compère. “It was such an overwhelming number of high quality entries that we upped the number of finalists to nine.

“It underlines the leading role this region plays in developing new technologies and innovative solutions to meet the challenges of reducing costs, security of supply, and moving towards a lower carbon and balanced energy mix.”

He added that OrbisEnergy, Lowestoft, and Great Yarmouth’s Beacon Innovation Centre provided tremendous support locally to foster innovation with incubation units for companies with new ideas and inspiration. OrbisEnergy and NWES are sponsoring the awards, which are also supported by the European Regional Dervelopment Fund (ERDF).

Simon Gray, EEEGR chief executive, was delighted at such an impressive line-up of finalists for an event with a track record of outstanding entries and winners over many years.

The 2013 winner was Marine Power Systems (MPS) with their WaveSub prototype which harnesses wave energy and can automatically adjust to optimum depth or protect itself by dropping safely below stormy seas.

“The success came at a vital time for us towards the end of last year,” said MPS managing director Dr Gareth Stockman. “We started our investment campaign this March following the successful test phase and were hugely successful in securing half of the investment target and substantial grant funding within two months.

“The EEEGR award not only showcased our innovation but gave us further credibility in raising investor confidence.”

The 2014 finalists will compete for prizes for winner, runner-up and special low carbon innovation award.

They are:

UK Power Networks:  Flexible Plug and Play, a quicker and cost-cutting, carbon saving method for connecting generators of various energy types to the electricity distribution network.

Aker Solutions: Integri-Tech, designed with remote monitoring to deliver accurate quantitative assessments of plant integrity to meet the oil & gas industry targets.

W3G Marine: OWTIS, Offshore Wind Turbine Installation Ship, specifically designed to meet the offshore construction needs of the wind industry with improved safety and operability and reduced risk and cost.

SubC Partner: FlexiCrane, easily assembled at locations to reduce manual handling where tools or materials have to be lifted through narrow spaces or where room is limited.

Zaviour Ltd: CloudQast, using a secure channel and embracing the latest Cloud technology to reduce the administration and challenges a company faces in dealing with compliance, communication and training

AKD Engineering: Personnel Transfer System, a safer and more adaptable concept for the transfer of technicians from workboats or crew transfer vessels to wind turbines in adverse weather.

James Fisher (Fendercare) and Extreme Ocean: TranSPAR, a small and agile vessel which can be rapidly deployed from a fixed or floating central hub for the next generation of offshore windfarm servicing.

Selex ES: Gridkey, a low voltage lightweight monitoring device that electricity distribution companies can install within secondary substations to receive near real-time information on the status of their LV networks. 

Equalizer International: Smart tools for flange work, a method specially designed to eliminate common injuries, save time and cut costs.