Collaborative development financing

The Vamamo IGCC research and development project has been carried out during 1996-2000. The work has partly been performed in collaboration between Sydkraft, Foster Wheeler, Electricite de France and Elkraft. It has also been partly financed by Elforsk AB, Sweden, The Swedish National Energy Administration and the European Commission. 

The development of performance measures requires a collaborative effort from various levels of the organization, as well as personnel from different departments, such as safety, environmental, finance, personnel, maintenance, and engineering. The inputs the various departments can provide include appropriate benchmark levels, validity of performance measures, data needs (such as methods for obtaining data, available data, and data collection means), audit procedures, and evaluation techniques. Input from the various departments can be useful in determining available sources so that duplication does not result in wasted time and money. 

Several of these investigations are carried out within an interdisciplinary environment where the theoretical work is intertwined with synthesis and experimental characterizations. Over the years, the group has fostered intensive collaborations with B. Kirtman (University of California in Santa Barbara), D.M. Bishop (f) (University in Ottawa), F. Castet (Institut des Sciences Moleculaires de I Universite de Bordeaux), and M. Nakano (Department of Materials Engineering Science of Osaka University). Moreover, the LCT carries on the tradition of participating to the development of high performance computing facilities, via the initiative of the CECI of the Federation Wallonie Bruxelles, a distributed computer architecture for about 400 users, financed by the F.R.S.-FNRS and the Universities. 

Japan dominates the present worldwide effort in biosensor research and development (R D The Japanese market in biosensor products is currently estimated at 1.5 million yen. About a hundred different firms from a variety of fields consider biosensors to be an important research direction (for example, Toyo Jozo, Fuji Electric, Toyobo, and Denki) or form collaborations for better development (for example, Daikin of Sumitomo and NEC). In Germany, 15 million D.marks were placed for financing biosensor research and development between 1988 and 1991. Other European countries (Great Britain, France, Italy and Spain) also participate actively in research in this field. 

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