Furthermore, partnership framework agreements exist with various industrial and academic stakeholders. These include: Naval Group, INERIS, INRIA, Telecom Paris, IPP (Polytechnic Institute of Paris) and ENS Paris Saclay.
Other developments include several partnerships within the Paris-Saclay campus ecosystem, including:
R&D is also present within the Energy Transition Institutes (ITE) which were set up as part of France’s “Investments for the Future” initiative: the Ile-de-France Photovoltaic Institute (IPVF), France Énergies Marines, which focuses on marine energies and offshore wind power, Efficacity, which works on energy efficiency, Supergrid Institute, which specialises in electricity networks of the future and Vedecom, which works on electric mobility, as well as in the IRT SystemX, which is located in the heart of the Paris-Saclay research hub.
The EDF group is the driving force behind ConnexITy, an R&D programme aimed at connecting players in the nuclear sector, using digital technologies.
EDF R&D has also set up the Materials Ageing Institute (MAI), an international research centre on materials ageing that brings together, alongside EDF, most of the world’s major nuclear operators.
EDF is also a founding member of several European associations recognised at the EU level, such as Nugenia and the SNETP for nuclear power and EASE for storage.
In the early 2000s, EDF set up a European Economic Interest Group in Germany with the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) known as EIFER. EIFER is the reference centre for the hydrogen industry; in this respect it supports the EDF group’s subsidiary Hynamics, which is dedicated to the commercial development of hydrogen solutions for industrial markets and heavy-duty mobility. EIFER teams are also fully engaged with topics relating to local decentralised energy systems, sustainable cities and territories, geothermal energy, e-fuels and biofuels.
EDF R&D UK consolidates the Group’s positions in the British research eco-system, particularly through Strathclyde University in the field of renewables, as well as with Manchester University, Imperial College, the National Nuclear Laboratory (NNL) and the University of Bristol in the field of nuclear energy.
The centre provides direct support to the activities of EDF business units, be it:
The centre is also fully committed to digital solutions for customers, blockchain and offshore wind farm projects, for which it is the reference centre for all the Group’s projects in France and abroad.
In Italy, Edison’s Research, Development & Technological Innovation Division (RD&TI) provides medium to long-term support for strategy and, in the shorter term, informs the development of new services and offerings from Edison. The teams focus in particular on photovoltaics, electric vehicles and digital technology. Staff and laboratories are located mainly in innovation spaces in the two Italian Politecnici (polytechnical institutes in Milan and Turin), thus nurturing cooperation and embedding Edison RD&TI in the world of innovation and research in Italy.
The centre based in Beijing is a valuable asset for taking part in partners’ large-scale Chinese demonstrators (such as those of CGN, CNNC, and State Grid) for smart grids and nuclear facilities. It also benefits from China’s highly advanced additive manufacturing (1) ecosystem. In 2022, the centre delivered the electricity trading platform established by the EDF China subsidiary with a local partner as part of the market deregulation decided by the Chinese government. The centre also actively supports EDF China’s commercial activities on the field of local multi-energy projects combining electricity, biomass, and heating and cooling networks.
Singapore’s R&D centre focuses more especially on the industrialisation of microgrid solutions at competitive prices using renewable energy, which is developed and tested with its demonstrator on Semakau Island off the coast of Singapore. The centre is also engaged alongside academic partners and local industry on a range of projects:
The EDF group has had an R&D and Innovation centre in Silicon Valley for several years. The centre supports its development in the USA and contributes to innovation in the Group. This laboratory’s research areas include:
Intellectual property plays a major role in protecting the EDF group’s technologies and know-how from competition, and in leveraging these assets through licensing agreements. Expanding the patent portfolio is thus a priority, with a view to making the best use of its capacity for innovation and its technology expertise. The portfolio consists of both patents and court-certified software and know-how.
At the end of 2022, the portfolio of the EDF group and Enedis comprised 740 patented innovations, protected by 2,189 property titles in France and abroad. In 2022, EDF filed 53 patent applications (2) (49 in 2021).
(1) Additive manufacturing, more ordinaryly known as “3-D printing”, refers to all the processes involved in manufacturing a physical object from a digital object by adding materials.
(2) Enedis filed three patent applications.
