Bilateral collaboration between Ministry of Science and Technology of China and Innovation Fund Denmark under the theme ‘Sustainable City Solutions’

Based on the Agreement from year 2007 on Scientific and Technological Co-operation between the Government of the People's Republic of China and the Government of the Kingdom of Denmark and the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) from the year 2017 between the Department of International Cooperation, Ministry of Science and Technology of China (MoST) and Innovation Fund Denmark (IFD), to enhance bilateral research and innovation cooperation between China and Denmark, MoST and IFD jointly launch a call for proposals.

All proposals for this call must be working with solutions for the sustainable cities of tomorrow. Cities, in particular, play an important part as role models for sustainable green urban development. More than half of the world’s population now lives in cities that are responsible for 75% of global CO2 emissions.

Prioritised research and innovation areas

• Energy & Storage; Power2X, Biomass, Storage and Grid Flexibility. While sustainable energy sources are making their way into the global energy mix, the stable supply remains a challenge. It is therefore crucial to improve the technologies for storage and ensure the necessary infrastructure. For a transition away from fossil fuels to take place and for renewable to make out a larger share of electricity, a fit for purpose energy distribution and storage system is needed.
• Smart Cities and Transportation; Data, AI & IoT, Smart buildings, Mass Transit, Autonomous Vehicles and Electric Vehicles. Demographics projections strongly point to continued urbanization and increase in urban density. Building and inhabiting cities as we have historically is not compatible with solving the climate challenge.

Funding budget
The Danish side (Innovation Fund Denmark - IFD) will allocate a total of 15 million DKK and the Chinese side (MoST) will allocate a total of 20 million RMB to support 4-5 joint research and innovation projects. The duration of the projects is expected to be up to 3 years for both sides.