SuperNode has responded to the European Commission’s call for evidence on a European Innovation Act.
SuperNode is developing electricity transmission and distribution technology, to support Europe’s electrification and achieving a real internal market in electricity. As a company developing highly innovative breakthrough technologies to support European energy independence, SuperNode is very dependent on the EU framework conditions for innovation. We look forward to support the Commissions important initiatives in this area.
European funders are reluctant to fund pre-revenue technology start-ups, especially when operating in a rigid sector with low appetite for innovation such as that of electricity transmission and distribution. We see our main competitors in the US finding it easier to obtain funding, despite having a less developed portfolio of products and IPR. They are also able to secure more funding for manufacturing than their EU counterparts.
The Commissions Clean Transition Dialogue on Energy Infrastructure on 27 February 2024 and the stocktaking that followed, rightly identified many of the hurdles faced by innovative grid technology companies such as SuperNode. It emphasised a need for simplification of the rules for the Innovation Fund and increasing support for green scale-ups while it considered access to EU funds to be complex and lengthy due to different eligibility criteria, application procedures, and red tape.
The eligibility criteria of some calls, especially associated with past and current EU ETS Innovation Fund calls, inadvertently disqualifies enabling technologies such as innovative grid technologies, as pointed out by the European Parliament in its 19/6 2025 resolution – electricity Grids: The Backbone of the EU Energy System. It “regrets also that the evaluation criteria applied to the assessment of projects submitted in response to the EU Innovation Funds calls for proposals prevent funding for the demonstration and manufacturing of grid technologies”.
The Parliament’s resolution also “calls on the Commission and the Member States to ensure that a proportionate amount of such funding is also spent on grid investment”. SuperNode strongly supports those recommendations of the European Parliament.
Grid technologies are recognised as innovative net-zero technologies in the EU Net Zero Industry Act. Consequently, Net-zero regulatory sandboxes for innovative net-zero technologies should be rigorously applied to grid technology innovation in accordance with the regulation to provide for controlled real-world environment, under a specific plan, developed and monitored by a competent authority.
When it comes to grid technologies, frameworks should be developed to enable controlled real-world environments with participation of system operators energy regulators and technology providers. They should allow for the development, testing, and validation of cutting-edge grid technologies, accelerating their deployment and ease their integration into the electricity systems of Europe.
Moreover, mechanisms that ensure that the test results in one jurisdiction (operating system) can be shared with other distribution and system operators, to avoid having to perform the same test or demonstration in each system.
See SuperNode’s full response to the European Commission’s consultation here.
European Commission’s Call for Evidence here.