EU joins Mission Innovation to promote clean energy innovation

The European Union (EU) has joined Mission Innovation, a global initiative on clean energy as its 21st member, vowing to accelerate global clean energy innovation in order to make clean energy widely-affordable, an EU statement said here Friday.

The EU joined the initiative at the inaugural ministerial meeting of Mission Innovation held in San Francisco on June 1-2, according to the statement issued by the European Commission, or the EU executive body.

The initiative was launched at the United Nations Climate Change Conference 2015 (COP21) in Paris with the aim to reinvigorate and accelerate public and private global clean energy innovation.

The European Commission now joined the initiative on behalf of the EU, which funds clean energy under the EU research and innovation program Horizon 2020.

"Scaling up clean energy innovation is key to the success of the European Energy Union and to the implementation of the Paris Agreement on Climate Change. It also represents a major global economic and industrial opportunity. Mission Innovation therefore coheres perfectly with our upcoming research, innovation and competitiveness strategy," Maros Sefcovic, European Vice-President responsible for the Energy Union, was quoted as saying in the statement.

Around 10 billion euros (11 billion U.S. dollars) funding is expected to be allocated to clean energy under Horizon 2020 for the period 2014-2020, according to the Commission. Endit