India and US have jointly collaborated to promote a solar research project by funding $50 million. This project will be done under the mantle of The Solar Energy Research Institute for India and the United States (SERIIUS), which was recently set up by the Indian Institute of Science and the National Renewable Energy Laboratories (NREL), part of the US Department of Energy.
Professor K. Chattopadhyay, the chairperson of the Materials Engineering Department at IISc, has been named one of the codirectors of the institute, along with L.L. Kazmerskie of the NREL. The institute, through a formalised R&D structuture, aims to promote binational collaborations.
The idea of SERIIUS began with the the PACE programme, which was launched in 2010 by US President Barack Obama and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. “SERIIUS is part of the PACE programme,” said Chattopadhyay.
“The two governments have contributed $12.5m each and the rest is being obtained through industry bids. The three major points of focus in the PACE programme are solar energy, building efficiency and biofuels. Our consortium consists of 30 members, 15 from each country and includes members IIT Bombay and Chennai, as well as universities like Berkely,” he said.
SERIIUS will have two headquarters, one at the IISc and one at the NREL in the US. The primary focus of the institute will be high value applied research and development that can result in solar energy being viewed as a viable energy source.
SERIIUS will also facilitate collaborations between research institutions and industry, greatly shortening the duration between a discovery, the development of that discovery and its commercialisation.
