The CSU state group invited on 12 February 2020 members of the AiF R&D Network for Small and Medium-Sized Businesses to Berlin for an exchange on environmental protection and transport policy. The round-table meeting was chaired by Karl Holmeier, Member of the Bundestag, Chairman of the Working Group for Economy and Energy, Transport and Digital Infrastructure, Education and Research, Tourism of the CSU state group and Professor Sebastian Bauer, President of the Aif. It was attended by other members of the state group and representatives of the industrial research associations affiliated to the AiF, including DECHEMA (Society for Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology eV), FAT (Research Association for Automotive Technology eV powered by VDA) and FVV.

Voices from the expert meeting

In order to support the development and implementation of the right technologies for the future, the task for politicians is to set up clever and well-defined regulations. Therefore, the exchange between the CSU state group and the AiF expert network is of particular importance:

• "We want climate protection to become a stimulus package. First and foremost, through more innovation and incentives rather than imposing restrictions. Economy and ecology need an integrated approach for the 21st century. The capabilities as well as the innovative strength of our companies and research institutions generate efficient economic cycles, enable effective energy saving and lead to new drive technologies", explained MdB Karl Holmeier according to the press release issued by AiF on 12/02/2020.

• Professor Kurt Wagemann, Executive Director of DECHEMA, drew attention to the many contradictions in the comparative assessment of battery and fuel cell-powered vehicles and conventional IC engine-driven vehicles burning synthetic fuels: "Up to now, only parts of the upstream value chains for the provision of energy sources and storage systems have been considered with regard to climate protection. For a complete and serious assessment, the associated infrastructures must also be included".

• Dietmar Goericke, Managing Director of FVV, made it clear that the results of the FVV CO2 life cycle analysis for different powertrain systems demonstrate the need for a technology-open and level-headed policy: "Early commitment to one of the different powertrain technologies is associated with too much uncertainty regarding real CO2 avoidance for politicians and society to risk making the wrong decisions. The results of the meta study conducted by Frontier Economics for the FVV will be presented at the FVV 2020 Spring Conference in Würzburg on 26 March.

• Professor Claudia Langowsky, Managing Director of FAT, concluded by pointing out that the issue of 'sustainability in supply chains' is not only an environmental and social problem, but also a serious economic and legal one: "Apart of politics, clients, investors and end customers can demand commitments and/or guarantees for sustainable supply chains from companies. If the companies are unable to provide these guarantees, there is a risk of restricted access to procurement and sales markets, legal problems and customer boycotts. Therefore, companies need support in the implementation of the requirements into operational practice".

• As already reported, the German Bundestag is approving 180 million euros for the IGF (Industrial Collective Research) with the current federal budget as well as additional grants from the Energy and Climate Fund for projects already underway in the AiF Research Alliance on the Transformation of the Energy System. Professor Sebastian Bauer expressed his sincere thanks to the members of the Bundestag for this growth of funds. Many German SMEs provided ecologically outstanding products and processes on an international scale - also in the fields of transportation and energy. Thanks to pre-competitive applied research, they are able to compete on the world market or are even leading.

Nationwide support of Industrial Collective Research (IGF)

The AiF and Industry are jointly promoting more support for pre-competitive research and development within the framework of Industrial Collective Research programme. This includes talks with the parliamentary groups of the German Bundestag in Berlin as well as the presentation of successful IGF projects in the constituencies of individual members of parliament.

Fortunately, this work is bearing fruit. In another press release of 12 February 2020, the AiF was able to announce that as of 31 December 2019, the IGF research landscape no longer has any white spots: In every city and region in Germany, representatives of industry and science work together to solve application-oriented problems in research and development. At the end of 2019, there were a total of more than 23,000 corporate participations in ongoing IGF projects.

Caption (from left to right):
Professor Kurt Wagemann, Florian Oßner, MdB, Dr Rolf Bulander, Prof Sebastian Bauer, Prof Claudia Langowsky, Karl Holmeier, MdB, Dietmar Goericke