The European Commission has recently established new guidelines to improve energy efficiency across the Union, thus guiding its member countries onto more focused efforts to promote renewable sources of energy within their overall energy generating systems. With that in mind, the new project FOTO-CER, with KERABEN GROUP as an industrial partner, is working to develop an innovative system of photovoltaic technologies which can be easily integrated into urban applications. As a result, residential and commercial buildings within cities will be able to generate more energy from renewable sources (solar power) without installing dedicated photovoltaic parks.

One of the main objectives of FOTO-CER project is to overcome the aesthetic nuisance of photovoltaic elements installed on urban covers, as these devices are opaque and usually black or dark-grey coloured. By developing transparent, photo-sensitive elements, and integrating them into tiles with potentially any designs and colours, FOTO-CER will not only add energy-generating features to the tiles, but also maintain all their technical and aesthetic qualities.

The project will be carried out by a consortium of eight Companies from different industrial areas: KERABEN GRUPO as the leader; Aliter Grup Renovables; Cerámica la Escandella; Ecopol Tech; Ingeniería Navarra Mecánica; Obras y Servicios Tex; Kerafrit; and Lenz Instruments. Four research institutes and universities will also participate in the project: Centro Tecnológico Lurederra; Universitat Jaume I (UJI); Fundació Institut de Recerca en Energía de Catalunya (IREC); and Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC).

FOTO-CER project has received funding from CDTI, which is supported by Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación and financed by the European Union – NextGenerationEU – through the guidelines included in the Plan de Recuperación, Transformación y Resiliencia.