The Interoperable Demand Side Response programme aims to support the development and demonstration of energy-smart appliances for the delivery of the interoperable demand-side response. IDSR consists of three streams of work, to support the innovation, design, and demonstration of interoperable Demand Side Response systems. Up to £9.15 million in funding is available.

Eligibility Criteria

To be eligible for funding, proposed projects must meet all the following eligibility criteria. These will be listed in the online application form as the Yes/No questions exemplified below.

Project Location

Over 50% of the Project’s activities (as measured by eligible Project costs) must be conducted in the UK.

Innovation and Technology Readiness

The focus of the Competition is the development of compliant ESAs and a supporting DSRSP platform, using SAPC and OpenADR via the GB smart metering system.

The ESAs must be based on existing hardware whose software is adapted to make the appliance smart and capable of DSR through the relevant specifications:

• • minimum TRL 7 for hardware at the time of application
• • minimum TRL 4 for software at the time of application

Technology Scope

The Competition is focused on SAPCs, ESAs and supporting DSRSP platforms capable of providing DSR to the UK electricity grid and designed to the specifications in the GB smart metering system using the SAPC specification. Therefore, an ESA must be communications-enabled and able to respond automatically to price and/or other signals by shifting or modulating its electricity consumption and/or production.

The four categories in scope for this competition must be used only in domestic and small non-domestic settings and they include:

• • Smart electric vehicle (EV) charge points, including V2X devices
• • Battery storage
• • Electric heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC), including heat pumps, storage heaters and heat batteries
• • White goods

The Competition will only support proposals that include appliances from the four ESA categories listed above. The technical requirements an ESA will need to meet, to provide DSR services, are specified in the GB smart metering specification. Each application must specify all the different ESAs that will be developed in accordance with the specifications.

Project activity

To be eligible for funding, the Project activity must be industrial research.

Project status & timescale

BEIS cannot provide funding for retrospective work on Projects or provide funding to Projects which have already begun.

Target dates for key Project milestones will be agreed upon between the successful bidder and BEIS prior to awarding the grant offer.

The Competition should aim to be completed and approved by BEIS by October 2024.

Additionality

Projects can only be funded where evidence can be provided that your proposed innovation would not be taken forward (or would be taken forward at a much slower rate) in the absence of public funding.

Grant size
It is anticipated that BEIS will support 3 Projects in this Competition. The total requested grant funding should not exceed £1.5 million per Project excluding VAT.

Since BEIS is seeking to maximise the impact of government funding, Projects looking for public funding intensities that are lower than the applicable maximum are likely to score higher in the appraisal process.

Grant intensity (Match Funding)

Given the subsidy categories, applicants will need to have private funding in place to cover the balance of the eligible costs. Such funding may come from a company’s own resources or external private sector investors but may not include funding attributable to any public authority. The level of private (match) funding for a Project will depend on the status of the applicant organisation(s) and the specific nature of the proposed Project; Section 4.2 provides details of the grant intensity levels.

Before the grant letter is issued, the applicant will need to provide satisfactory evidence of match funding. This needs to be evidenced, for example by relevant bank statements or letters showing intention to invest in the applicant.

Project team composition

Members of the Project team can be:

• • Private sector companies: both SMEs and large enterprises can apply as part of a consortium with other private sector companies, or in a consortium with academic, research or public sector organisations. Consortium bids must be led by a private sector company (SME or large industrial company). Special Purpose Vehicles are permitted to lead consortia only if they are constituted as legal entities.
• • Academic, research (including RTOs), public, third sector or community organisations must work as part of a Project consortium with private sector organisations – they cannot work alone or act as lead applicants.
• • Applicants (lead Project members of consortium bids) must be able to demonstrate that they are financially viable.
• • Applicants based in Northern Ireland, or with significant interests or subsidiaries in Northern Ireland, will also be subject to scrutiny from the European Commission in accordance with Article 10 of the Northern Ireland Protocol to the UK/EU Withdrawal Agreement.

Multiple Applications

• • Lead applicants may only enter as part of one application each into each stream competition.
• • In addition, DSRSPs may only enter as part of one application each into this each into each stream competition,
• • ESA manufacturers can enter as part of multiple applications as long the category of ESA entered is different per application.

Please note, that project consortium member(s) can also apply to the other stream competitions, if their applications demonstrate clearly how they intend to meet the relevant specifications. Within each application, applicants will need to clarify areas of duplication for work and associated costs should their application for funding be successful under each stream. If Project consortium members or subcontractors are part of multiple successful applications, they must be able to deliver on them and they must not have applied for funding for the same piece of work more than once.