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Representatives from six European countries met in Peterborough earlier this month to share best practice and develop ideas to stimulate and accelerate economic growth in the clean technology sector.

The event was held as part of the Cleantech Incubation Europe (CIE) project which is funded by the EU’s INTERREG IVC programme. Peterborough is a lead city in the project, representing the UK. CIE helps EU companies take advantage of the growing clean technology market which, worldwide, is worth more than €2 trillion a year and has been growing at 12 per cent a year since 2007. It is expected to more than double in size by the mid 2020s.

CIE supports SMEs and brand new companies to develop new sustainable products, services and processes through the use of cleantech incubators. The projects’ findings will be disseminated Europe-wide to enable other regions to implement improvements to their incubator programmes.

As home to one of the largest clusters of environmental businesses in Europe, Peterborough was an ideal host city for the event which brought together experts to look at removing the barriers to commercialising cleantech innovations. The summit began with a workshop about how to develop a successful business incubation unit that can support the development of cleantech start-ups. Participants drew on a number of European examples of best practice to create a blueprint for others to follow.

Expert speakers from The Technology Strategy Board, Department for Business Innovation & Skills and Cranfield University also presented on ‘the cleantech opportunity’ focussing on market trends and insights.

Gareth Jones from Opportunity Peterborough organised the cleantech summit in the city and believes they are an invaluable tool: “The seminars bring together representatives from different organisations and countries to share best practice on how cleantech innovations can be made commercially viable and how we support start-ups in this field” he said.

“This is an important and growing sector – a vital economic export for Peterborough and the UK. CIE is taking action now to standardise and improve the support for cleantech products and services to ensure we are well placed to take advantage of this opportunity.”

Find out more: www.cleantechincubation.eu