The Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (UPM) is the oldest and largest of the Spanish Technical Universities. The UPM currently has more than 3,000 faculty members, around 38,000 undergraduate students, and around 6,000 postgraduate students. The UPM has a strong commitment to R&D and Innovation. It has more than 200 Research Units and a dozen Research Institutes and Technological Centres among which is the IES. From a total annual budget of around $350 M€, the UPM receives annually over $100 M€ support from external sources for research activities.
The UPM has participated in around 200 European R&D projects over the past four years. The IES is a UPM Research Institute devoted exclusively to photovoltaic research. It was created in 1979, from the previous Laboratorio de Semiconductores whose activity in photovoltaic started in earnest in 1975. At present the IES has over 80 staff. It carries out R&D into photovoltaic fundamentals, solar cells, concentrators and system issues.
MAIN TASKS IN THE PROJECT
UPM, due to its vast experience in the management of research and demonstration projects, will be part with ENEA and BGU of the Scientific Board that will support the Project Coordinator in the scientific management of ECOSOLE. The IES-UPM integrates 5 Research Groups of which the Systems and Instruments Integration Group (ISI Group) is involved in this project. The ISI Group uses the resources of non-imaging optics to design cheap and effective optical elements to couple the light to the solar cells. The ISI group has an external test field where a dozen different concentrators are being tested. It has also installed the biggest world concentrator plant in Tenerife and is internationally involved in the definition of standards for concentrators. Furthermore it has developed a variety of unique equipment for the manufacture and testing of PV concentrators.
RELEVANT EXPERIENCE AND PUBLICATIONS/PATENTS
The UPM has succeeded in spinning off companies, one being Isofotón S.A, one of the largest cell producer in the World, third in Europe in 2007. The UPM has a wide-ranging experience in coordinating EC projects in various fields of PV research in the 2FP (MONOCHESS), the 3FP (PV-EYE, MONOCHESS II), the 4FP (SICOCELLS, HERCULES, EUCLIDES) the 5FP (MIBCELL, PVFIBRE, TWINGO, C-RATING, IDEOCONTE), the 6FP (Integrated Project FULLSPECTRUM) and the 7FP (NACIR, IBPOWER).
