The nGEL project, in its 19th month of implementation, held its first review meeting in Berlin, Germany, on November 27-28. The project coordinator, Fraunhofer, hosted the consortium members to discuss the progress achieved during the first phase of the project. Among other partners, Technovative Solutions Ltd, leader of the sustainability analysis and awareness campaign for the project, joined the meeting with representation from the organisation’s Collaborative Research Leader, Dr Mahfuza Ahmed. We recently took the opportunity to talk with her about the highlights and key takeaways from the review meeting.
What is/are the reason(s) behind organising the meeting?
According to the project Grant Agreement, there are three periodic review meetings scheduled. Following the agreement, the first review meeting took place on 28 November 2025 in Berlin, Germany, hosted by Fraunhofer. A General Assembly also took place on 27 November in Berlin, the day before the review meeting. The Project Officer (PO) assigned by the European Commission joined the meeting to monitor the project progress during the first reporting period. Work package leads presented their progress on the work completed during the period in the presence of the project officer.
Could you please provide a brief summary of the key topics that were presented by the consortium partners?
The presentations began with an overall project overview, including the project objectives and a consolidated summary of progress across all work packages, highlighting any deviations, risks, and the overall project status for reporting period 1. This was followed by updates on project management and coordination activities, covering data management, ethics and GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) compliance, quality assurance, risk management, and the planned next steps.
Subsequently, the activities and outcomes of requirements analysis and specifications were summarised, noting that this was completed by month 6. Presentations then covered progress focusing on Cold Thermal Energy Storage (CTES) development—including PCM (Phase Change Material) selection, testing, and simulation—as well as the control strategy and system for the flexible ORC (Organic Rankine Cycle).
The demonstration and validation phase was also presented and discussed in detail, with updates on the development of the nGEL-integrated ORC plant, including process flow diagrams (PFDs), piping and instrumentation diagrams (P&IDs), draft component datasheets, initial equipment specifications, and preliminary layout and arrangement plans for the demonstration site. In addition, progress on the nGEL Digital Twin, thermo-economic optimisation modelling, and Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) modelling was presented. The session concluded with updates on project exploitation and dissemination activities.
What were the key takeaways from the meeting? Were any important decisions taken?
The key takeaways from the meeting were the strong confirmation from the Project Officer that the project is progressing well. That close coordination across work package leaders is essential for the successful implementation of the nGEL innovations. The meeting strengthened cross-partner collaboration, clarified responsibilities, and set a clear path for the next phase of development of the nGEL integrated ORC power plant, its integration with the Kizildere power plant, and its demonstration. Important decisions are covered within the key takeaways.
What are the next steps of the project?
The next goal of the project is to finalise the nGEL innovations demonstration strategies for flexible power, heating, and cooling through the RePG plant, which will be integrated with the Kizildere power plant in Denizly, Turkey. The work on the control strategy and system for flexible ORC will involve developing the controller and establishing a detailed action plan, translating the proposed control strategy into a mathematical control problem, and testing this strategy within the physical ORC plant and Digital Twin environment during the demonstration phase. Additionally, preparations will be made to initiate data communication, along with creating a clear timeline to guide the overall controller development process.
On the Demonstration site, work will continue with detailed safety assessments, reviewing site constraints, and coordinating between design and operations teams.
The simulation will be continued for the Cold Thermal Energy Storage (CTES) and HTES (Hot Thermal Energy Storage). Corrosion and other laboratory tests will continue on the pre-selected PCM materials. The final material will be selected after the thermal storage modelling and optimisation are completed.
The AI development model, which predicts the ORC power output based on ambient temperature, will continue to function, including further refinement and tuning of the hyperparameters of the developed models for the large-scale ORC system at the demo site. This will be followed by transferring these developments to a new dataset provided by project partner RePG. The work will also extend to secondary applications involving a small-scale ORC system and additional smaller datasets from two similar ORC installations. The UI/UX design for the DSS frontend within the Digital Twin will be completed, and subsequently, work will commence on the backend.
To enhance the Digital Twin's responsiveness and to meet the KPI (Key Performance Indicator), the ANN (Artificial Neural Network) and PNN (Physics-Informed Neural Network) will be explored. Work will continue on thermodynamic and economic optimisation modelling, LCA modelling, and perform an environmental impact analysis for the nGEL integrated binary power plant.
The first review meeting of the nGEL project was not just a gathering, but it helped the consortium members take a pause and self-evaluate their work. The partners also benefited from the discussions, as they were able to shape the future roadmap by addressing deviations and challenges.
The nGEL project has received funding from the Horizon Europe Framework Programme (HORIZON) Research and Innovation Actions under grant agreement No 101148170