Silvie Petránková Ševčíková

The Energy Research Centre (ERC) was established on March 2, 1999 thanks to the backing of the VŠB – Technical University of Ostrava and the subsidy of the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports of the Czech Republic on the project “Energy Resource Utilization” within the programme “Strengthening HEI's Research Potential”. The new institution drew on long-term experience of the Department of Energy Engineering.

Since January 2002 the Energy Research Centre has become an independent HE institute in accordance with the Higher Education Act no. 111/1998 Coll. Since January 2021 ERC has become part of Energy and environmental technology centre.

The ERC activities are highly varied, covering a wide range of various fields. The most important ones include above all research and development and cooperation with industrial partners.

Research and development is oriented on:

• Improvement of technical level of combustion facilities > investigation of a principle of combustion processes, > improvement of the energy transformation process,

• Alternative processes of thermic transformation

• Safety in power engineering and industry

All the main directions of R&D works in the ERC are concentrated in the INEF Centre (Innovation for Efficiency and the Environment). This regional research – development Centre was built in 2010 – 2014 thanks to a project of the same name funded from the OP Research and Development for Innovation.

The ERC includes also the accredited testing laboratory no. 1166. 3 for measurements of heat engineering quantities. This workplace has also an authorization of the Ministry of the Environment of the Czech Republic for pollutant emissions measurements and for education of workers in the field of emission measurement on all competence levels.

Cooperation wtih industrial partners is oriented on:

Beside the energy services, the cooperation with industrial partners in a field of European and national chemical legislation has been established. This cooperation includes the following activities:

1. consulting and implementation of Regulation (EC) no. 1970/2006 on Registration, Evaluation, Authorization and Restriction of Chemicals (REACH),

2. consulting and implementation of legislature in a field of occupational health protection,
3. field of risk assessment and risk management for the use of chemical substances,