Green engineering grant program

National Instruments has announced its 2011 Green Engineering Grant program, a worldwide competitive program that fosters rapid design, prototyping and commercialisation of promising new renewable energy, energy-efficiency and smart grid systems.

Through the program, the company will donate up to US$25,000 equivalent in LabVIEW graphical system design software tools and training to eligible start-ups to help advance clean energy development in applications such as solar, wind and biofuel technology.

The 2011 program has a special focus on technologies that improve the smart grid and provide the foundation for a clean energy future.

LabVIEW software and the LabVIEW FPGA Module, as well as embedded prototyping and deployment platforms such as NI CompactRIO and PXI instrumentation, are suitable for building control and monitoring solutions for the renewable energy market.

To date, the program has delivered software and training to more than 40 start-ups and small companies working on a variety of renewable energy applications. Examples of how past grant recipients are using tools in their renewable energy solutions include: powering remote villages with portable airborne wind technology; producing quality transport fuels from inedible plants; generating electricity by harnessing ocean thermal energy.