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MIT & Fraunhofer Announce New Center for Sustainable Energy Research

The Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems based in Germany plans to collaborate with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology on a new research center in Massachusetts called the Center for Sustainable Energy Systems.

The Fraunhofer-MIT Center, which will be built near the MIT campus, will concentrate primarily on solar power and green building and design.More specifically, the Center will aim to reduce the cost of solar power by developing advanced materials and smart electronics for plug-and-play solar modules. In the green building and design, the center will research construction technologies that will improve energy efficiency and lower consumption in major building structures.

The center has already attracted $5 million in initial funding from the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative and $1 million from England’s National Grid, a utilities company also working in America, according to a new report from the Cleantech Network.