We’re a little more than halfway to the next Zayed Future Energy Prize* awards ceremony, but the fun has just started for the judges evaluating this year’s contestants, and the challenge is probably greater than ever. In its 7th year, the Zayed Future Energy Prize competition has pulled in a record number of submissions.
With 597 submissions, what I often call the Oscars of cleantech has 26% more contestants to go through this year than last year. It also has 514 Lifetime Achievement Award nominations to review before deciding on 1 winner.
“The Global High Schools category increased by 17 per cent worldwide, with a 75 per cent rise in entries from the Pacific Islands and Australia, the Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) category increased by 34 per cent with 331 submissions, 35 per cent from North and Latin America. Non-governmental organisations increased by 39 per cent with 139 submissions, a notable portion from Europe and the Americas,” a press release from the Zayed Future Energy Prize team states.
“The Zayed Future Energy Prize offers the opportunity to be part of an extraordinary global journey and a shared vision of a better world,” Ólafur Ragnar Grímsson, President of the Republic of Iceland and Chair of the Prize Jury, said. “The preliminary analysis of submissions for the 2015 Prize is a positive indicator of how countries around the world are empowering entrepreneurship, innovation and youth engagement, and pledging their commitment to economic growth by embracing new, critically important sectors.”
I can’t wait to see the finalists and winners at the 2015 Zayed Future Energy Prize awards ceremony in January, and I’m curious to see if they end up adding more categories, which they seem to do on a fairly regular basis.
Check out our previous coverage of the Zayed Future Energy Prize, including coverage from attending the past two awards ceremonies.
*Full Disclosure: I write for and manage Sustainnovate.ae, a website linked to the Zayed Future Energy Prize.
Sign up for daily news updates from CleanTechnica on email. Or follow us on Google News!
Have a tip for CleanTechnica, want to advertise, or want to suggest a guest for our CleanTech Talk podcast? Contact us here.
Former Tesla Battery Expert Leading Lyten Into New Lithium-Sulfur Battery Era — Podcast:
I don't like paywalls. You don't like paywalls. Who likes paywalls? Here at CleanTechnica, we implemented a limited paywall for a while, but it always felt wrong — and it was always tough to decide what we should put behind there. In theory, your most exclusive and best content goes behind a paywall. But then fewer people read it! We just don't like paywalls, and so we've decided to ditch ours. Unfortunately, the media business is still a tough, cut-throat business with tiny margins. It's a never-ending Olympic challenge to stay above water or even perhaps — gasp — grow. So ...
