Impact Round 2025
On this page you will find all of the information regarding the Volt-Age Impact Round Calls for Proposals, including Impact Projects and Living Labs based on Existing Relationships.
Researchers are now invited to submit Notices of Intent providing an overview of their proposed projects. Researchers are also now able to begin writing their calls for proposals.
Overview
Impact Projects
Impact Projects refer to large-scale, multidisciplinary research initiatives designed to develop and implement new technologies and solutions for the electrification of society. A broad range of academic, public, community and private partners must be involved in Impact Projects to demonstrate real and significant impacts focusing on innovation, economic viability, equity, and the well-being of society. There will be approximately 10 Impact Projects selected by Volt-Age. Each successful project will be awarded up to $4M funding from the Volt-Age CFREF, for projects lasting 4 years. Impact Projects should be articulated around students. Our goal is to recruit up to 250 PhD students in the Volt-Age Cohort who will be at the heart of Volt-Age Impact Projects.
Living Labs
Living Labs are inclusive spaces to tackle collective challenges through collaborations between researchers and different societal stakeholders across the innovation cycle, from co-defining problems to research and development to testing. Volt-Age Living Labs must exhibit three main characteristics: co-creation of research, engagement of diverse stakeholders, and taking place in a real-life context. Up to two (2) Living Labs will be selected from this first Call for Proposals for Living Labs based on existing relationships. Each successful project will be awarded up to $1.5M funding from the Volt-Age CFREF funds, with projects lasting 3-4 years. A separate call for Living Labs based on New Partnerships will be launched at a later date.
Notice of Intent
The Notice of Intent is designed to allow researchers to announce their intention to apply for an Impact Call Grant. The NOI includes details of the research focus, proposed members of the research team, potential partners, and impacts relating to Volt-Age research goals.
NOIs will be posted publicly on the Volt-Age Concordia website so that they can be viewed by other researchers, allowing for additional collaborations and partnerships to emerge. The NOIs will not be reviewed or assessed by Volt-Age ; they are only informational.
We advise any researchers to review NOIs posted before applying to the Impact Call.
NOIs are non-binding and don’t impose any commitment regarding your Impact project application.
Note: For an individual to submit an Impact Call Application as a Principal Investigator, they must be listed as a PI or Co-Applicant Investigator on an NOI.
| Deadline | January 31, 2025 |
Submitted NOIs
Notices of Intent will be published in the presentation below as they are received.
Impact round NOIs Presentation by Volt Age
Call for proposals
Update on Memorandums of Understanding
The decision has been made that MoUs with both Impact project and Living Lab project partners can be submitted within the first year after being awarded the grant. Partners with whom an MoU has not been signed prior to submitting the application must submit a Letter of Support and must indicate in that letter that they commit to finalizing and signing an MoU in this time frame.
Impact Projects
| Duration | Up to 4 years |
| Value | Maximum $4 million |
| Deadline | February 28, 2025 |
| Submit application | Applications must be submitted by email to volt-age@concordia.ca using the application template (available in Word format). Applications must be submitted as a single PDF format. |
| Contact | volt-age@concordia.ca |
Updated Impact Call Proposal Template Last Updated February 11, 2025
Living Labs Projects
| Duration | Up to 4 years |
| Value | Maximum $1.5 million |
| Deadline | February 28, 2025 |
| Submit application | Applications must be submitted by email to volt-age@concordia.ca using the application template (available in Word format). Applications must be submitted as a single PDF format. |
| Contact | volt-age@concordia.ca |
Updated Living Lab Proposal Template Last Updated February 11, 2025
Resources
Application Checklist
Your application should be submitted as a single PDF to volt-age@concordia.ca.
In the body of your email, please include the title of your project as well as the names of the PI and co-Applicant Investigators only.
Make sure your application includes the following:
Completed Call for Proposal (Impact Project or Living Lab)
Completed Budget Grid (Impact Project or Living Lab)
CCV or SSHRC/NSERC formatted CVs (or 2-page summary CVs for all those who do not have an existing formatted CV)
Any completed MOUs and Reciprocity Agreements (if applicable) - note that an MOU or Reciprocity Agreement must be submitted for each one of your partners within the first year of a project being accepted.*
Any completed risk assessment and mitigation plans for private sector partners - note that these must be submitted within the first year of a project being accepted.*
Letters of Support from each listed partner confirming the contributions and commitments that will be made to the project
For Living Lab projects only: Completed Community Needs, Goals, and Priorities Survey and/or Feasibility Study - note that these must be submitted within 6 months of an award being given
*NOTE: Risk Assessment and Mitigation Plan with private sector partners, MOUs, and Reciprocity Agreements are not required at the time of submission. However, these documents must be submitted within the first year of a project being accepted in order to ensure that full funds are released.
Impact Project and Living Lab Budget Grids Updated February 14, 2025
This update corrects errors in formulae on the Summary, Partnership Contributions, and Research Budget sheets.
Curation process
The Curation Process was designed to gather perspectives and feedback from researchers, administrators and students to help guide the creation of the Impact Call for Proposals. The Curation Process included a total of 16 events engaging approximately 200 individuals, including response collection activities, workshops, webinars, and informal meetups.
Evaluation process
During the review process, the review committee assigns a rating to each application. These ratings are used to create a ranked list of applications, which the Volt-Age CFREF uses to allocate funding. Funding is awarded in order of ranking until all available funds are exhausted or no additional applications meet the funding criteria.
FAQ
Completing the application
Risk Assessment and Mitigation Plan with private sector partners are not required at the time of submission. However, these documents must be submitted with all MOUs and Reciprocity Agreements within the first year of a project being accepted in order to ensure that full funds are released.
MoUs with both Impact project and Living Lab project partners can be submitted within the first year after being awarded the grant. Partners with whom an MoU has not been signed prior to submitting the application must submit a Letter of Support and must indicate in that letter that they commit to finalizing and signing an MoU in this time frame.
Please include NSERC or SSHRC formatted CVs (eg. CCV - full Form 100A not required) with your application for the Principal Investigator and all co-Applicant Investigators. If you do not currently have a CCV or other NSERC/SSHRC formatted CV, please include a 2-page summary CV focussing on work relating to your contribution to the project.
Templates and Budget Grids
If there is a conflicting statement or rule between a call for proposals and the corresponding budget grid template, the rule or statement in the call for proposals supersedes and applies.
Yes. The research trainee salaries have been purposefully separated from research budget for both the Living Labs and Impact Project budget grids. The research trainee amounts only appear on the research trainee tab.
For Impact Projects, a minimum of 80% of the total amount requested from Volt-Age (up to $4 million) must go towards research trainee salaries.
For Living Labs, a minimum of 40% of the total amount requested from Volt-Age (up to $1.5 million) must go towards research trainee salaries.
The amount you have to request from Volt-Age for the Research Budget (i.e. all allowable expenses other than research trainee salaries) equals the total amount you are requesting minus the research trainee salaries total, ensuring that the minimums are respected.
As all of the contributions listed in the budget grid need to be confirmed through the Letters of Support, please ignore this column.
No. The templates, for either Impact Projects or Living Labs, must be used for completing all applications.
Yes. Each section of the form that is fillable has a character limit enforced equivalent to the standard number of characters per page. The character limit is equivalent to the listed page limits for each response.
Note: Please make sure that you are using the Word template to complete your application to ensure that your responses fit within the set limits for each section.
In the Research Plan section are you able to do styling.
In the rest of the template, you are not. Bolding, Italics, underline, etc. are not available. In order to ensure that page/character limits are respected across all of the applications, the Word document was created as a form, which limits the ability to use styling.
Please use uppercase letters and dashes if necessary to separate sections and create lists.
You are able to add charts, tables, and figures into your response for the Research Plan. That is the only place that you are able to do so. They do count towards your page limit.
Research Trainees
If existing doctoral students are to be transferred exclusively, they must not have completed more than one year of their program and their existing project must have ended, or they were already recruited through a seed funding project. For existing students, include names, program, duration in program and justification for transfer to Volt-Age projects. Note that existing students will be funded by Volt-Age scholarships for the remaining of their study up to year four. Overall, new students should constitute more than 80% of the recruited research trainees as part of the project.
For Impact Projects, each project should recruit a minimum of 2 x number of applicants new doctoral students (e.g. a small team of 6 researchers should recruit a minimum total of 12 doctoral students whereas a larger team of 10 should recruit a minimum total of 20 students). Note that the distribution of students among the team can vary as long as the total minimum is respected.
For Living Lab applicants, each project should recruit a minimum of 1 x number of applicants new doctoral students (e.g. a small team of 4 researchers should recruit a minimum total of 4 doctoral students). Note that the distribution of students among the team can vary as long as the total minimum is respected.
The listed research trainee salaries are the minimum required salaries. You are at full liberty to offer higher including from the Volt-Age grant itself or from other sources at your university or elsewhere.
Note: The Research Trainee salaries in the budget grids are set to the amounts that Volt-Age will provide per student. Any additional monies offered to students from the Volt-Age grant itself will come out of the remaining amount that you can request from Volt-Age and thus should be included in the Research Budget sheet.
For Impact Projects, a minimum of 80% of the total money requested from Volt-Age must go towards Research Trainee salaries. This means that if you are requesting the full $4 million from Volt-Age for your project, you must allot a minimum of $3.2 million to Research Trainee salaries.
For Living Labs, a minimum of 40$ of the total money requested from Volt-Age must go towards Research Trainee salaries. This means that if you are requesting the full $1.5 million, you must allot a minimum of $600,000 to Research Trainee salaries.
Yes. All PhD students in the Volt-Age Cohort are offered the same fellowship amount, which is for 4 years. The 4-year fellowship term is what is used when calculating research trainee budgets, even for 3-year projects.
Note: Exceptionally, existing students who qualify to work on Impact Round projects will only be offered a fellowship for the remainder of their studies up 4 years.
Definitions and Rules
No, there is no limit on external or non-academic partners for your project.
On top of the partners that you list in your proposal that you know will be working with you on your project, we have allowed for partnerships to evolve. The proposal templates state the following:
"Projects may evolve over time, with up to five external partners, including Indigenous communities, joining within the first year."
An Early Career Researcher is someone who is within 5 years of their first academic appointment.
Diverse fields of study means that researchers are in different departments.
Yes. Up to 2 Co-Applicant Investigators can be from collaborating instutions for Impact Project Proposals. However, collaborating instutions cannot receive funding from the Impact Round.
Principal Investigators and Co-Applicant Investigators should mainly be from Concordia and partner institutions (University of Calgary, Dalhousie University, Toronto Metropolitan University). Up to 2 Co-Applicant Investigators can be from institutional collaborators (Carleton University, University of Windsor, ETS, Polytechnique Montreal, Université de Montreal), however institutional collaborators cannot receive any funding from the Impact Round. Researchers from all other institutions are eligible to be academic collaborators on Impact Projects.
Yes! We welcome applications from individuals who are not currently part of the Volt-Age community. The Impact Round applications will be evaluated on their merit for this round of funding only. There is no link between the Seed Grant and Impact Round calls for proposals in terms of eligibility or funding opportunity.
