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 January 13, 2025
Please note that this is an updated version of the Proposal template. It contains a clarification regarding the inclusion of institutional collaborators as co-applicant investigators as well as corrections regarding the budget and partnership contributions. The Impact Project Budget Grid template has also been updated.
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 January 13, 2025
Please note that this is an updated version of the Proposal template. It contains a clarification regarding the MoUs and a change regarding the number of PhD students that each applicant must supervise. The Living Labs Budget Grid has also been updated.
Resources
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
In specific places in the Impact Round Call for Proposals template, researchers are given the opportunity to include charts and tables if they so choose. The template does not allow these elements to be embedded directly into the fillable response areas. These elements can be included on separate pages.
Note: Tables and charts should only be figures that enhance the application. Additional text should not be included on these separate pages.
No. The templates, for either Impact Projects or Living Labs, must be used for completing all applications.
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.
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.
For Impact Project applicants, each must supervise a minimum of 2 PhD students.
For Living Lab applicants, each must supervise a minimum of one PhD student.
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.
