11 March 2025 | Human Capital

Regions create ecosystems for Learning Communities

Consortia are currently being formed in six Dutch regions that will set up ecosystems for the co-development and sharing of knowledge using, among other things, learning communities. They are doing so in order to answer the call for ‘Learning Communities as the Green Hydrogen Economy’s Accelerators’ with a joint project proposal in May 2025. Companies, research institutions and education can all still register to take part

GroenvermogenNL’s call aims to accelerate the green hydrogen economy. Investments, innovation and upscaling are crucial to this end. This will require almost 38,000 properly trained professionals. To tackle this challenge, GroenvermogenNL and a large number of stakeholders have drawn up a human capital agenda (HCA) with the objective of ensuring sufficient working professionals with the required knowledge and skills are trained in a timely manner.

Contact your region and get involved.

Regional Learning Communities

A lot of new knowledge is required if the hydrogen transition is to succeed. To implement this new knowledge in the labour market, GroenvermogenNL links knowledge development to regional learning communities consisting of companies, educational and research institutes who work, learn and innovate together. The learning communities implement and further develop research results in practice, enabling the continuous improvement of professionals and students’ skills.

What is Such an Ecosystem Like?

Work is already underway in the northern Netherlands to create a regional knowledge and innovation centre called Hydrogen Valley Campus Europe. There companies and research institutions will collaborate on a variety of projects and learning communities including the Hydrohub Megawatt Test Center, the REMO lab, NorthGrid and EmmHy[TV1] . Companies from the Northern Netherlands industrial cluster will participate including Nobian, HyCC, VoltH2, RWE and Groningen Seaports and this will trickle knowledge down to daily practice as well as relaying questions back to the research institutions. The ecosystem neatly combines applied and fundamental research. Naturally parties from GroenvermogenNL’s R&D projects (including HyPRO and HyTROS) as well as pilot and upscaling projects are involved. Entrance[TV2] stimulates cooperation within the regional learning communities.

Responsive Working, Learning and Innovation Ecosystem

GroenvermogenNL’s call aims to encourage requesting parties to form consortia and seek out collaborations with regional learning communities. The call’s central question is: How can a responsive ecosystem that features strong links between working, learning and innovating be developed that combines knowledge and skill sharing for (future) hydrogen professionals resulting in a reduction in time-to-job?

Budget per Region

As part of the call, a subsidy budget totalling well over € 26.8 million has been made available for research. Seven applications can be granted, one in each in of the Netherland’s regions. There is a maximum subsidy figure per regional application.

Special Procedure: a Single Consortium and a Single Project Plan

The call will be implemented by NWO. We have decided on an exceptional procedure:

There will be no competition between subsidy applicants. The parties will cooperate on a single project plan per region
Two workshops were held in every region
Companies can also apply for a subsidy (max. 40%).

View the call Learning Communities as the Green Hydrogen Economy’s Accelerators.