Stiftinga Vestlandsforsking / Western Norway Research Institute

Stiftinga Vestlandsforsking / Western Norway Research Institute (WNRI) is a leading research institute on critical and cross-disciplinary research. The competence is wide, covering social studies, natural sciences, technology and the humanities. The institute is highly specialised in two main areas: i) environmental analysis in the field of industrial ecology and energy-efficiency, and ii) applied information technology, database design and ;

WNRI was established in 1984, and has since accrued a highly recognized expertise in servicing a wide range of public and private institutions, at the European, national and local level. The company has been extensively involved in EU FP projects as Coordinator and Partner. This has given the institute substantial expertise in the coordination of such projects.

WNRI has substantial expertise in the field of life-cycle assessment (LCA) from research projects conducted within the last 10-15 years. The institutes competence in LCA has been gained through application in a wide range of industrial sectors. Among the researchers there is highly relevant expertise from international (USA and China) industrial and academic research.

WNRI has been Coordinator for three, and Partner in four other, pilot actions in EU's Competitiveness and Innovation Framework Programme (CIP) Intelligent Energy Europe. Several of these projects applied LCA in different industrial sectors. WNRI was Coordinator for the other Norwegian contributions in the FP6 ENERGY Integrated Project HyWays - The Development and Detailed Evaluation of a Harmonised European Hydrogen Energy ;

WNRI coordinated the FP6 NMP SSA Europe-China Cooperation in Green Electronics Production Research (EC-GEPRO). The project focused on the development of technology for the production of green electronic products, and led to the establishment of a Centre of Excellence at Shanghai University for European-Chinese collaboration on environment-friendly ;

WNRI was Partner in the FP7-NMP project Functional joining of dissimilar materials using directed self-assembly of nanoparticles by capillary-bridging (HyperConnect), as well as in the FP7-Capacities SME-2011-1 Research for SMEs project Development of a competitive 0 GWP dry process to reduce the dramatic water consumption in the ever-expanding solar cells manufacturing industry (SOLNOWAT).