ESFRI
European Strategy Forum
on Research Infrastructures
2016 ESFRI Roadmap
Short Guide for Applicants
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Table of Contents
1. 2016 ESFRI Roadmap
........................................................................................................................ 3
2. Evaluation procedure
....................................................................................................................... 4
Figure 1: 2016 ESFRI Roadmap Evaluation procedure...................................................................... 5
Proposal submission (step 1) ................................................................................................................. 6
Eligibility check and assignment to lead SWG + Pre-screening (step 2)............................................... 6
Scientific evaluation (step 3).................................................................................................................. 7
Assessment of maturity (step 4) ............................................................................................................ 8
Final check and proposal to Plenary Forum (step 5) ............................................................................ 9
Final decision (step 6) ............................................................................................................................ 9
List of abbreviations
............................................................................................................................ 10
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1. 2016 ESFRI Roadmap
In April 2014, the European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures (ESFRI) decided to develop a
new ESFRI Roadmap to be published in early 2016. In May 2014, the Council of the EU acknowledged
the work done by ESFRI to identify priority projects and welcomed the plans of ESFRI to update its
roadmap by 2016. New Research Infrastructures (RIs) (or major upgrades of existing ones) may be
proposed for the 2016 Roadmap and will be assessed by the ESFRI Strategic Working Groups (SWGs)
on the scientific case and the ESFRI working Group on Implementation (IG) on their maturity, in
parallel. The new RI and major upgrades need to demonstrate an advanced degree of managerial and
financial maturity.
The final 2016 ESFRI Roadmap will be a document of approximately 120 A-4 pages including:
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A Landscape Analysis, Gap Analysis and Outlook (about 60-70 pages, including tables and
graphs);
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A list of (about 25) Projects with the rationale of their selection (40-50 pages).
The following model describes the overall process leading to the 2016 ESFRI Roadmap:
The objective of this document is to describe application and evaluation procedure to the 2016 ESFRI
Roadmap.
With respect to previous ESFRI roadmaps, the following (new) rules will apply:
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approximately 25 projects will be on the 2016 ESFRI Roadmap list;
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projects that have been on the roadmap list and not implemented will automatically roll off the
roadmap after 10 years;
any project wishing to be considered again after 10 years must be re-proposed, either in a
different form or with bottlenecks clearly resolved, and will compete with new projects;
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approximately sixteen projects on the current roadmap were introduced in the 2008 and 2010
updates and will remain so the expected total of 25 allows room for 8 to 10 new projects on the
2016 Roadmap;
assessment of new projects will be performed by the SWG and IG, assessed by scientific peer
review, adjusted AEG assessment matrix and indicators of pan-European relevance;
entry level projects will be at a more mature level, i.e. a project will:
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have successfully completed a design study;
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have planned its business case/delivery strategy;
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have obtained the financial commitment of one MS/AC and at least two others clearly
demonstrating political commitment;
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be ready for a decisive preparatory phase.
every 2-3 years the projects on the roadmap will undergo an assessment of implementation by
the IG similar to that carried out by the Assessment Expert Group (AEG) in 2012.
Only ESFRI delegations or EIROforum members can submit proposals for the ESFRI 2016 Roadmap, so
the first step for potential applicants is to contact them for a first assessment. ESFRI delegations or
EIROforum members should carefully check whether the RI project is sufficiently mature, whether
the requested commitment by other MS/AC/Organisations is safeguarded. ESFRI national delegations
and EIROforum members can have specific pre-selection mechanisms in place for this first
assessment, so before preparing a proposal for the 2016 ESFRI Roadmap, please liaise with the
appropriate (national) contact point. The list of these contact points is available on the ESFRI website.
Please also consult the `Online Submission Form for Proposals for 2016 ESFRI Roadmap on the ESFRI
website in order to know the level of detail requested for the application.
2. Evaluation procedure
The following graph describes the submission and evaluation procedure of proposals for the 2016
ESFRI Roadmap update:
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ESFRI Delegation
can submit proposal online
1
Executive Board (EB)
Eligibility check
ELECTRONIC
SUBMISSION
SYSTEM
EIROforum Member
can submit proposal online
EB + SWGs chairs First
REJECTED
PRJECTS
no
Pre-screening
(Attribution to lead
4
SWG)
3
2
yes
lead SWG
IG
evaluates 1) scientific excellence, 2) pan-
assesses maturity
European relevance, 3) socio-economic
impact 4) e-needs
relevant SWG (eventually)
contribute to evaluation of 1) scientific excellence,
2) pan-European relevance, 3) socio-economic
impact 4) e-needs
Yes
lead SWG
A) scientific evaluation per project
B) overall recommendation per field
IG
A) maturity assessment per project
B) maturity recommendation per project
Executive Board
checks a) balance between fields, b)
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relevance for EU policies and c) global
dimension
Executive Board
recommendation per project
proposal 2016 ESFRI Roadmap
EMERGING
PROJECTS
‘emerging’
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Plenary Forum
decides on ‘retained’,
‘retained’
‘emerging’ or ‘rejected’
REJECTED
PROJECTS
2016 ESFRI ROADMAP
‘rejected’
Figure 1: 2016 ESFRI Roadmap Evaluation procedure
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Proposal submission (step 1)
The proposals may only be submitted by ESFRI delegations and EIROforum members through the EU
Survey tool. EU Survey will be the tool made available to ESFRI to collect the proposals; it will not be
used as an evaluation tool. Following the submission, every document exchange will be made
through CIRCA to the ESFRI EB and the respective SWGs Chairs, in a closed circuit.
ESFRI delegations and EIROforum members are advised to prepare the proposals offline, based on
the Online Submission Form available on the ESFRI website. The proposal must be completed online
in one go, as no saving of work underway is technically possible.
The `Online Submission Form for Research Infrastructure Proposals for 2016 ESFRI Roadmap` consists
of three parts to be completed fully:
PART A: PROJECT SUMMARY used for the eligibility check by the ESFRI Executive Board;
PART B: SCIENTIFIC IMPACT, PAN EUROPEAN RELEVANCE, SOCIO-ECONOMIC IMPACT & e-NEEDS
mainly used by the SWG to evaluate the scientific excellence of the proposal;
PART C: IMPLEMENTATION used by the IG to assess the maturity of the proposal.
The deadline for submission is on 31 March 2015 at 17h CET sharp.
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Eligibility check and assignment to lead SWG + Pre-screening (step 2)
The Executive Board (EB) will execute a first eligibility check based on the information provided in
Part A to confirm that the proposed project:
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is complete, submitted within the deadline and written in English;
matches the definition of a RI ;
is supported by at least three different EU Member States (MS) or Associated Countries (AC) ; at
least one of which should express a formal financial commitment to the project and the others
clearly demonstrating political commitment through the submission of a Letter of Intent (LoI). In
case of an EIROforum member proposal, a council resolution expressing funding support should
be provided.
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The EB and the respective SWG Chairs will proceed to a pre-screening of the proposals, proposing to
exclude proposals which do not fit a sound RI concept in each scientific field nor a sound justification
for a major upgrade .
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The EB will report to the ESFRI Plenary Forum on:
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the number of projects received,
the results of adopting the eligibility criteria,
Horizon 2020 Definition for “European research infrastructures (including e-Infrastructures) December 2013, i.e. “‘Research
Infrastructures’ are facilities, resources and services that are used by the research communities to conduct research and foster innovation
in their fields. They include: major scientific equipment (or sets of instruments); knowledge-based resources such as collections, archives or
scientific data; e-infrastructures, such as data and computing systems and communication networks; and any other infrastructure of a
unique nature essential to achieve excellence in research and innovation.”
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As a reference, Horizon 2020 Associated Countries list is available in
http://ec.europa.eu/research/participants/data/ref/h2020/grants_manual/hi/3cpart/h2020-hi-list-ac_en.pdf. Switzerland is to be
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considered AC Country in this framework, as it is associated to the I Pillar of Horizon 2020 after the 15 September.
3 A major upgrade is an upgrade to an RI with the goal to deliver a transformative change in its scientific outputs, or a complete change of
technical approach and NOT routine maintenance or incremental gains, NOT routine maintenance or incremental gains.
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the list of rejected projects, as a result of the EB + SWGs chairs pre-screening,
the assignment of the proposals to the SWGs for evaluations (a lead SWG will be responsible for
further scientific evaluation and eventually other relevant SWG can be consulted by the lead
SWG, if relevant).
The EB will propose to the ESFRI Plenary Forum:
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a list of projects that shall undergo the evaluation and selection procedure, thus acts as a filter
ensuring that ESFRI is not overloaded with proposals that do not have any chance to get on the
2016 ESFRI Roadmap.
The ESFRI Plenary Forum approval will determine the beginning of the Evaluation process by the
SWGs and IG.
Scientific evaluation (step 3)
The lead SWG is responsible for the execution of the evaluation of the scientific case of the proposal
based on the information provided in Part B. If an SWG does not sufficiently cover the scientific field,
external experts may be sought. In a case of an e-infrastructure proposal being submitted, ESFRI will
liaise with the e-IRG in order to assess its value.
The following procedure applies:
Each SWG will agree on a list of three independent experts to be asked to supply a peer-review
of the projects. They must be independent and formally declare not to be in conflict of interest
with the proposal.
- The experts will assess the scientific quality of the projects. Their reports will provide advice to
the SWG.
- Based on the expert reports and also on the information provided by the projects, the SWG will
assess the scientific uniqueness, the increase of capacity brought about in the given field and
their impact on global competitiveness.
- The new projects are tested against the Indicators of pan-European relevance and extra
information can be asked from the projects by the SWG.
- The new projects are tested against the indicators of the e-IRG . This will be done by each SWG
with the help of its e-IRG member.
- Each SWG may interview the project proposers of the group in order to clarify eventual questions
and to draw a conclusion on a shortlist of candidates for the 2016 ESFRI Roadmap. This interview
should not however allow for any change of the proposal in order to safeguard a level-playing
field.
The following dimensions will be evaluated:
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1. scientific impact /scientific relevance for the respective scientific area in the European RI
ecosystem;
2. European added value/ pan-European relevance;
3. socio-economic impact;
4. e-needs
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For more information, please consult: http://ec.europa.eu/research/infrastructures/pdf/FI13_46_14_ESFRI%20Indicators_report_4.pdf
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For more information, please consult: http://www.e-irg.eu/images/stories/dissemination/white-paper_2013.pdf
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Each SWG will put forward to the EB an evaluation per project scoring each of these criteria in the
following category and an overall score per project:
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very high - issues under assessment are outstandingly covered;
high - issues under assessment are comprehensively covered;
medium - issues under assessment are adequately covered, but the proposal shows weakness in
a specific area of the criteria. Enhance the projects’ chances of future success may require
significant changes to a specific part of the proposal;
low - issues under assessment are weak and proper evidence of project chances for success is
lacking or omitted.
Based on this scientific evaluation of each project, each SWG will present an overall recommendation
to the ESFRI EB in the following three categories:
1. candidate projects for the 2016 ESFRI Roadmap;
2. emerging projects to be mentioned in a separate part of the final report, not yet mature enough
to be included in the 2016 ESFRI Roadmap, but potential candidates for later editions;
3. rejected projects - projects that shall not be considered further for the roadmap update together
with detailed explanation for this rejection.
Each SWG will also indicate which, if any, of their selected projects may be a candidate as global RI,
according to the ‘GSO Framework’ .
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Assessment of maturity (step 4)
The IG will assess the maturity of the proposals mainly based on the information provided in Part C.
Independent experts will assess the following dimensions of maturity (see also ANNEX 3: Online
Submission Form for Proposals for 2016 ESFRI Roadmap - Part C):
- preparatory work achieved;
- commitment by stakeholders;
- planning;
- governance, scientific and legal management;
- HR policy and project management;
- costs and financial commitments;
- feasibility and risks.
The ‘Letters of Intent' are dealt with by the EB for the eligibility check, but the independent experts
will also look at these in order to assess the compliance with the key requirements. The ‘User
Strategy’, including access, and the Research Data Management (RDM) are in principle dealt with in
the scientific evaluation by the SWG, but the independent experts will also take them into account to
assess the compliance with the key requirements. Concerning the ‘preparatory work achieved’ it is
clear that the independent experts particularly will look at the achievements (post hoc) of a design
study and a feasibility study as only projects that have completed both are in principle eligible for the
2016 ESFRI Roadmap. In this sense, the assessment of the business case as well as the investment
(plan) will be an ex ante assessment of the plans.
The independent experts will score each project on each dimension in the following category
resulting in an overall score per project which is not necessarily an average of the scores per
criterion:
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For more information, please consult the Framework for Global Research Infrastructures of the Group of Senior Officials on Global
Research Infrastructures: http://ec.europa.eu/research/infrastructures/pdf/gso_framework_for_global_ris.pdf
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very high - issues under assessment are outstandingly covered;
high - issues under assessment are comprehensively covered;
medium - issues under assessment are adequately covered, but the proposal shows weakness in
a specific area of the criteria. Enhancing the projects’ chances of future success may require
significant changes to a specific part of the proposal;
low - issues under assessment are weak and proper evidence of project chances for success is
lacking or omitted.
Based on this ‘assessment of maturity` per project by the independent experts, the IG will present a
recommendation per project in the following three categories:
1. candidate projects for the 2016 ESFRI Roadmap;
2. emerging projects to be mentioned in a separate part of the final report, not yet ready to be
included in the 2016 ESFRI Roadmap, but potential candidates for later editions;
3. rejected projects.
Final check and proposal to Plenary Forum (step 5)
Based on A) a scientific evaluation per project and B) an overall recommendation for strong
candidate projects from each SWG and A) the maturity assessment per project and B) the maturity
recommendation per project from the IG, the EB will execute a final check on the following criteria:
- balance between the thematic fields of the SWG;
- relevance of projects for EU policies;
- global dimension of projects.
Valuing the input from the SWG and IG, the EB will present a recommendation per project containing
the following summary report:
- project summary and the result of the eligibility check by EB;
- scientific excellence;
- pan-European relevance;
- social-economic impact;
- e-needs;
- assessment of implementation;
- overall recommendation (candidate, emerging or rejected project).
The EB thus offers a proposal for decision on the 2016 ESFRI Roadmap to the Plenary Forum.
Final decision (step 6)
The Plenary Forum will decide on the 2016 ESFRI Roadmap in the autumn of 2015. The new Roadmap
will be presented in spring 2016.
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List of abbreviations
ABBREVIATION
MEANING
AC
Associated Country to Horizon 2020
AEG
Assessment Expert Group
EB
Executive Board
ESFRI
European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures
IG
Working Group on Implementation
LA
Landscape Analysis
LoI
Letters of Intent
MS
EU Member State
MoU
Memorandum of Understanding
RI
Research Infrastructure
SWG
Strategy Working Group
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