Muscat – The Ministry of Education, represented by the Department of Innovation and Scientific Olympiad, in partnership with Petroleum Development Oman, organised 4 two-days sessions to evaluate scientific innovations for the fifth edition of the PDO Award for Renewable Energy. This edition of the competition is devoted to hydrogen energy and finding innovative ways to extract it as was announced in January. Registration for the awards ended in May.

The award targets students of Grades 7 to 12 in public and private schools. The initial evaluation of the qualified projects was held on Monday and Tuesday to compete for the final evaluation, which will be held in December.

On the importance of award and its role in developing students’ abilities and encourage innovation, Dr Maya al Azri, Acting Director of Department of Innovation and Scientific Olympiad, said, “The Ministry of Education believes in the importance of other government and private institutions participating in supporting educational programmes that contribute to developing students’ skills and abilities in innovation. This award is one of the important programmes.”

A total of 170 projects were submitted for this edition of the award, 44 of which qualified for the second phase representing various governorates. The qualified projects made presentations to the jury consisting of several academics, experts and specialists. Evaluation was done at this stage through video communication, with the third phase of the award to be held in person in December. Participants were evaluated on several criteria – research topic, design, methodology, implementation, creativity and originality. Fifteen schools qualified to compete for the competition prize money – RO5,000.

The PDO Award for Renewable Energy was launched in the 2016/2017 academic year, in a successful partnership between the Ministry of Education, represented by the Department of Innovation and Scientific Olympiad, and PDO Renewable Energy, aiming to enhance aspects of innovation and scientific research among students, find solutions to energy issues, and provide innovative scientific models in the field of renewable energy, including solar, wind and geothermal energy.