What is TRL?

In most innovation support grant schemes (not only) in Europe, the technology maturity level is defined using the TRL (Technology Readiness Level) scale. For some grant calls, projects ‘only up to’ or ‘from’ a certain TRL level are eligible. For example, calls supporting basic research only up to TRL 3 or calls supporting solutions for market application of a product from TRL 4 to 9. In grant calls, however, the BRL scale is equally important and has taken its essence from the TRL scale.

 

The scale was originally created by NASA
In the 1970s, NASA asked itself how to categorize the maturity of technology and came up with a solution: the TRL. Originally, TRL scales were created for space exploration technologies to measure their level of maturity. Today, many organisations, research and innovation agencies and public funding programmes use TRLs for their own purposes in many areas, not just space exploration. It has gradually been adopted by a large part of the scientific world, especially by officials involved in research funding. They had a simple reason for doing so. A simpler and clearer distinction of the stage that the research was at. The TRL grade, of course, changes from lower values to higher values during the “life cycle” of a project. Every research usually starts at level 1, but not every innovation reaches level 9.

 

TRL grades range from grade 1 to grade 9, where 9 is the highest level of technology maturity:

Source: https://innonews.blog/ | Source: https://www.earto.eu/

 

 

Video aid for TRL level definition: