The CITADELS project aims to contribute towards transforming the 7 widening countries represented in the Project into CITADELS of human-centric Industry 5.0 development. The Project brings together a consortium of 10 partners from 9 countries, including 4 large academic institutions that are highly influential within their innovation ecosystems, 3 exemplary DeepTech companies, and 1 science and technology park, where academia meets industry to make innovations happen and grow into the business. Additionally, CITADELS is supported by the 2 EU-leading partners to bring know-how in cross-sectoral collaboration, to ensure stakeholder engagement and pan-European impact (EIT Manufacturing), and to introduce a sustainable, responsible research and innovation approach (K&I). CITADELS combines the excellence of DeepTech talents and social scientists to comply with EC’s “ERA industrial technologies roadmap on human-centric research and innovation for the manufacturing sector” to ensure sustainable DeepTech careers and the progress of DeepTech. The CITADELS project seizes the opportunity presented by recent investments in advanced public R&I infrastructure and the growing demand for DeepTech expertise across Europe to combat the brain drain in widening countries. By aligning academic research excellence with industry needs, CITADELS focuses on talent circulation (20 research talents and 20 R&I support talents will be involved as a whole), creating attractive career pathways in DeepTech and building the capacity of local ecosystems to adopt cutting-edge technologies. This project will support translating research into high-value industrial applications and position widening countries as competitive players in the global DeepTech landscape. Ultimately, CITADELS will boost regional economic resilience and foster social cohesion by modernizing local industries and creating high-value jobs, driving long-term economic growth and resilience in widening countries.

The objective of CoolHeating is to support the implementation of "small modular renewable heating and cooling grids" for communities in South-Eastern Europe. This will be achieved through knowledge transfer and mutual activities of partners in countries where renewable district heating and cooling examples exist (Austria, Denmark, Germany) and in countries which have less development (Croatia, Slovenia, Macedonia, Serbia, Bosnia-Herzigowina). Core activities, besides techno-economical assessments, include measures to stimulate the interest of communities and citizens to set-up renewable district heating systems as well as the capacity building about financing and business models. The outcome will be the initiation of new small renewable district heating and cooling grids in 5 target communities up to the investment stage. These lighthouse projects will have a long-term impact on the development of "small modular renewable heating and cooling grids" at the national levels in the target countries.