REWAISE will create a new “smart water ecosystem”, mobilising all relevant stakeholders to make society embrace the true value of water, reducing freshwater and energy use, resulting in a carbon free, sustainable hydrological cycle, to transition into a resilient circular economy. A network of nine living labs, involving 5 major water utilities, demonstrates real-life, large-scale operational environments for technological innovations and new governance methods to secure a resource-efficient water supply for the EU. New business niches will be created, incentivizing water-related investments, and accelerating SME growth, by linking users with specific water needs, incorporating life cycle and cost assessments, and collective action in new governance frameworks for smart value creation and high social returns. By incorporating paradigm shifts from a linear Roman heritage to a new circular, water-smart economy, REWAISE reveals the full Value of Water for Europe, considering 3 key components of the economic and societal value generated by integral water cycles: • Value in Water: is accomplished by extracting and putting to beneficial use dissolved substances such as nutrients, minerals, chemicals and metals, as well as organic matter and energy, embedded in raw and used water streams. • Value from Water: encompasses the economic activities inherent to the water cycle, related products and services that generate benefits and jobs, directly or in other sectors that depend on water, such as energy and transportation, • Value through Water: the societal, health and well-being functions of water, which will be enhanced by inter-linking users, regulators, water operators and other stakeholders in electricity and chemicals markets through a digital platform that optimizes decision making and business opportunities through socio-economics-based coordination between them, while minimizing emissions , risks and vulnerability.

In this proposal, we build on the ancient and still widely used process of saltworks, where seawater goes through natural evaporation and fractionated crystallization in shallow basins. This process produces sea salt and a brine (bittern) free of calcium as a by-product, which is 20 to 40 times more concentrated than seawater in some crucial elements. The SEArcularMINE project uses this bittern, targeting Magnesium, Lithium and other Trace-Elements belonging to the alkaline/alkaline earths metals (e.g. Rb, Cs, Sr) or transition/post-transition metals (e.g. Co, Ga, Ge) group. Three innovative technologies will be developed and integrated within a circular approach, based on three different processes: 1) reactive crystallisation; 2) selective membrane separation; 3) selective sorption/desorption. The concept is enhanced by: i) energy-efficient concentration steps, ii) on-site generation of reactants from the available brines and iii) production of the required energy from reverse electrodialysis fed with the process outlet brine on-site and solar or wind energy. A multi-disciplinary approach will be adopted for bringing the low TRL of the three main technologies and of the overall integrated concept up to TRL4-5. There will be fundamental advances in the knowledge of the processes, leading to break-through developments of the 3 most important technologies for the recovery of minerals from brines, but also from seawater or any other kind of metals-rich solution. Within our circular strategy, we will look also at the option of including desalination upstream from the saltworks, providing freshwater to the local communities and a concentrated stream to feed the saltworks, increasing salt productivity and bittern availability. The adopted approach will have positive effects on the environmental and financial performance, laying the foundations for a future industrial application.