CYCLOLIVE is a collaborative effort with 9 diverse partners from Italy, Germany, Morocco, Spain, Tunisia, France, Jordan, and Turkey. The project aims to tackle energy and environmental challenges linked to olive oil production biowastes in the Mediterranean region. These wastes are typically underutilized or managed inadequately, and CYCLOLIVE strives for a sustainable "zero waste" approach, focusing on the following key objectives: Environmental Monitoring: Objective 1 (OB1) assesses river basin quality near olive milling sites in Italy, Morocco, and Tunisia, measuring the impact of olive mill wastewater (OMWW). The project will then establish three mesocosms, which will serve as experimental platforms to simulate the impact of OMWW discharge under controlled conditions. Energy and Sustainability: CYCLOLIVE will execute three OMWW treatment demonstration cases with enhanced CWs integrated with biochar and solar aeration power (OB2). Additionally, it will carry out three demonstration cases in Italy, Morocco, and Tunisia for converting OMSW into biochar for water treatment, using either solar-based or conventional energy systems (OB3). Two more demonstration cases in Morocco and Italy will focus on transforming OMSW into biochar for use as a slow-release bio-based fertilizer in both field and soilless agriculture (OB4). Furthermore, a demonstration case in Turkey will convert the same OMSW into water-absorbent biopolymers (WABs) for field and soilless agriculture (OB5). Waste-to-Value – To implement three demonstration cases in Italy, Morocco, and Tunisia for the OMWW reuse and/or biochar/WAB application for the field or soilless production of edible crops important in the Mediterranean context using modern and tailored decision support tools (OB6). Sensible soil bioindicators will be used to study soil effects due to the introduction of CYCLOLIVE products in agriculture. Life Cycle Assessment (LCA): Objective seven (OB7) evaluates the life cycle of materials produced within the CYCLOLIVE project using the LCA approach. This assessment will provide insights into the environmental sustainability of the project's innovations. Health and Quality Assessment: CYCLOLIVE will conduct comprehensive monitoring of inorganic and organic micropollutants across the agricultural chain to evaluate potential risks to human health related to food consumption (OB8 and OB9). The project will also assess food quality, including essential primary and secondary metabolites like sugars, polyphenols, and glucosinolates. Stakeholder Engagement: The tenth objective (OB10) emphasizes active engagement with local industrial and commercial stakeholders and end-users from the project's early stages. A participatory approach will ensure that the innovations meet practical needs and are readily adopted. Policy Advocacy: The eleventh and final objective (OB11) focuses on collaborating closely with policymakers. The project will share its results and outputs to advocate for adopting best management practices related to ecosystem resources and waste management. The project studies real and reconstructed ecosystems. Reconstructed ecosystems are tested with OMWW/OMSW to simulate uncontrolled discharge, assessing various biological and chemical parameters, including emerging and priority micropollutants. OMSW is used to produce biochar for water treatment and eco-friendly polymerization techniques create biochar and WABs for agriculture. These are tested at three sites for soilless crop production, growing olives, rockets, strawberries, tomatoes, maize, and peppers with modern irrigation. LCA assesses environmental impact. Food safety monitoring covers various contaminants in the agricultural production chain, and food quality assessment focuses on primary and secondary metabolites. The project also addresses social aspects like consumer acceptance and farmer concerns about unconventional water sources for irrigation.

The aim of this project is to increase the conversion efficiency of conventional photovoltaic solar cells by incorporating photonic up conversion layers based on photoemissive nanostructure materials. Such photonic layers will allow to take advantage of the UV radiation contained in the solar spectrum (about 5-8% at the earth level). Indeed, current solar cells are sensitive to photons located in the lower region of the solar spectrum (visible light), while incident UV photons are unused in photovoltaic processes. Upon incorporation of the photonic conversion layer to the electrodes of common photovoltaic devices (e.g., Si-based, perovskites, dye sensitized) we expect and overall conversion efficiency increase between 2-3%, due to a better exploitation of the solar spectrum. Our approach consists in the incorporation of photonic conversion layers based on photoemissive carbon nanostructures and polymer complexes that are capable of harnessing such UV fraction of sunlight and can be easily implemented on existing PV cells. Hence, a cost-effective approach with minimal impact over the readily available fabrication techniques is proposed. Although the use of photonic up-converting materials has been already explored in the literature, the novelty of this proposal stands from the nature of the photonic layers, combining carbon nanostructures and polymers as well as the integration in electrodes of large dimensions to evaluate the performance of the full solar cells operating in real conditions (illumination and outdoor harsh environments), as opposed to common studies with the focus limited to measuring the indoor photochemical response of lab-scale electrodes. In this regard, previous studies of the consortium partners have demonstrated the photochemical characteristics of carbon nanostructures and polymer complexes with high photoemissive features, and that can be embedded in polymeric matrices to generate optically transparent polymer composite. Such materials can also be manufactured using low cost procedures and local resources (e.g., in the case of carbon nanostructures), which is extremely important for boosting their large scale implementation. Several photoemissive materials will be incorporated in different polymeric matrices to create the photonic layers, and cast them on commercial electrodes to determine the efficiency obtained by the systems. The aging mechanisms as a function of exposure to UV radiation, and as a function of the number of cycles of the temperature variation will be investigated in terms of the impact in the overall photovoltaic conversion. The materials will be tested for durability in aggressive environmental conditions (e.g., dust, high level of irradiation) in the African countries of the consortium.

MED-LINKS aims at providing small-scale producers with tailored and effective solutions enhancing efficiency, sustainability and fairness along fruit and vegetable supply chains in Mediterranean countries. The project tackles five Specific Objectives: (i) to assess the competitive performance of Mediterranean FV supply chains and consumer preferences; (ii) to support the adoption of quality and sustainability standards among small-scale supply chain actors; (iii) to provide innovative IT tools supporting decision making; (iv) to provide small-scale actors with optimised management practices and business relations enhancing quality, sustainability and profitability; (v) to encourage stakeholders to exploit the results for local communities. MED-LINKS approach is based on the combination of three groups of optimization tools: (i) quality and sustainability standards and protocols, (ii) digital platform empowered with blockchain technology (smart contracts) and (iii) managerial tools and coordination strategies (i.e. Business Models). These will be customized based on the actual conditions of local actors participating in three different supply chain systems representative of commercial circuits in the Mediterranean region, namely: a) local Short Food Supply Chains, b) Green Public Procurement, c) Export-Oriented Supply Chains. The project will target and engage local clusters of small-scale producers in Egypt, France, Greece, Italy and Morocco to enhance their capability to adopt quality, environmental and social standards and thus to connect with other supply chain actors and profitability, while meeting final consumers’ needs. After a recognition of the major existing public and private quality and sustainability schemes in each of the three supply chain systems, innovative quality and sustainability tools or strategies tailored for SMEs (e.g. voluntary certifications schemes, Participatory Guarantee Systems, etc.) will be proposed. The second optimization set of strategies concerns the exploitation of innovative business models. An experts’ pool will evaluate and select the BM to optimize within specific clusters. Finally, partners will propose guidelines for pilot actions, bringing about technological innovation’s proposals compatible with selected optimized BMs. As a third set of optimization tools, a web-based digital platform will be developed to support small producers in (i) networking with other supply chain actors and final consumers, (ii) increasing opportunities and reputation (iii) adopting quality and sustainability standards and (iii) managing commercial B2B transactions. In order to scale out and scale up the proposed innovations, context-specific response strategies enhancing the competitiveness and sustainability of local SMEs and value chains of interest will be implemented and demonstrated through five Pilot Actions. Compatibility between the proposed certification paths, business models and digital solutions will be tested and their potential benefits will be verified in real contexts, in each target Country. MED-LINKS will also develop training and advisory activities, while stakeholders’ feedback will be monitored and drivers determining acceptance or refusal of the solutions proposed will be analyzed.