This project aims to develop and validate (to reach TRL 4) a novel thermochemical technology that not only can store mid-temperature heat (250-400 deg C)This project aims to develop and validate (to reach TRL 4) a novel thermochemical technology that not only can store heat at competitive cost and very high efficiency but also may upgrade that to considerably higher temperatures. This way, the technology enables the upgrade of medium-temperature heat to drive high-temperature and more efficient power cycles, e.g. supercritical. The heat is stored in the form of chemical bonds making it suitable for a long-duration and seasonal storage solution for power and heating applications This novel and outstanding heat storage/upgrading concept offers some further important features that make it even more promising. These are its i) competitive cost-effectiveness compared to other technologies due to its expected long lifespan, and design/operation simplicity, ii) compatibility with a variety of heat sources (solar collectors, industrial waste heat, electricity, etc.), and power blocks, upon the right material selection, iii) capability of continuous discharging with periodic charging as a requirement for many power cycles upon proper sizing/design, iv) scalability up to several-hundred MWhs of capacity and storage duration from several days to even seasonal with minimal losses, v) no environmental impacts, toxicity, and human health issues, and vi) many more potential applications upon further and case-specific developments in the future. The consortium consists of 9 partners from all corners of the EU; including 3 universities, 1 research center, 2 SMEs, 2 large enterprises, and 1 NGO, ensuring that all required expertise exists for the successful accomplishment of the project and future exploitation, and also the partners optimally supplement each other. The technology will be demonstrated in different designs and integrations at 5 kW heat capacity at the DLR laboratory.

EU is currently responsible for 11.6% of the world's final energy consumption (9425 Mtoe in 2014) and for 10.8% of the world's final CO2 emissions (33.3 GtCO2 in 2014) with Industry accounting for 25.9% of the energy consumption and for 47.7% of the final CO2 emissions. Energy in industry is mostly used for process heating and cooling, which represents about 63% of the total industry final energy demand. A rather significant theoretical waste heat potential, accounting to 370.41 TWh (Waste heat) per year, has been estimated in the European industry. Energy Intensive Industries (EEIs) are unsurprisingly the top heat emitters. On the other hand, it is estimated that at least 50-70% of EU households could be served more cheaply by thermal infrastructure through district heating networks. District heating currently provides only 8% of the heating demand in Europe. There is therefore an opportunity for increasing energy efficiency growth rates and contributing significantly to the decarbonization targets of European Industry by using the large underutilized energy resources found throughout European EEIs to substitute conventional heat sources in the European industrial and urban sector. The overall objective of INCUBIS is: To help decarbonise European industry by 2050 by unlocking the market potential of ENERGY SYMBIOSIS through developing and deploying five (5) Energy Symbiosis Incubators across Europe, complemented by a digital Cloud Incubator, thus enabling the utilization of waste energy from EEIs. In doing so INCUBIS will achieve total energy savings of 200GWh/year, trigger €6 Million of investments in sustainable energy, generate benefits of €4 Million, achieve GHG reduction of 55k tCO2-eq/year, and convince 1450 business over 40 industrial parks to commit to energy cooperation. To achieve this INCUBIS has put together a prestigious consortium of 8 partners including 5 SMEs that span 6 European countries and will work for the duration of 36 months.

Challenged by climate change, and coupled with the need to secure sustainable economic growth and social cohesion, Europe must achieve a genuine energy revolution to reverse present-day unsustainable trends and live up to the ambitious policy expectations. A rational, consistent and far-sighted approach to heating and cooling is key for ensuring such transformation. Toward this direction, district heating and cooling systems need to be more efficient, intelligent and cheaper. InDeal project will offer an innovative platform that will impose a fairly distribution of heating and cooling among the network’s buildings by: (i) real – time energy consumption data gathering via artificial intelligent meters, (ii) identifying and evaluating the network’s buildings’ need and demand for heating and cooling depending to their energy efficiency, energy consumption and type of building (EDP tool), (iii) predicting the short-term and long-term weather conditions and forthcoming need for heating and cooling (EDP tool), (iv) monitoring and control the level of energy stored in network’s storage stations and substations (SMT), (v) 24/7 monitoring of the DHC system by a central control platform and (vi) minimizing heat losses via novel pipe design solutions and innovative insulation materials. The target of InDeal is to turn the current DHCS into a new next-level automated DHCS that will guarantee the increase of the overall energy efficiency of the system accomplishing a fairly distribution of heating and cooling energy demands. In light of this, InDeal will make a significant step forward contributing to wider use of intelligent district heating and cooling systems and integration of renewables, waste and storage.

The basic idea is to embed the waste from building demolition (fragmented bricks, fragmented plaster or concrete, fragmented glasses, machined wood from windows frame or from wood beams after demolition etc.) in a geopolymer matrix to produce prefabricated panels for different use. The main objective of InnoWEE is in fact the development of an optimized reuse of Construction and Demolition Waste (CDW) materials producing high add value prefabricated insulating and radiating panels to be used in energy efficient buildings. The proposal is based on: 1) Recovery, selection and disassembling of CDW that will be characterized and eventually treated to yield suitable raw materials to be used for production of prefabricated components. 2) Development of new high performance prefabricated insulating geopolymeric panels for building walls envelopes and radiating panels for indoor wall and ceilings with low environmental impact, low embodied energy, low CO2 emissions, high thermal performance. Panels will be fabricated recycling cement, bricks, mortars, glass and wood reaching at least 30% of CDW. 3) To install the panels in demo sites characterized by different climate to evaluate their performance in terms of reducing energy use and minimizing environmental impacts. 4) To use an integrated design process and a holistic approach for the whole life cycle of the materials and components and produce a material that is cost effective, competitive, robust, reliable and low maintenance. 5) To create practical and sustainable building solutions that are easy to integrate into building designs, easy to install, take in consideration the needs of the stakeholders that strongly influence the market, and have been tested to meet all the current standards.