This project will extend the successful standardization approach of the Investor Confidence Project beyond buildings and into Industry and Infrastructure. It will utilize a similar approach to the Horizon 2020 funded ICPEU project which developed standardization for building energy efficiency projects. It will develop standardized Protocols and associated tools (Project Development Specifications, Index of National Resources and Templates) for energy efficiency projects in industry and infrastructure - specifically street lighting and district energy. It will have a European wide communications plan, as well as work in five specific countries, building on the work of ICPEU. It will also develop and deploy trainings for Project Developers and Quality Assurance providers. Using the eco-system of Project Developers and its own networks the project will engage with project developers to certify projects and programmes as being Investor Ready Energy Efficiency (IREE). It will dedicate technical assistance resources to helping project owners and project developers to adopt IREE. It will also dedicate specific resources to working with financial institutions to help them incorporate IREE into their investment and lending procedures.

Unlike the EU Emissions Trading Scheme and large companies, SMEs have less technical human and financial resources to improve their energy efficiency. Barriers have been deeply investigated including lack of awareness, low capital and difficulty to access financing, doubts around actual saving potential and the lack of technical human resources. So, national schemes are finalized to provide them with technical resources such as methodologies, best practices, technologies inventories and subsidies. Some of the schemes introduce mandatory actions (energy analysis) to obtain such subsidies. Nevertheless, national policy schemes have failed to some extent to convince SMEs that the energy audit is something more than a “bureaucratic fulfilment” to obtain a contribution and to push also large companies to take the step from the analysis to the investment. To overcome that, DEESME aims at a) Enabling companies to manage the energy transition by taking profit of multiple benefits and energy management approaches, b) Supporting the development and the implementation of EU policies on energy efficiency in the framework of art. 8 of EED beyond the project by providing national authorities with guidelines proposals and recommendations on how to strengthen the national schemes and c) Enhancing the adoption of the DEESME approach by National Authorities beyond the project timeline through the implementation of institutionalization activities. DEESME will target primarily National Authorities to address their needs from the incumbent policies and to make them aware of the resources available to empower their schemes under art. 8 using the multiple benefits approach. Moreover, it will also target SMEs to assist them to develop and test the technical DEESME solutions by organising information and training initiatives, realising energy audit and implementing energy management systems starting from international standard and adding the multiple benefits energy efficiency approach.

DMaaST aims to enhance the manufacturing ecosystem's resiliency and capability of self-adaptation in response to external events. It is achieved through a Smart Manufacturing Platform comprising 4 layers: The data layer establishes a foundation for mapping manufacturing ecosystem information using ontologies and decentralized knowledge graphs, ensuring a trusted cross-organization real-time data integration. Next, a layer with a two-level cognitive digital twin is created, with the low-level DT modelling two use cases' manufacturing services production line; and the high-level DT modelling the main stages of use-cases’ sectors value chains. The resulting DTs will use human expertise-knowledge, data-driven algorithms and physical modelling to provide a reliable and robust DT of the manufacturing ecosystem. The next layer employs the data and modelling layer's information to present a multi-objective distributed decision support system algorithm combining multi-objective techniques and the latest trends in Federated Deep Learning. This makes DTs actionable models and provides the necessary information to make optimal production decisions. The fourth layer focuses on presenting the information in a user-friendly manner with timely scoreboards. Additionally, a dedicated module will assess the production's circularity and sustainability and considering products traceability through the EU-DPP. Therefore, the sustainability and remanufacturing opportunities of the production process will be improved. The project ensures scalability, providing information for replicating and trying new manufacturing processes thanks to the manufacturing services digital warehouse while assessing risks and opportunities for improvement. DMaaST innovations enable the manufacturing ecosystem to adopt the Manufacturing as a Service concept by smoothly evolving all the technologies from a TRL3 to a consolidated TRL6 in 2 use cases in key sectors, aerospace and electronics.

STORMING will develop breakthrough and innovative structured reactors heated using renewable electricity, to convert fossil and renewable CH4 into CO2-free H2 and highly valuable carbon nanomaterials for battery applications. More specifically, innovative Fe-based catalysts, highly active and easily regenerable by waste-free processes, will be developed through a smart rational catalyst design protocol, which combines theoretical (Density Functional Theory and Molecular Dynamics Calculations) and experimental (cluster) studies, all of them assisted by in situ & operando characterisation and Machine Learning tools. The electrification (microwave or joule-heated) of structured reactors, designed by Computational Fluid Dynamics and prepared by 3D printing, will enable an accurate thermal control resulting in high energy efficiency. The project will validate, at TRL 5, the most promising catalytic technology (chosen considering technological, economic, and environmental assessments) to produce H2 with energy efficiency (> 60%), net-zero emissions, and decreasing (ca. 10 %) the costs in comparison with the conventional process. The dissemination and communication of the results will boost the social acceptance of the H2-related technologies and the stakeholder engagement targeting short-term process exploitation and deployment. The key to reach the challenging objectives of STORMING is the highly complementary and interdisciplinary consortium, where basic and applied science merge with engineering, computer and social sciences.

CircularPSP brings together 7 procurers from 7 countries, representing 45 million citizens, to invest €5.64 million in R&D to tackle the common challenge of accelerating digital transition towards a Circular Economy (CE). The Buyers Group represents highly attractive national markets (DE, FI, TR, SE, IE, PT, SI) supported by a Preferred Partner in UK, including capitals with global influence (Berlin, Helsinki, London, Istanbul). The consortium represents European CE-transition and PCP leaders in science and practice. Suppliers are expected to deliver a new green digital public service and data platform enabling entire municipal operations (city) and the local economy (market) to choose, open up, and consume existing and new data. The solution is to support business processes and workflows to plan, procure and implement innovative CE-solutions across Europe more quickly and at larger volume. The unmet procurement needs are: tools to improve organisational and operational performance; data analytics using taxonomies to exploit and exchange CE information and data; removal of language barrier to unlock EU-wide knowledge and learnings. To enable the transition suppliers will answer with ICT innovation in the cross-cutting combination and leveraging of existing and new strategic digital technologies: 1) scalable platforms for city and SMEs users, 2) CE data analytics using EU taxonomy, open linked data, injected by AI, and 3) natural language processing (NLP) to break language barriers across the EU and beyond. The envisaged solution is relevant for all European authorities including cities, ministries, agencies, and housing. Activity triggered by the solution will increase the volume of circular procurement and widen commercialisation opportunities for green digital companies and result in EU leadership in Circular Economy. With interoperability at the core and innovative tools for data sharing and open standards, the solution will provide a use case for the upcoming Common Industrial and Green Deal European Data.