The project SEAGLOW (Sustainable Energy Applications for Green and Low-impact Operation of small-scale fishing boats in the Baltic and North Sea basins) will demonstrate the impact and potential of 5 different technological applications to reduce fossil fuel consumption and GHG emissions on small fishing boats in the North and Baltic Sea basins. The project will focus on comparison of available technologies through the industrial partners of the project as well as work towards developing and improving the applied technologies through the data collection from the applied cases with the goal of decreasing the environmental impact of the vessels. SEAGLOW will collect sensor data from the case vessels to measure the impact of the applied application over time as well as look into potential combinations of the technologies, which include hybrid electric drivetrains, methanol powered engines, durable polymer-based surface coatings preventing fouling, reducing drag and improving engine performance, to use of low-cost permanent sensors to influence sailing behaviour. The technologies will be tested on vessels from 8.5 – 11.5 tons in full operational conditions on 4 vessels in Denmark, Estonia, Norway and Sweden

The overall aim of ShapingBio is to support and accelerate bioeconomy innovation and the deployment of new knowledge in the EU and its member states. ShapingBio aims to provide evidence-based and concrete information and recommendations for better policy alignment and stakeholder actions to realize the cross-sectoral potential of the bioeconomy and to reduce the fragmentation across bio-based sectors and food system and policies across regions, domains and governance levels. These actions contribute significantly to the bioeconomy strategy and Action Plan, the farm to fork strategy, the EU Green Deal policy priorities and the EU's Climate ambition for 2030 and 2050. For that purpose, ShapingBio aims to create a better understanding and information basis of the bioeconomy innovation eco-system by providing a comprehensive mapping and analysis of initiatives, structures, policy instruments and key gaps related to the topics policy and governance, applied R&D and technology transfer, (cross-sectoral) collaboration and financing across the EU macro-regions and different sectors. This will be carried out in close collaboration with various types of stakeholders from different sectors, by ensuring the involvement of all the relevant actors. Multi-actor groups will be set up to support policy advice design, but also to propose new forms of matchmaking, networking and knowledge-transfer. Those propositions will be implemented and tested in around twenty events. Based on these actions, recommendations for an effective governance in terms of policy instrument and their mixes will be derived as well as guidelines for different stakeholder groups for better collaboration and exploitation of bioeconomy innovations. Follow-up events will be conducted, to ensure that the recommendations are understood, actively reflected and implemented into stakeholders' activities and action plans to foster the deployment of bio-based innovations.

The effective application of biotechnology plays a crucial role in building a sustainable European industry, in line with the EU Bioeconomy Strategy and its Progress Report, and contributing to the transformation of Europe outlined in the Green Deal. But despite the enormous potential of biotechnology for contributing to sustainable development in areas such as healthcare, materials, chemicals and food production, the technology is not widely accepted and supported by the general public. This leads to reluctance among industry to adopt and invest in biotechnological solutions, uncertainty among investors, and creates little incentive to eliminate regulatory barriers that prevent implementation. Recognising their concerns is therefore essential for improving the adoption of these technologies. The main objective of the B-TRUST project is thus to develop a transparent and inclusive governance model enabling the application of biotechnology to the bio-based and agri-food sector. More specifically, to (1) inform and create transparency related to consumer and environmental safety, (2) leverage engagement from citizens and other stakeholders, and (3) develop and exchange best practices. This model will be built based on the Theory of Change, to ensure impact while keeping all actors committed, and use co-creation trajectories with civil society and stakeholders as trust catalysts, leading to a set of measures and principles for building trust. The model will be developed and finetuned via four biotech use cases chosen to cover different types of concerns and benefits. Mapping out the real and perceived risks and benefits of these technologies will lead to a comprehensive assessment of the technologies, laying the foundations for general trust-building. Lastly, a forum will be created to deploy trainings and keep stakeholders engaged and informed, allowing the model to be replicated and sustained for further research and development, policy making and funding schemes.

Competitive conflicts for land use between the energy and food sectors have appeared, which could be mitigated by the vertical integration of RES in farms through new circular business models. By this approach, farms will become climate neutral, optimising their production and reducing their impact on natural resources and biodiversity, on top of providing energy services to communities and diversifying their economic income. However, there is a need to identify, understand and overcome major existing barriers perceived by agricultural communities. Moreover, current initiatives do not to effectively consider and address the complex interactions and factors from the farming and RES context, thus missing to support decision making based on accurate projections, estimations and forecasts. HarvRESt will work on these needs by improving the existing knowledge and its fragmented status, which will be feed to an Agricultural Virtual Power Plant able to run different scenarios and farm configurations to determine the best operation procedures for a given RES solution. This data will be then provided to a decision support system able to weight trade-offs and key indicators to provide ad-hoc recommendations to farmers and policy makers, thus enabling the consecution of improved production rates on renewable energy, food & feed within agro communities. For the successful execution of HarvRESt and implementation of recommendations, a multi-actor approach fostering co-creation sessions together with the provision of training materials for farmers empowerment will be implemented. The full approach of HarvRESt will be supported and executed at 4 use cases representing different topologies of farms, a diversity of stakeholders and organizational structures, distinct geographical conditions and a wide variety of RES technologies. Together with HarvRESt community and mapped initiatives, the project will act as a hub for knowledge and best-practices on RES integration at farm level.

Supporting the deployment of AGRIvoltaics to accelerate the sustainable market uptake of SOLar energy in agriculture within a 36-month project that engages experienced partners across five EU states (Greece, Italy, Spain, Demark and Poland). The project aims to support at least 30 PV market actors, farmers, farmers associations, agribusinesses, etc. in EU countries to overcome existing barriers and viably take up APV systems in their lands. We start by analysing framework conditions and APV value chains and we are also engaging local stakeholders in co-designing our approach and support actions. Then, we provide a series of demand-driven business, financial and technical support services along with dedicated capactiy building programs. In parallel we develop an Engagement Platform hosting tools that facilitate collaboration and knowlede exhange among industry actors and provide credible estimations about; APV potential, prospect profits with benefits and APV policy making level across various EU countries and critical factors. Also, we improve the societal acceptance of APV amongst farmers and citizens by 25% (or above) through well-tailored awareness-raising campaigns and social impact methodologies. At the same time, we trigger the development of an enabling environment for the market uptake of APV by formulating relevant policy recommendations at both national and EU level and widely disseminating them to more than 100 policymakers. Finally, an ESG monitoring and evaluation framework evaluates the performance and impact of all the above, ensuring the long term sustainability of our solutions and providing us with the intel required to catalyse mutual learning and contribute to creating a guide for replicating our results. Therefore, we expect a power output of 50 MWel by our supported cases / projects, leading to an increased share of renewable energy in the final energy consumption in the target countries and ultimately, saving more than 0.5 million tn of GHG.