In order to meet the climate change mitigation objectives of the European Union as well as the objectives of the Paris Agreement, it is inevitable that the European Union phases out fossil fuel consumption in the power sector and decarbonizes fossil-fuel dependent industries. These industries are not spread evenly across the EU but concentrated in a number of carbon-intensive regions. Decarbonization will lead to deep structural changes with implications for regional economies, labour markets, as well as for the regions’ social, political, cultural and demographic composition. If not managed well, these structural changes may cause serious economic impacts, societal upheaval, aggravated social inequalities and hardship. To minimize such consequences it is necessary to better understand the patterns and dynamics of structural change in response to decarbonization at the regional level, to understand which parameters determine the pace of transformation as well as the capacity of regional actors to adapt and pro-actively create alternative structures. This project aims to enable these activities through highly integrated, inter- and transdisciplinary research working in close collaboration with regional stakeholders. It combines quantitative model-based research with qualitative in-depth analysis. The qualitative research will focus on four highly fossil-fuel dependent regions: Western Macedonia (Greece), Silesia (Poland), Ida-Virumaa (Estonia) and the Rhenish mining area (Germany). The regions were selected to cover a diverse set of different fuels, state of economic development, diversification of the regional economy, political economy, and spatial composition. This diversity will enable the project to derive generalizable insights about the patterns and dynamics of decarbonization and the corresponding structural adjustments that hold relevance for all carbon-intensive regions in the EU and its neighbouring countries.

TOURing, aims at establishing and sharing a common model for skills in Tourism sector in the EU in order to address the skills mismatches and “invest” for the future developments. We are going to establish an effective mechanism where partnering VET Institutions and Tourism Businesses are going to engage mutual learning, peer counselling, and capacity building, aimed at raising the quality and attractiveness of VET provision and a European, National, Regional and Local Level. TOURing, is the answer towards bridging the gap between the market needs in terms of skills and competences in the Tourism Sector, and the ability of the VET to provide more tailored Curricula and Up-Skilling opportunities that would create balance in the booming tourism sector.Based on the above our main goals are:• To support Tourism Stakeholders to respond immediately to the fast changing and increasing skills gaps in digital and green skills sets;• To contribute to the Knowledge Hub of Pact for Skills by providing updated and state-of-the-art curricula addressing the need for digital and green skills in tourism sector;• To create the ground for partnerships and cooperation structures between VET/Education Providers and Labour Market Representatives in Tourism Sector;• To raise the awareness of VET systems and Tourism Industry in digital and green transitions in tourism;• To increase the quality of the VET Curricula related to Tourism which nowadays goes hand in hand with digital technologies and environmental sustainability;

United Circles project will demonstrate, with 46 partners across 14 countries + 1 international body, three Industrial-Urban Symbiosis value chains, to upcycle of urban Food Waste, urban Wastewater Solids, and urban Construction & Demolition Waste (C&DW). To close urban and industrial water loops to reduce freshwater use in drought prone regions, and integrate energy co-generation technology in upcycling pathways. Made possible by advancing innovative technologies from TRL5 to TRL7 in combined integrated value chains, to enable zero waste cities and a decarbonised Process Industry. The value chains cover collection, sorting, upcycling and production of new upcycled products. To demonstrate how: 1) a demolish building’s C&DW can be transformed into a new 2 storey 3D printed building with upcycled low-carbon cement, cement bonded particle boards, and insulation foam; 2) a waste-water treatment plant can become a resource recovery centre for all materials, water and energy, in an integrated manner. By supplying high quality gas to the local gas grid, by providing upcycled cellulose as industrial feedstock to pulp & paper industries, and by providing clean water and fertilizer for agriculture; 3) food waste in the form of used cooking oil can be upcycled in a first application of 2nd generation biorefinery to create novel fully biodegradable and food waste origin bioplastic products for complete replacement of fossil fuels. The United Circles 3 value chain demonstrators will each be integrated in a Hub 4 Circularity, that will underpin their Industrial-Urban networks governance and evolution, using advanced governance frameworks, feasibility towards financing methodologies, digital tools, social and environmental innovations, and a material and products observatory. The H4C in the proposal will enable business to territory plans, with their regional stakeholder network, that seek to expand the demonstrator integrated technologies to higher TRL levels.

The overarching goal of ACCEND is to establish capabilities and processes that enable the project partners to conduct impactful and exemplary cross-border startup accelerator programmes in Europe - to initiate and establish a long term cross-border startup acceleration service ecosystem. It brings together and enriches a diverse and complementing array of deep tech acceleration services: support in access to finance; advisory in the use of testbeds and living labs for business development; matchmaking with key public procurers of innovation; and global growth coaching advisory targeting global scaleup pathways with go-to-market activities. ACCEND builds shared understanding and trust between the project partners by collaboratively designing joint, distributed Cross-border Startup Accelerator Services that builds on strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of each partner and their regional ecosystems; It conducts a pilot programme named ACCEND Accelerator where these complementing services are delivered to a 100+ scale-up companies, aiming towards opening the regional services and funding borders, as well as global markets for these startups. To conduct this successfully, it connects the startup services ecosystem in the partner regions more widely, to leverage local and European initiatives, and to anchor the cross-regional collaboration. The project's ultimate goal is to validate a sustainable model for continuous cross-border Deep Tech acceleration services deployment.