ChArGED addresses the energy consumption in public buildings and proposes a framework that aims to facilitate achieving greater energy efficiency and reductions of wasted energy in public buildings. The framework leverages IoT enabled, low-cost devices (NFC or iBeacons) to improve energy disaggregation mechanisms that provide energy use and (consequently) wastages at the device, area and end user level. These wastages will be targeted by a gamified application that feeds personalized real-time recommendations to each individual end user. The design of the game will follow a cleanweb approach and implement a novel social innovation process that will be designed based on human inceptives factors and will help users to understand the environmental implications of their actions and adopt a more green, active and responsible behaviour. The blend of social interaction and competitions with its personalized character are expected to eventually contribute to the user engagement and commitment to generate savings in the long term leading to tackle energy efficiency targets in public buildings while emphasizing on cost effectiveness. Furthermore, users will become more educated on energy efficiency actions and their impacts which has an impact beyond the actual public building. Efficient energy use will render its consumption predictable and this will be exploited by the ChArGED gamified application to optimize use of the micro-generated energy. Users will be motived to reduce energy consumption when power comes from the grid. Predictable energy consumption will also support more informed decisions of micro-generation sources to match the use patterns. The ChArGED solution will be developed with iterative end users representatives’ engagement during analysis, design and development. Further users at least 150 real building occupants in three (3) countries (50 in each building- validation country) will be engaged for deployment and validation.

GECKO will focus on accountable, responsible, and transparent artificial intelligence (ART AI) to address urgent environmental needs and support the European Green Deal and AI ecosystem, ensuring that all citizens benefit from the sustainable green transition. The EC AI flagship report highlights the need for the input of civil society to discuss values being embedded into AI (via social sciences) and responsible design practices (via information sciences) that encode societal values and guidelines into AI system so that they are ethical by design in order to build and retain trust in AI. ART AI is a promising approach for EU, but has not yet reached the level of maturity and urgent research and new research skills are needed to bridge the gap between disciplines. GECKO will establish a synergy between science, humanities, and technology research, currently missing, through a ground-breaking integrated research programme giving Europe a competitive global advantage. GECKO’s ambition is to create a sustainab

Eco-Bot aims to utilize recent advances in chatbot tools and advanced signal processing (i.e. energy disaggregation) using low-resolution smart meter-type data with the goal of changing their behaviour towards energy efficiency. Eco-Bot targets to a personalized virtual energy assistant to deliver information on itemized (appliance-level) energy usage through a chat-bot tool. The "chat-bot" functionality will be use an attractive frontend interface, permitting seamless communication in a more natural and interactive way than a traditional mobile application. This way, Eco-Bot aims to achieve a higher level of engagement with consumers than previous efforts (i.e. serious games, gamification, competitions or other interactive ICT), by adding a more engaging form of interaction with existing platforms that has been proven in different market settings. The proposed system considers knowledge of the delivered multi-factorial models, including rebound-effects, as a result of the baseline research on both European and International activities. Then, based on advanced ICT, such as knowledge engineering, machine learning, expert systems, the project transforms the multi-factorial models for energy reduction to interactive, personalized and targeted recommendations to consumers on how to save energy. Eco-Bot uses also existing NILM, e.g. energy disaggregation methods, and data analytics to break down consumption to the appliance level, where this is possible (smart meters at reasonable granularity, adequate number of information collected) so as to make consumers aware of their most energy-consuming devices. The project will demonstrate the system in three different use cases, each one representing a different business model (B2B / B2B2C /B2C). We aim to validate our system across real and diverse conditions such as socio-cultural, environmental, demographic, climate and consumption, so as to draw concrete conclusions regarding performance, effectiveness, affordability, etc.

The adaptation of RES technologies and machinery and their demonstration at a large-scale on farm level, require supporting measures with respect to spatial planning, infrastructure, different business models and market organisation, trends that are not all under control from a farmers’ perspective. RES4LIVE project will fill these gaps ensuring a wider adoption of RES and energy efficiency technologies, machinery and techniques in livestock farms towards a zero-fossil fuel consumption. A great part of RES4LIVE technical work deals with the adaptation of specific technologies for both renewable energy and biofuels so that to perfectly fit livestock farming and becoming attractive in terms of cost effectiveness, operational flexibility and with low maintenance. The key technologies include PVT systems, modular heat pumps, biogas upgrading to biomethane, and tractors retrofitting to be fuelled by biomethane. Except these technologies, standard RES and other solutions are included in the integrated energy system, such as the use of PV panels, geothermal energy, and electrification of on-farm machinery. The RES4LIVE project emphasises on the demonstration of the selected technologies in 4 pilot farms in Belgium, Italy, Germany and Greece, for a duration of at least 12 months, to serve as the means of de-fossilising evidence and impact generation. The aim is to totally replace the fossil fuel consumption of certain needs in the pilot farms, proving that fossil-free-energy farming is possible to be achieved with a sustainable way. At the same time, the replicability potential is another key activity so that to prepare the commercialization process of the solutions. The overall objective is to provide advanced and cost-effective technologies to the livestock sector that ensure the sustainability of the farms’ operation, and the superior thermal comfort of the animals for increased productivity with minimum climate change impact.

Europe’s industry and economy depend on a secure access to many commodities. In 2020, the EC updated its list of critical non-energy non-agricultural raw materials (CRMs), based on scarcity of supply and importance to EU industry. Today, the list includes: Antimony, Fluorspar, Magnesium, Silicon Metal, Baryte, Gallium, Natural Graphite, Tantalum, Bauxite, Germanium, Natural Rubber, Titanium, Beryllium, Hafnium, Niobium, Vanadium, Bismuth, HREEs, PGMs, Tungsten, Borates, Indium, Phosphate rock, Strontium, Cobalt, Lithium, Phosphorus, Coking Coal, LREEs, Scandium. Securing sustainable access to CRM, is of high importance for the EU economy. However, the EU is confronted with a number of technological and environmental challenges along the entire production value chain of primary and secondary raw materials. NetHelix demonstrates in real life settings a toolbox of new technologies for automating and streamlining the extraction process, taking advantage of deposits through mining and waste deposits processing methods, maximising efficiency, reducing waste production, and increasing environmental and huma health and safety.