Sustainable development and circular economy require balancing between environmental, economic and social benefits and de-coupling the economic growth from resource use. The European New Green Deal highlights the need for reliable, comparable and verifiable sustainability information. Existing sustainability assessment approaches suffer from lack of comprehensiveness, consistency and practical tools for implementation. This results in fragmented and hardly comparable information on product sustainability performance. The ORIENTING project takes up this challenge and develops a robust and operational methodology for the life cycle sustainability assessment (LCSA) of products and services. The novelty value of the project relates to an approach that considers environmental, social and economic impacts in an integrated way. The ambition is to develop a methodology that can assess goods produced under linear as well as circular business models, allowing practitioners to understand and manage possible trade-offs. ORIENTING contributes to the development of a future Product Sustainability Footprint at European level, evolving existing PEF and designing new indicators for the evaluation of material criticality and product circularity. New tools will be developed to support and simplify the methodology application in business and policy development. Tools include guidance and training materials, data and software specifications and a hands-on LCSA IT tool. The LCSA methodology and its enabling tools are demonstrated in five industrial case studies. The consortium works in close cooperation with various stakeholders (industry associations and clusters, SMEs, consumer organisations, as well as governmental and standardisation bodies). The project outcomes will enable informed business decisions and contribute to the development of a levelled playing field – a single market – for products based on robust (i.e. transparent and verifiable) sustainability information.

Gathering 22 partners from the EU, Norway, Switzerland and Ukraine, iDesignRES aims to provide public authorities and network operators with open-source toolboxes allowing to plan and to optimise the uptake of low and zero emission energy sources at regional, national and European scales. With these open-source tools, iDesignRES provides latest multi-physics component energy models, comprehensive energy system modelling (in particular assembling of component models), long-term multi-carrier grid planning and optimisation of investment and operation. iDesignRES embraces a new degree of openness, transparency and accessibility to use energy system models and their components. It delivers a harmonized data structure compatible with all modelling approaches (i.e., standardized in a common modelling language). iDesignRES relies on an already built database compliant with these standardized data formats. Based on this modelling and data infrastructure, iDesignRES will develop a unique and innovative cloud-hub platform to run any energy system model online. This will facilitate research collaboration (easier software testing and version control), and increase computational performance (open licenses, cloud services and supercomputing) for average users. To demonstrate and validate the tools, iDesignRES has five real-life cases: two macro region cases (North Sea area and South East Europe), two industrial clusters (Basque and Lombardy regions), and one expansion case in Ukraine. The models and scenario results are combined in the final iDesignRES visualisation tools aimed to inform policy makers and grid operators. The outcome is that the public and relevant authorities can design a renewable energy system entirely online with easily accessible suite of tools, capable to: model at high spatial-temporal resolutions (sub-hourly NUTS level2 regions), to represent detail energy system physics, and to assemble models with a high degree of modularity.

The main objective of this project is to move forward the current waste management practices into a circular economy motto, demonstrating the value of integrating and validating a set of 20 eco-innovative solutions that cover all the waste value chain. The benefits of these solutions will be enhanced by a holistic waste data management methodology, and will be demonstrated in 4 complementary urban areas in Europe. The eco-innovative solutions include technological and non-technological tools such as: a) IT tools to support the daily operation and long-term planning, b) Apps for citizens empowerment and engagement, c) Educational materials based on innovative teaching units and serious games, d) Tools for citizen science for the co-creation of novel solutions, e) Mechanisms to boost behavioral changes based on economic instruments and social actions, and f) Decentralized solutions for valorization and reuse of high value resources. The different solutions will be implemented in 4 complementary European areas: a) Zamudio (ES) is a highly industrialized area with a spread population that uses a separated kerbside collection; b) Halandri (GR) is a large suburban city with a wide range of business that has a very basic waste management system; c) Seveso (IT) is a residential town that uses a door-to-door system; d) and Cascais (PT) is an extensive and high touristic coastal town that implements an advanced collection system. The project includes a consortium of 19 partners with 4 public agencies and administrations, 3 research centers and universities, 8 SMEs, 2 LEs, 1 cluster and 1 NGO, that will work together during 36 months with an overall contribution from the EC of €9M.The most relevant expected impacts are: a 20% increase in waste sorting, 10% saving of management costs, and 10% reduction of GHG emissions. The experience gained, and the synergies among the partners describe the best possible scenario to launch new governance and business models.

For a long time, our economy system has been ‘linear’. Linear economy extracts raw materials from the environment, expends enormous quantities of fossil fuel energy shipping, processes these raw materials and elaborates useful products, producing after its use tones of waste. Every year in the EU, nearly 15 tonnes of materials are used per person, while each EU citizen generates, on average, more than 4.5 tonnes of waste annually, almost half of which is disposed of in land fill sites.To ensure that in the future there are enough raw materials for food, shelter, heating and other necessities, our economy must become circular. The circular economy works by keeping raw materials and products in productive loops for as long as possible. The Circular economy offers an opportunity to reinvent our economy, making it more sustainable and competitive. This will bring benefits for European businesses, industries, and citizens alike.Household appliance sector is one of the biggest sector in Europe contributing to the European GDP in 54 billion Euros per year but at the same time, it produces around 9 million tones of discarded equipment each year and 3.2 million tones of the discarded equipment is treated each year under the WEEE Directive (Directive 2012/19/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of 4 July 2012 on waste electrical and electronic equipment) and other waste legislation.For the European manufacturers of household appliances, the Circular Economy represents closing the loop of an industrial development grounded on innovation and competitiveness, in line with the process and product innovation oriented to eco-sustainability and environmental responsibility.In this context, Economic actors, such as businesses and consumers, are key in driving this process. Local, regional and national authorities are enabling the transition, but the EU also has a fundamental role to play in supporting it.The European Commission in order to encourage the transition towards a Circular Economy, adopted a Circular Economy Package, which includes measures like: revise legislative proposals on waste; reduce of food waste; boost the separate collection; extend the product service life that includes the obligation of recyclability and repair of household appliances;.. to boost global competitiveness, foster sustainable economic growth and generate new jobs.The transition to a circular economy will require a qualified workforce with specific and sometimes new skills, and opportunities for employment and social dialogue. If the right skills at all levels must be developed, they will have to be assumed by the education and training systems. Europe has to anticipate needs and encourage the development of skills and other measures to support job creation in the green economy (Document “New Skills Agenda for Europe”).In this sense, CIR-ECO - Towards a Circular Economy: Generating a New Professional Profile in Household Appliance Sector project will work to identify, describe and develop the Professional Profile that will be needed to become the Circular Economy a reality in Household Appliance Sector (repairing, refurbishing and recycling discarded equipment).The aims of CIR-ECO - Towards a Circular Economy: Generating a New Professional Profile in Household Appliance Sector are:- the identification, definition and description of the Professional Profile of workers that will participate in the repairing, refurbishing and recycling of discarded equipment (washing machines,..) in order to reduce the use of raw materials, minimize the generation of waste, increase the use of the products, etc… in the new transition towards the Circular Economy. - the description and development of the Training Curriculum and training modules included in the New Professional Profile in Household Appliance Sector within the Circular Economy but not covered by the formal Educational System developed in the participant countries.- Create a Learning Virtual Environment with the training materials developed to facilitate the access to the target group.The direct target group is:- Unemployed people who want to insert in the labour market - Workers that need to re orientate their careers to get a stable job - Workers within companies of Household Appliance Sector that change its economic system from lineal to circular.- VET students