February 23, 2024
A Wood-to-Wood Cascade Upcycling Valorisation Approach: Another Horizon Europe project starts!
The Wood-to-Wood (W2W) project Kick-Off Meeting took place on the 19-20th of February 2024 in Athens, Greece. This HORIZON-RIA project is funded under the Horizon Europe programme. The project officially started on the 1st of January 2024 with a duration of 48 months.
Dr. Stelios Christofi (Managing Director & Founder), Vasilis Poulikakos (R&D Project Manager) and Maria Panayi (R&D Financial Assistant) participated in the kick-off meeting, chaired by Ms. Akrivi Korba, Project Manager on behalf of the Project Coordinator Institute of Communication & Computer Systems (ICCS).
W2W strives to demonstrate effective and sustainable value chains in the production of wood without pollutants, as well as the creation of bio-composite building materials, biopolymers, polyols, chemical detergents, and nutrient recovery. This comprehensive strategy aims to decrease the need for new materials, minimize waste sent to landfills or incinerators, and generate value-added products from discarded materials. W2W actively contributes to the shift towards a circular economy by advocating for closed-loop systems that prioritize the repurposing and reuse of materials, thereby prolonging their usability.
Objectives
Create and validate a comprehensive framework for the Wood-to-Wood (W2W) process, focusing on stakeholder interactions, wood characterization, classification, valorisation, management technologies, data sharing principles, and impact assessment methods.
Enhance the capabilities of wood sorting mechanisms to better align with environmental and technical valorisation parameters, improving the efficiency of wood separation processes.
Develop sustainable and innovative technologies for upcycling waste materials, utilizing cascade refinement, chemical and bioremediation processes, as well as energy, gas, and ashes valorisation. This aims to promote resource efficiency, reduce waste, and establish sustainable waste management practices.
Innovate approaches and digital tools to integrate life cycle thinking and advanced sustainability assessments throughout the cascade process, ensuring a holistic and environmentally conscious approach.
Validate W2W technologies and solutions in three distinct Use Cases, representing diverse value chains and demonstrating the applicability and effectiveness of the developed processes.
Boost competitiveness and advocate for sustainable practices in industries by fostering skills development, collaborative training programs, capacity building, contributions to standards and certification schemes, policy influence, and the implementation of business models aligned with circular and sustainable processes.
eBOS has a key role in the project, focusing on creating the Integrated Circular Wood Upcycling Platform. This platform will have a user-friendly interface and include features like visualization, control functions, AI-based optimization, and decision-making capabilities. It’s designed to help model, simulate, and assess various aspects of wood use. The platform allows: i) Processing and analysis of data from various stages of the wood lifecycle for identifying patterns and trends that can be used to optimise cascading use strategies and minimise environmental impacts; ii) Predictive modelling of the environmental impacts of different wood waste cascading scenarios; iii) Integration with Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to analyse the spatial distribution of wood waste sources, transportation routes, and processing facilities; and iv) Real-time monitoring of wood waste cascade strategies and adaptive management.
Apart from the technical tasks, eBOS will lead the “GDPR, Gender Balance, Legal, and Ethical Issues Management”. This means the task will focus on creating and overseeing procedures to handle ethical considerations throughout the project. The main goal is to establish ethical guidelines following the European Code of Conduct for Research Integrity and Data Protection rules. These guidelines will cover responsible research practices, how to select participants, and templates for consent forms. The task ensures that all project activities involving people follow GDPR and Privacy regulations by using well-crafted consent forms. Additionally, it highlights the importance of including Social Sciences and Humanities to support Responsible Research and Innovation.
The W2W
project has received funding from Horizon Europe,
under Grant Agreement No. 101138789.
Funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Health and Digital Executive Agency (HADEA). Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them.