PROSEU aims to enable the mainstreaming of the prosumer phenomenon into the European Energy Union. Prosumers are active energy users who both consume and produce renewable energy (RE). The growth of prosumerism all over Europe challenges current energy market structures and institutions. PROSEU research will look into new business models, market regulations, infrastructural integration, technology scenarios and energy policies. PROSEU’s interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary team will closely work together with RE Prosumer Initiatives (15 Living Labs), policymakers and other stakeholders from eight countries, following a quasi-experimental approach to learn how prosumer communities, start-ups and businesses are dealing with their own challenges, and to determine what incentive structures will enable the mainstreaming of RE Prosumerism, while safeguarding citizen participation, inclusiveness and transparency. Moving beyond a case by case and fragmented body of research on prosumers, PROSEU will build an integrated knowledge framework for a socio-political, socioeconomic, business and financial, technological, socio-technical and sociocultural understanding of RE prosumerism and coalesce in a comprehensive identification and assessment of incentive structures to enable the process of mainstreaming RE prosumers in the context of the energy transition.

CONTEXTIn the face of the major environmental problems facing European cities, nature-based development solutions offer a relevant answer. By relying on ecosystems, these solutions can significantly improve climate change resilience and quality of life, while contributing to a functional economy. Yet while these solutions offer many environmental, economic and social benefits, their development remains marginal. In question, a lack of knowledge of plant engineering in urban areas and its functionalities, combined with a limited experience feedback from project owners and local authorities (overall costs, management, maintenance and upkeep modality, long-term sustainability of ecological interest) which constitutes a brake in the decision on the choice of the good practices to adopt.The PROGRESS Project focuses on environmental professionals and stakeholders in urban areas by offering them the opportunity to meet and discuss the issues of development, maintenance and sustainability of urban green spaces. The program consists of sharing and transmitting experiences, methodologies and know-how in different issues and contexts (cities, populations, climate contexts, local and governmental policies, economic and institutional feasibility, etc.). It is also about training future professionals (students, apprentices, young graduates) by giving them new tools and new methods.OBJECTIVES- Contribute at a European level to a transfer of knowledge, methods and experiences on sustainable management practices of urban green spaces;- Strengthen the technical knowledge and alternative management methods of green spaces for professionals and environmental stakeholders in urban areas.In a global approach, it is also a question of being able to approach the question of urban spaces through:- The elements of control and management of urban green spaces: modalities and costs of management and exploitation of these spaces, notions of sustainability, economic, social and political contexts ...- The notion of the commons and the citizen reappropriation of urban spaces, particularly through participatory management;THE PARTNERSThe project brought together 4 partners from 4 European countries who bring complementary skills in the fields of green engineering, environmental education and citizen participation.- Orchis Engineering, Montpellier, France: Engineering consulting firm specializing in the fields of water, environment and renewable energies. Specificity: urban water management and green engineering, islands of freshness- Eco-Union, Barcelona, ​​Spain: A non-profit organization that works to connect agents of change in different sectors of society to catalyze the transition to sustainability. Specificity: Urban Mobility, Citizen Participation, Capacity Building and Advocacy- Goodplanet, Brussels, Belgium: A non-profit organization that helps young people and adults learn to live in a sustainable way. Specificity: environmental education, youth, training and learning tools- Forest and Landscape College: Department of Geosciences and Natural Resource Management, University of Copenhagen. Specificity: maintenance, sustainable urban drainage systems (SUDS) and use of plants in an urban contextTRAINING ACTIVITIES- Activity C1: Urban planning and management of urban natural spaces. From March 27 to 31, 2017, Montpellier, France.- Activity C2: Citizen participation in the management of urban green spaces. May 8 to 12 2017, Barcelona, ​​Spain- Activity C3: The design of urban green spaces for young audiences. From 23 to 27 April 2018, Brussels, Belgium- Activity C5: Sustainable management of green spaces. August 20-24, 2018, Skovskolen, Denmark.- Activity C8: Transition to the natural city. October 22 to 26, 2018, Barcelona, ​​Spain.RESULTSIn total, there were more than 123 participants - professionals, students, elected officials ... from various professions related to the creation, development and management of green spaces - who met during the training seminars.The PROGRESS project has globally contributed to:- Strengthen international cooperation;- Develop professional networks;- Acquire new methodologies and new knowledge on UGS;- Mapping the issues and solutions to be implemented;- Develop an original form of teaching: a mix of learners on intensive training seminars- The use of urban space as a living experimental laboratory

Why at one or several points in time do Coal and Carbon Intensive Regions (CCIR) flip into fundamentally different development trajectories and embrace clean-energy transformations? TIPPING+ will focus on the critical concept of Social-Ecological Tipping Points (SETPs) to inquire how a much more robust scientific understanding of the socioeconomic, psychological, cultural, gender and political processes leading to SETPs can be used to support clean-energy transitions in CCIR or prevent catastrophic or undesirable outcomes in other ones (e.g. populism and anti-democratic attitudes). TIPPING+ will carry out empirical analyses and advance the state-of-the-art on both negative and positive tipping points. However, a main focus of TIPPING+ will concern the participatory co-production of knowledge on the driving forces and deliberate tipping interventions for positive tipping points toward energy transitions in European CCIR. A typology based on at least 20 regional case studies will be generated with an early engagement of key practitioners examining: 1) New trends, changes and impacts of energy transitions on demographic structures and geographical distribution patterns in gender, migration and youth 2) Community, gender and psychological factors related to energy transitions 3) Policy interventions and governance factors 4) Economic transformations on employment, distributional welfare and energy and natural resources. TIPPING+ builds on the latest social science applied to Transition Theory (Tàbara et al, 2019) which shows that enabling deliberate positive tipping points in development trajectories depend on: a) Collective visions and narratives which frame and provide actionable meaning b) The kinds of transformative capacities to achieve these visions and c) Key strategies, solutions and socio-technical innovations derived from such capacities. International cooperation will also be established with non-European partners in Indonesia, Australia and Canada.

INCITE-DEM's experienced Consortium aims to enhance inclusive participation and civic engagement while expanding democratic innovation and dynamic feedback mechanisms between citizens and institutional actors in representative democracies. Currently, “wicked problems” relating to ecological crises but also media developments and digital divides create unprecedented pressures on democracies. Next to related socio-economic challenges, we’re witnessing a decline in political trust and the formation of new societal cleavages. INCITE-DEM will offer a unique contribution to the future of democracy in Europe by harnessing historical and quantitative and qualitative social science research, agent-based modelling, design thinking, and advanced analytical methods for the purpose of expanding inclusive participation and engagement and fuelling democratic innovation. Furthermore, we will implement Democracy Labs (DLabs) in six countries, where citizens, representatives of democratic innovation initiatives, policymakers, and other stakeholders come together to co-create imaginaries of inclusive democratic innovations. The new solutions and democratic futures envisioned are the objects of design fiction products. All innovations co-created in the DLabs are then validated through a choice experiment survey with citizens and interactive fora with policymakers, to check their feasibility and the potential for implementation. Lastly, a set of policy roadmaps for a sustainable, inclusive, and innovative democracy in a world facing deep societal, technological and ecological transformations are produced and presented to a broad range of stakeholders at multiple levels of governance in Europe.