The transition from fossil fuels to renewable and sustainable energy sources has become the European Union’s top developmental priority, with low-performing countries in Central Europe facing the most urgent need. As the region’s largest country, Poland’s continuing economic progress has not come without significant costs; due to its history in electricity production, in 2009 it had the highest rate of production by coal of any EU member state. This makes Poland Europe’s third largest polluter in terms of damage to society, home to six of Europe’s 30 most damaging power-plants, and to be among Europe’s worst for public exposure to harmful pollution. At the same time it is experiencing rises in domestic electricity demand twice the EU average. This makes Poland the most urgent nation in the EU with regards to the need for immediate conversion to renewable energy systems and resources. However, unlike traditional power facilities, energy produced by RES often produces unpredictable and variable outputs related to weather, season, and geographical location. While Polish research now has expertise in many of the technologies needed for energy transition, it lacks critical knowledge in modelling, planning, integrating, and managing large-scale renewable energy systems in a flexible and effective manner. The SUPREME project twins one of Poland’s best energy research centres, the Instytut Maszyn Przeplywowych Im Roberta Szewalskiego Polskiej Akademii Nauk with needed expertise in Denmark (Aalborg University), the Netherlands (University Twente), and Austria (the European Sustainable Energy Innovation Alliance). Focusing on needed knowledge transfer in integrating energy technologies, the project’s well-formulated mix of extended staff exchanges, joint work, Summer Schools, and other events will create a long-lasting and effective partnership that will have a very significant impact on Poland’s energy systems infrastructure.

The EU has started a progressive decarbonisation with the aim to become carbon neutral by 2050. Energy Intensive Industries (EII) are expected to play an important role in this transition as they represent 24% of the final energy consumption, but a clear long-term vision and strategy is required in order to remain competitive while contributing to the decarbonization targets of the EU. RE4Industry has been conceived under this framework with a twofold objective: to support EII in the identification and integration of renewable energy (RE) solutions together with the definition of Action Plans for decarbonisation, and to transform the EU industrial landscape into a large market niche for the uptake of RE while defining the appropriate framework conditions for short- and long-term scenarios. To this end, RE4Industry will set up and empower a comprehensive network of stakeholders and market actors who will identify feasible RE technologies and their market barriers and will interact with industry representatives to gather their needs, expectations, drivers and barriers towards the implementation of these technologies. Such an approach will be accomplished through a strong engagement strategy and the creation of RE4Industry Collaborative Network, who will receive from the project partners knowledge transfer material such as success cases, best practices, policy recommendations and technological roadmaps for promoting RE adoption. In parallel to the networking activities, RE4Industry will develop a baseline methodology for the design of Action Plans for decarbonisation in EIIs that will be developed and validated together with 3 representative industrial use cases from the steel, aluminium and chemical sectors. RE4Industry solid replication strategy will enable the roll out of this methodology in at least 8 additional use cases of different sectors within the project lifespan and the initiation of cross-border knowledge transfer activities to a total of 12 EU countries.

The EMERGE project seeks to provide African policy makers, academics, investors, and citizens with the tools and knowledge required to increase the production of clean energy and the sustainable use of resources while bridging cultural and socioeconomic divides. In order to simulate scenarios that optimize the use of current resources while taking into account social, climatic, economic, and technical constraints, EMERGE will co-design and test a Toolbox by integrating and building upon existing tools, methodologies, and approaches. Additionally, a Knowledge Base with a collection of initiatives, materials, and knowledge-exchange activities will be created. The North Western Africa (Morocco), Niger river region (Mali/Nigeria), and Mozambique are three African ecosystems where EMERGE will develop knowledge communities through a participatory approach.

The development and adoption of renewable and sustainable forms of energy has become a major priority for Europe and is an important theme in H2020. Research into new, energy-related technologies to reduce Europe’s reliance on non-renewable fossil fuels is a critical need, and requires more newly qualified people in areas such as renewable-energy infrastructure management, new energy materials and methods, as well as smart buildings and transport. Bio-energy is particularly relevant to the Work Programme, because it is at the crossroads of several key European policies – from the Strategic Energy Technology Plan Roadmap on Education and Training (SET-Plan) to the European Bio-economy Strategy for European Food Safety and Nutrition Policy. So far, technological development has concentrated on using crops and wood for fuel, energy and industrial products. These conventional bio-resources are, however, limited, and the use of nonconventional, currently unused or under-utilised bio-resources provides the best possibility for the growth of the bioeconomy. However, European development in this priority field is failing to keep pace with demand due to a lack of qualified personnel, a lack of cohesion and integration among stakeholders, and poorly developed links between professional training and the real needs of industry. Based on seven work packages the Phoenix RISE project will address these issues by exploiting the complementary expertise of its partners and creating synergies between them through the targeted secondments of staff to advance research and innovation knowledge in bio-energy research. Phoenix is an international, interdisciplinary, cross-sectorial project, bringing together a total of 16 partners: 14 from the EU (5 companies and 9 academic organisations) and two Third-Country academic partners to enhance its collective research excellence and create new, post-graduate-level research training in key disciplines that support the provision of bio-energy.