Lead (Pb) is a heavy metal very harmful to health and the environment. Lead is particularly harmful to children resulting in 600,000 new cases of children with intellectual disabilities every year due to Lead exposure. Cost-benefit analysis suggests that, in France alone, overall benefit of €22.72 billion/year could be achieved in terms of avoiding future medical interventions, limiting the need for special education and increasing future productivity by reducing Lead exposure. The European Commission has been working on reducing Lead exposure in different areas. Despite this, the large-bore engine industry still heavily relies on Lead-based journal bearings. 7 tonnes of Lead will be released to the environment from large-bore engines manufactured in 2015. This amount of Lead would be enough to potentially poison 2 times the global population. BeLEADFREE aims to deliver novel Lead-free journal bearings to large-bore engine builders worldwide, ranging from medium and heavy-duty diesel engines (e.g. commercial road vehicles) to large four-stroke medium-speed engines (e.g. ships, engine generators or gensets). This will be achieved by optimising novel manufacturing approaches that have proven successful at TRL6 and designing and building a pilot line to manufacture Lead-free journal bearings to be validated in real engine working conditions. The completion of the project will ensure the initial market take-up of the new product and its implementation in manufacturing businesses in EU. The proposed project will be conducted by a multidisciplinary consortium with two industrial partners, Daido Industrial Bearings Europe Ltd. (1st time industry applicant and project co-ordinator) and Elsyca NV (SME), who will be supported by academic partners IK4-Tekniker and Coventry University who have a strong experience in applied research and knowledge transfer from Academia to Industry.

One drawback associated to Ultra High Strength Steels (UHSS) coated components is the risk of hydrogen embrittlement (HE) and delayed hydrogen fracture of the part. This problem has been tackled by developing LHE (Low HE) processes and by applying a degassing stage. The standard degassing process is applied equally to the components regardless UHSS or coating composition/morphology. However, it is known that the nature and structure of both the base material and the coating have a great influence in the hydrogen intake and degassing efficiency. Thus, there is much room for improvement if a better understanding of the underlying phenomena of electrochemically deposited corrosion protection layers of UHSS parts on hydrogen degassing is achieved. As there are no experimental techniques to measure hydrogen content or HE in a specific part of a real component at an industrial environment, modelling and simulation approaches, developed with a strong experimental base, are expected to provide the keys to process improvement. The main objective of the H2Free project is to develop a practical guideline for hydrogen degassing of UHS-steels plated with LHE-Zn-Ni, with the aim of saving production costs and allowing Zn-Ni to overtake Cd coatings. The guideline will contain simple rules/formulas to provide criteria to design the degassing process, based on experimental data and on modelling to predict the hydrogen effusion in coated UHSS, the remaining hydrogen concentration in the components and so the probability of hydrogen embrittlement. With its digital approach, H2Free will accelerate materials modelling uptake into European industrial decision making and link all partners to central European materials modelling platforms and activities. The project brings together a strong consortium composed of 4 outstanding research centres and 2 SMEs with complementary profiles and large expertise, covering the special skills, capabilities and certification expected for the project.

Platinum group metals (PGM) are currently highly demanded due to their unique properties which have made them indispensable in different strategic sectors as renewable energy, electric mobility and digital technologies. Unfortunately, PGMs are costly and Europe depends on their importation from other continents, which is nowadays a high risk for the development of strategic applications in key industrial sectors. For these reasons PGMs are categorized as critical raw materials (CRM) by the EC. Thus, finding alternatives to them is critical for the EU economy. In this context, NICKEFFECT project has identified an opportunity to replace these materials in key applications as electrolysers electrodes, fuel cells catalysts and magneto-electronic devices. The proposed alternative is based on nickel (Ni), an earth-abundant element with ferromagnetic character. To enhance the catalytic performance of Ni, innovative deposition techniques to obtain coatings, with ordered and pseudo-ordered porosity, will be developed. The higher surface to volume ratio provided by the increased porosity will allow enhancing catalytic performance or converse magnetoelectric effect (CME) in electronic devices. NICKEFFECT will develop and validate at least 3 new materials, together with the coating methodologies (including process modelling) and decision support tools for materials selection (integrating safe and sustainable by design (SSbD) criteria and materials modelling). The NICKEFFECT project brings together a strong consortium composed of twelve different partners with complementary profiles and large expertise, covering the special skills, capabilities and certification expected for the project.