Funded by: Interreg Alpine Space, co-funded by European Union
Total eligible costs: 520.675 EUR; ERDF grants: 390.506 EUR
Project duration: 18 months
Circular bioeconomy value chains (CB-VC) are becoming more prevalent but are challenging to support due to their cross-regional nature. Typically, the circular input material is generated in one region, while manufacturing or processing takes place in another. As a result, clusters and regional agencies have limited insight into viable models and opportunities for CB-VCs, and financial institutions lack an overview of new circular value chains. INNOBIOVC addresses these issues by rolling out the Innovation Express Call Scheme (IECS) for CB-VCs in a transnational network of six Alpine regions and five countries.
The project will implement the IECS approach in regions that are interested in jointly supporting CB-VCs. It addresses previous bottlenecks like the challenge of finding appropriate partners for mutual product or solution development using the Value Chain Generator (VCG.AI). The project will also develop a sustainability assessment tool (SAT) to measure sustainability gains in functioning CB-VCs, empowering funding agencies, program owners, and investors to better measure sustainability gains induced by funding programs and investments.
The project has four main activities:
- Analyzing the current state of sustainability measurement approaches within value chains and on the company level.
- Rolling out an improved IECS with a focus on cross-regional value chains, key resources, and sectors such as agriculture, food and beverages, chemistry, polymers, and energy.
- Adapting the VCG.AI for better partner matching and exploitation.
- Developing a sustainability assessment tool (SAT) to better quantify the social, economic, and ecological sustainability gains.
To achieve success, several regions need to bundle their competencies and capacities to jointly develop cooperation leading to the creation of new biocircular value chains (BC-VC). None of the regions or single project partners can cover all items needed to build a complete BC-VC, and business models or value chains are not bound by regional or international borders. Therefore, all three core items of INNOBIOVC (IECS, SAT, VCG.AI) will be offered transnationally to all interested entities to ensure that the best possible partners will match. This approach will generate relevant new products and solutions through INNOBIOVC, leading to the establishment of new BC-VCs that are expected to grow substantially. These new BC-VCs will play a significant role in promoting a carbon-neutral and resource-sensitive Alpine Space.
Partners: Economic Development Agency Heilbronn Region (Lead partner), Business Upper Austria, Lombardy Green Chemistry Association, Chemistry Cluster Bavaria, and Anteja ECG
Project’s website: https://www.alpine-space.eu/project/innobiovc/