The Energy Performance Contracting (EPC) model has been successful in attracting investments in energy efficiency, but mainly for single, large projects. Energy efficiency programs, on the other hand, constitute an alternative path to scaling up the number of buildings that implement energy efficiency interventions, but the practice of rebates and incentives that are paid up front creates a need to rely on deemed energy savings and on complex and costly regulations that hinder innovation. SENSEI will propose a solution to this deadlock. Building on earlier successful experimentation outside of the EU, we will design concepts and business models that will help: (a) generate new sources of benefits that increase the value of an energy retrofit project by enabling the compensation of energy efficiency as an energy resource, and (b) turn the project’s value into an investable asset to attract private financing. The main concept underlying the SENSEI business models is pay-for-performance (P4P), which offers an effective way to engage both energy providers and third-party investorsin energy efficiency. SENSEI will first elaborate P4P schemes for financing energy efficiency that can be implemented across the EU, and then integrate these P4P schemes with the preparation and implementation stages of the EPC model, with the intention of increasing and/or financing the gains in a building’s value that are produced by energy efficiency improvements. The developed concepts will utilize actual building data and the consortium’s competences to carry out a series of negotiation games among all SENSEI parties – representing all links in the EPC and P4P chain. The project has planned a series of activities to both disseminate the insights from these games and to support stakeholders in using our recommendations with the goal of rolling out the first P4P pilots in the EU.

E2DRIVER will develop a collaborative-cooperative training platform boosting the automotive supply industry collective intelligence on energy efficiency. The platform will provide access to training material, online lessons, guidelines, energy and financial tools, virtual reality modules and a community of key actors in the sector for SMEs to undergo energy audits and implement their recommendations. To this end, E2DRIVER training methodology will enable the development of specific training plan itineraries based on the company’s needs and trainees’ role in the company, which will increase the effectiveness of the training sessions and the awareness on energy issues among the staff. The development of E2DRIVER platform will not be a static action resulting from the project execution, but will enable a continuous update of the training material, best practices, benchmarking analysis and guidelines due to the implementation of an ontological flip teaching method, which enables trainees to generate their own knowledge and training materials to be shared through E2DRIVER cooperative networks. E2DRIVER platform will be tested and validated in 40 companies from the automotive supply industry in four countries that represent over 50% of the EU employees in this sector: Spain, France, Italy and Germany. Moreover, a total of 60 trainers will be certified in E2DRIVER training methodology, which will ease the replication of the project results and the business consolidation of E2DRIVER platform. E2DRIVER gender-balanced consortium includes three well-known research institutions with expertise in energy efficiency, social science and decision-making processes. In addition, a partner in charge of training at national level and an association as multiplier organization has been involved in every pilot country. Finally, this competitive consortium is complemented by two research oriented SMEs focussed on exploitation and dissemination issues.

The overall objective of the I AM GREEN project is to co-design a widespread incubator and start-up academy model addressed to support entrepreneurs in all steps to take from the business idea design to market penetration, passing through a tailor-made training and incubation path that gives special attention to sustainable development and ways to “greening” the business. The project aims to contribute to the qualitative improvement of services offered to start-ups thanks to an integrated approach that guides entrepreneurs along all steps of the entrepreneurial path with a special focus on training and financial needs. The designed incubation model will be a virtual and physical space where Innovation & Development Agencies, Research & Training Centres and Start-up Incubators work together to assist the entrepreneur with a 360-degree approach. The idea is to develop an incubation model where start-ups are incubated in a well-settled company that introduce them in the market. The rationale of incubation is the sharing of the same value chain and/or the possibility to create synergies such as industrial symbiosis projects. The general objective is to offer a more fertile environment for new business ideas birth and growth as well as creating new business opportunities leveraging on potentialities to greening processes, supporting their development at EU level acting as a real driver for innovation and sustainable growth for Europe. This will be done by improving the support that is available to them, functioning as a think-tank that identifies needs and prepares new directions within start-up creation support as well as available training and consulting services.

Energy Conscious Consumers ECO2 will facilitate a large amount of consumers to become conscious about and improve their energy efficiency. It will offer them two forms of learning. Either they choose to go alone through an online e-learning, or they choose to be brought through transformative group learning, in which the e-learning system supports the group processes. Together the two – single or group processes - provide attractive approaches for a wide array of consumer segments. The ECO2 processes are based on “blended” engagement methods, making use of both online and dialogue elements. Consumers will be recruited by contacts through social media, consumer media, energy suppliers and other gatekeepers. Segmentation will be used to increase the effectiveness of recruitment and to adapt the e-learning processes. The processes will be thematic, facilitated by an online ECO2 Platform, based on the online/blended engagement platform EngageSuite. Each consumer will be stepping up a ‘ladder of change’ from Motivation to Exploration and finally to Action. In the process the user receives information, reflects/deliberates and seeks knowledge and knowledge sharing. The user creates her/his own action plan on the next personal steps to take. ECO2 will deliver “Actions” on five important themes – the house, smart equipment, energy use/bills, rebound and prosuming. Further, an Action on co-creation of policies, innovations and designs will be executed and the results communicated to policy-makers and innovators through policy seminars. ECO2 has three phases – Ramp-up, Pilot and Upscaling. Ramp-up makes infrastructures, segmentation analysis, story-boards and production of themes. Pilots test the Actions with voluntary consumers. Upscaling involves viral recruitment of consumers, expansion to new countries, and collaboration with consumer gate-keepers. ECO2 will continue after end of project by: 1) an ECO2 Community, 2) stakeholder responsibility for the ECO2 Platform.

The MAESTRI project aims to advance the sustainability of European manufacturing and process industries. This is done by providing a management system in the form of a flexible and scalable platform, and to guide and simplify the implementation of an innovative approach, the Total Efficiency Framework. The overall aim of this framework is to encourage a culture of improvement within process industries by assisting the decision-making process, supporting the development of improvement strategies and helping define the priorities to improve the company's environmental and economic performance. Its development and validation will be achieved through application in four real industrial settings across a variety of activity sectors. The Total Efficiency Framework will be based on four main pillars to overcome the current barriers and promote sustainable improvements: a) an effective management system targeted at process and continuous improvement; b) efficiency assessment tools to define improvement and optimisation strategies and support decision-making processes; c) integration with a toolkit for Industrial Symbiosis focusing on material and energy exchange; d) a software Platform, based on the Internet of Things (IoT), to simplify the concept implementation and ensure an integrated control of improvement process. Over a period of 4 years, the project will deliver exploitable resultsclustered into technological outputs (including eco-innovative products, processes and services tailored to industrial end-users) and structured solutions (involving technical, economical, legislative and policy solutions synergistically combined).