Category: Standardisation, LCA, labelling and regulatory hurdles

3-CO project

3-CO project

Posted on by Louis Ferrini
This project ends on: 31/01/2026

Concise Consumer Communication through Robust Labels for Bio-based Systems

The aim of the 3-CO project is to develop and demonstrate viability of a supportive framework for Label and Certification Schemes (LCS) on Business-to-Consumers (B2C) communication for industrial bio-based products (BBPs) that enables and supports consumers to make more sustainable buying choices.

The supportive framework will consist of actionable guidelines for LCS owners that reflect consumers’ and other stakeholders’ needs, digital solutions to support better-informed decision-making processes of consumers as well as policy recommendations on deploying social measures.

In terms of approach, 3-CO will

  1. assess the LCS and metrics in the bioeconomy,
  2. iteratively engage consumers to understand their decision-making processes and motivation towards sustainability consumption, and needs and requirements towards future labelling of BBPs,
  3. co-develop smart digital solutions for consumers to support their behavioural change towards responsible consumption,
  4. assess measures for social engagement/innovation supporting consumers, industry and public bodies to switch towards socially and environmentally responsible behaviour, and
  5. create guidelines for the design of labels for BBPs for owners of environmental labelling and information systems, public authorities and industry designers.

The project aims to improve the sustainability performance and competitiveness in the bio-based systems.

Impact of the 3-CO project will include

  1. improved transparency of BBP value chains and information to consumers and public authorities through digital solutions,
  2. support of environmentally responsible decision-making through LCS,
  3. improved understanding of metrics on environmental, societal and economic value generated by BBPs, and as a wider impact
  4. innovative governance models.

3-CO will help to increase the market share of sustainable, circular BBPs, influencing the business of companies that make and offer these.

Contacts:

Maarit Halttunen: maarit.halttunen@vtt.fi

website: https://3co-project.eu/

 BIOCIRCULARCITIES project

 BIOCIRCULARCITIES project

Posted on by Louis Ferrini
Project concluded

Exploring the circular bioeconomy potential in cities. Proactive instruments for implementation by policy makers and stakeholders

The BIOCIRCULARCITIES project is designed to help identify and develop innovative and comprehensive regulatory frameworks and roadmaps that are well aligned with circular bioeconomy principles. The project will focus on the interactions between the circular and bio-economies, using insights derived from multi-stakeholder participatory processes. It will consider both supply-side and demand-side aspects of policymaking to maximise the effectiveness. It will determine these through four strands. The first will be by exploring the circular economy potential of unexploited bio-based waste streams generated around three European cities – Barcelona in Spain, Naples in Italy and Pazardzhik in Bulgaria. The second will be to identify and analyse those circular bioeconomy best practices in the EU that could be successful in the pilot areas. Third, opportunities and obstacles to for introducing such processes. It will then use the learnings from the three areas to propose proactive instruments and policy roadmaps that can be applied in a wider European context.

Contacts:

Rosaria Chifari: rchifari@ent.cat

website: https://biocircularcities.eu/

HARMONITOR project

HARMONITOR project

Posted on by Louis Ferrini
This project ends on: 31/05/2025

Harmonisation and monitoring platform for certification schemes and labels to advance the sustainability ofbio-based systems

The HARMONITOR project will improve the effectiveness of sustainability certification schemes and labels (CSLs) in various sectors of the EU bioeconomy and strengthen their possible use as a co-regulation instrument within the EU Bioeconomy policy framework. The project will also establish and test a participative review platform concept to help CSLs to find commonalities and cooperation when operating in bio-based value chains within and across EU borders. The goal of this platform is to promote continuous improvement of CSLs and continuous knowledge of these dynamic developments by market actors.

Contacts:

Sergio Ugarte: s.ugarte@sqconsult.com
Costanza Rossi: c.rossi@sqconsult.com
Monique Voogt: M.Voogt@sqconsult.com

website: https://www.harmonitor.eu

CALIMERO project

CALIMERO project

Posted on by Louis Ferrini
This project ends on: 30/06/2025

Industry CAse studies anaLysis to IMprove EnviROnmental performance and sustainability of bio-based industrial processes

CALIMERO project will analyse case studies across five bio-based sectors to find solutions and improve their overall environmental, economic and social performance of industries. New methodological developments to evaluate the sustainability of bio-based industries will be implemented using the Product Environmental Footprint guidelines as a starting point. Multi-Objective Optimization frameworks will be used to tune operational parameters in order to improve industrial processes’ sustainability impacts. Finally, guidelines and recommendations will be addressed to industry, policymakers and the scientific community.

Contacts:

Ricardo Méndez (Coordinator): Ricardo.mendez@contactica.es 

website: https://calimeroproject.eu/

BioReCer project

BioReCer project

Posted on by Louis Ferrini
This project ends on: 31/08/2025

Biological Resources Certifications Schemes

BIORECER aims at assessing and complementing current certification and labelling schemes for biological feedstock according to the new sustainability EU goals. These objectives include new criteria for sustainability, origin, tracking and traceability, in order to ensure best possible environmental performance and applicability at EU and global scale.

Contacts:

Pedro Villanueva Rey: Pedro.villanueva@cetaqua.com

website: https://biorecer.eu/

ALIGNED project

ALIGNED project

Posted on by Louis Ferrini
This project ends on: 30/09/2025

Aligning Life Cycle Assessment methods and bio-based sectors for improved environmental performance

The ALIGNED project will deliver a modelling framework to assess and optimise the environmental and socioeconomic performance of bio-based industries. ALIGNED will advance the scientific field of Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and collaborate with industries and representatives from five bio-based sectors: construction, woodworking, textile, pulp and paper, and bio-chemicals.
The ALIGNED framework will allow accurately to model key aspects not covered in current practice: the competition for biomass and for land, dynamic and time-specific carbon accounting, and biodiversity and socio-economic impacts. ALIGNED will also develop future energy and resource scenarios derived from integrated assessment models, and a consistent approach to uncertainty assessment.
Key stakeholders in the five sectors will be continuously involved, by providing feedback in the early framework development and by sharing the learnings from its practical application. The professional engagement of stakeholders will secure industry relevance and acceptance delivering real impact.

Contacts:

Jeisel Goyanes: jeiselgoyanes@sustainableinnovations.eu

website: https://alignedproject.eu/

SUSTRACK project

SUSTRACK project

Posted on by Louis Ferrini
This project ends on: 31/10/2025

Supporting the identification of policy priorities and recommendations for designing a sustainable track towards circular bio-based systems

The transition from linear fossil-based systems to circular and bio-based systems represents an opportunity and a suitable pathway for achieving several SDGs. Indeed, circular bio-based systems depict a great opportunity to reconcile sustainable long-term growth with environmental protection through the prudent use of renewable resources for industrial purposes.

This needed transition is a complex process, which does not simply require innovative technologies from the supply-side, but also societal transformations based on a multi-actor process.

The circular bioeconomy meta-sector may be a good candidate to put forward a new economic model, which requires transformative policies, purposeful innovation, access to finance, risk-taking capacity as well as new and sustainable business models and markets.

However, a critical assessment of the environmental, social and economic impacts of the current linear fossil-based economy, as well as of the improvement potential associated with circular bio-based systems, is needed to underpin the identification of policy priorities.

Bearing this in mind, SUSTRACK is a three-year project aimed at supporting policymakers in their efforts to develop sustainable pathways to replace fossil and carbon-intensive systems with sustainable circular and bio-based systems (at the EU and regional scale), contributing to achieving the European Green Deal’s objectives.

This will be done by:

  • identifying environmental, economic and social limits of a linear carbon-intensive and fossil-based economy;
  • improving existing assessment methodologies;
  • assessing the environmental, social and economic impacts of the EU’s current linear fossil-based economy;
  • comparing multiple transition scenarios focusing on the most carbon-intensive sectors;
  • identifying priorities according to scenarios analysed in the project and develop guidelines and policy recommendations.

Contacts:

Piergiuseppe Morone (Coordinator): piergiuseppe.morone@unitelmasapienza.it

Gülşah Yilan (Project manager): gulsah.yilan@unitelmasapienza.it

website: https://sustrack.eu/

SUSTCERT4BIOBASED project

SUSTCERT4BIOBASED project

Posted on by Louis Ferrini
This project ends on: 31/05/2025

Sustainability certification for biobased systems

SUSTCERT4BIOBASED in a nutshell
In the transition from a linear fossil-based economy towards a circular biobased economy, numerous biobased value chains have been set up at different levels of development, and several new biobased products have been introduced to the market. Biobased products are wholly or partially derived from biological resources, but still, it is important to ensure their sustainability considering the range of environmental impacts, as well as to ensure their social and economic sustainability.
To this end, a plethora of sustainability certification schemes and business-to-business labels have been developed to allow traceability and transparency of sustainability impacts along the value chains and trades. Today, it is essential to evaluate the credibility of these tools and support their harmonization. This is where SUSTCERT4BIOBASED comes into play!
SUSTCERT4BIOBASED aims to develop a monitoring system to assess the effectiveness, robustness and completeness of the existing certification schemes and labels, identify their strengths and weaknesses and promote the adoption of the best-in-class examples. The interdisciplinary consortium will also be reviewing and analysing the existing sustainability certification schemes and business-to-business labels; creating a database of global trade flows for biological resources and biobased products, and carrying out costs and benefits analysis from the adoption of certification schemes and labels in selected industrial biobased value chains. In this vein, the consortium will engage a variety of relevant stakeholders such as international organisations, industrial biobased value chain actors, scheme owners, certifications bodies, regional bioeconomy actors, and policy makers, and will offer recommendations for the adoption of effective and robust sustainability schemes and labels.

Contacts:

Iris Vural Gursel (Coordinator): iris.vuralgursel@wur.nl

Annie Kalimeri (Communication): akalimeri@white-research.eu

Pinelopi Kaslama (Communication): pkaslama@white-research.eu

website: https://sustcert4biobased.eu/

Bio4Africa project

Bio4Africa project

Posted on by Louis Ferrini
This project ends on: 30/05/2025

Diversifying revenue in rural Africa through circular, sustainable and replicable bio-based solutions and business models

Africa will need to feed over 2 billion people by 2050 while coping with unprecedented demographic, socio-economic, environmental, climatic and health transitions. Meanwhile, undernourishment is still on the rise, affecting almost 20% of its population now. Under this light, ensuring Africa’s food security becomes imperative, with the bioeconomy posed to play a leading role to this end. It is against this backdrop that BIO4AFRICA sets off to support the deployment of the bioeconomy in rural Africa via the development of bio-based solutions and value chains with a circular approach to drive the cascading use of local resources and diversify the income of farmers. Our focus is on transferring simple, small-scale and robust bio-based technologies adapted to local biomass, needs and contexts (green biorefinery, pyrolysis, hydrothermal carbonisation, briquetting, pelletising, bio-composites and bioplastics production). In doing so we aim at empowering farmers to sustainably produce a variety of higher value bio-based products and energy (animal feed, fertiliser, pollutant absorbents, construction materials, packaging, solid fuel for cooking and catalysts for biogas production), significantly improving the environmental, economic and social performance of their forage agri-food systems. To this end, we have set up 4 pilot cases with over 8 testing sites in Uganda, Ghana, Senegal and Ivory Coast, offering more than 300 farmers and farmer groups of all sizes (incl. small dairy and lower-income farmers, women farmer groups and transhumant pastoralists among others) the opportunity to test them in real productive conditions. Along the way, our balanced mix of 13 African and 12 EU partners will engage in solid multi-actor collaboration with rural communities and government, co-developing novel sustainable value chains driven by circular business models and supporting deployment in other areas, all while safeguarding agronomic, environmental, social and economic sustainability.

Contacts:

Knud Tybirk: kt@foodbiocluster.dk

website: https://www.bio4africa.eu/

BeonNAT project

BeonNAT project

Posted on by Louis Ferrini
This project ends on: 30/06/2025

Innovative value chains from tree & shrub species grown in marginal lands as a source of biomass for bio-based industries

BeonNAT project proposes to use marginal lands in Europe (estimated 4.3 M km2 and 0.4M km2 of agricultural and forest marginal in EU-28, respectively) to obtain forest biomass for the production of 8 products based on new biobased value chains: essential oils, extracts, wood paper, particleboard, bioplastics, biochar, active carbon and absorbents. This way, BeonNAT will allow for the production of biodegradable bio-based products and bioactive compounds that will play an important role to replace fossil-based competing substitute products.

Contacts:

Luis Esteban (Coordinator): luis.esteban@ciemat.es

Iciar Serrano (Communication): iciar.serrano@contactica.es

website: https://beonnat.eu/