2017 EU Process Industry Conference

Post date: 
17/03/2017 - 12:23

2017 EU PROCESS INDUSTRY CONFERENCE: A LOOK TO THE FUTURE

#SPIREProcess2017

 

The first day of SPIRE’s 2017 EU Process Industry Conference on 19 September took a look to the Future of European Process Industry from a range of perspectives: the European Commission, the Industry itself, and SPIRE cPPP. The debate was enriched by contributions from Rudy de Waele, Futurist and innovation strategist.

In his last presentation as SPIRE Chairman, Klaus Sommer praised SPIRE PPP as an inherently open and highly collaborative initiative that was providing innovation foresight and a route towards the next generation of sustainable process industries. SPIRE looked to reinvent feedstocks, reduce emissions, introduce digital for better monitoring and control, reinvent materials and processes with significant ecological impact down the value chain, and reduce waste to create true circularity in the economy. Clearly SPIRE is well aligned with EU priorities and was now running at full speed.
Daniel Gauthier, SPIRE’s newly elected chairperson, thanked Dr Sommer for guiding SPIRE from a concept into a reality and conceded that it would be a challenge to take SPIRE to the next level. But to help make a better Europe, he thought there was a need to define a new vision and new even more ambitious targets for SPIRE. 

In the afternoon, short success stories from 48 SPIRE projects were showcased and illustrated the huge achievements that this first cross-sectorial cPPP has made since its launch at the very end of 2013. 

The second and third day (20 and 21 September) were reserved for A.SPIRE members and colleagues from the Commission. On the 20th the focus was on specific topics of interest for future innovation developments by the SPIRE Community and parallel thematic discussions based on ideas from the SPIRE membership, while the 21st was SPIRE’s annual Brokerage event with a focus on the forthcoming 2018-19 Horizon 2020 work programme and calls where there would be some EUR 320 million of public funding available for new SPIRE projects largely aiming at large scale demonstrations, prompting industrial deployment and targeting breakthrough advances across the process industry, through industrial symbiosis, recycling and recovery. 

SPIRE has already shown itself to be a worthwhile effort and investment and is a key element in building a sustainable Europe, however the hard work will need to continue until 2020 and beyond: for SPIRE – and the Future EU Process Industry - the best is still to come!

Pictures are now available!

 

CONFERENCE PRESENTATIONS - DAY 1

19 September 2017

 

A.SPIRE at the mid-term of H2020

A look to the future framework - the perspective of the European Commission

 

Process Industries and European Commission Dialogue

  • Jurgen Tiedje, DG Research and Innovation, European Commission

  • Nicolas Segebarth, DG Research and Innovation, European Commission

  • Harri Kulmala, CEO of DIMECC Ltd and member of the High-Level Group on maximizing impact of EU Research & Innovation Programmes

  • Daniel Gauthier, Advisor to CEO of Heidelberg Cement

  • Adriana Orejas, Downstream Technology Projects Director of REPSOL

 

Storifying the future of EU Process Industries

Rudy De Waele, Futurist and innovation strategist, keynote speech

A.SPIRE’s perspective:

  • Francois Monnet, Advanced Technologies Director, Solvay and A.SPIRE Board Member

  • Klaus Peters, Secretary General, European Steel Technology Platform (ESTEP) and A.SPIRE Vice-President

  • Pierre Barthelemy, Executive Director of Research and Innovation, Cefic and A.SPIRE Board Member

 

Project pitching sessions

 

In all three sessions the audiences were invited to vote for two awards for a) the presentation that had the best look to the future (which presentations made us dream more?); and b) Creativity: (which presentation had the most creative slide(s)?) The awards were made at the closing cocktail reception.

SESSION 1 covered Modelling and integrated process control and Process Optimisation with moderators Ralph Sievering of BFI and Ane Irazustabarrena from Tecnalia. 

Five SPIRE projects from this session – CONSENS, PROPAT, RECOBA, DISIRE and iCspec - will be undertaking a joint dissemination workshop entitled ‘Tackling the Future of Plant operation – Jointly towards a Digital Process Industry’ on 13-14 December in Barcelona.

SESSION 2 covered the valorisation of different energy sources and adaptable processes using alternative feedstock and was moderated by Ludo Diels of Vito and Richard Heyn from sintef.

The projects that presented were:

SESSION 3 focused on Waste to Resource, Industrial Symbiosis/Water, Business models, and Sustainability Assessment with moderators Mikael Larsson of swerea and Martin Winter from Cefic. The projects that presented were:

Awards

The awards were presented at the cocktail reception by Daniel Gautier and Àngels Orduña from SPIRE and Nicolas Segebarth from the Commission. From Session 1 PRINTCR3DIT was selected as most creative and ROMEO as the best presentations, while Session 2 saw Bio4Products acclaimed as most creative and KARMA2020 the best presentation. From Session 3 the triple project presentation on SAMT, MEASURE and STYLE was voted as the most creative and INSPIRE the best.

 

 

Presentations of DAY2 and DAY3 are available on the SPIRE Knowledge Platform.