Partners
Silesian University of Technology
The Silesian University of Technology (SUT), is the oldest technical university in the region and one of the most prestigious in Poland. It was established in 1945 as a scientific and educational facility for Upper Silesia, the most industrialized area in Poland, and one of the most industrialized in Europe. For over 70 years of its history, it has always been a public institution, playing a cultural and opinion forming role in the region.
15 educational units of the University - 13 faculties, Institute of Education and Communication Research and Institute of Physics - currently offer almost 60 study programmes and about 200 specializations, including the whole spectrum of engineering studies. Aside from technical programmes, candidates may also study administration, business analytics, mathematics, sociology and management - including project management - as well as foreign languages and pedagogy.
The Silesian University of Technology occupy leading positions in both national and international rankings. It ranked 5th among technical universities and 13th among all universities in Poland in the “Perspektywy” Educational Foundation Ranking. Two study programmes: environmental engineering and logistics were considered the best in Poland, which allowed SUT to rank 4th in the whole country in terms of engineering study programmes. In the SCImago Institutions Ranking (SIR), an international classification of higher education institutions, Silesian University of Technology was awarded the 4th place in Poland and 17th in Eastern Europe.
According to the report made by Sedlak & Sedlak company, 1 in 12 chairmen in Poland graduated from SUT. Meanwhile, the “Rzeczpospolita” journal states, that our university is second nationwide, when it comes to successful people. Finally, the “Wprost” magazine, graduates from SUT are 4th in Poland in terms of most wanted by the employers.
Moreover, the institution was recently honoured with an “HR Excellence in Research” Logo, which confirms that the university operates in accordance with the European Charter for Researchers and the Code of Conduct for the Recruitment of Researchers. SUT was also awarded an ELSEVIER Research Impact Leaders 2016 award in the Engineering and Technology category, focusing on the impact of the university on the visibility of Polish science worldwide.
Nowadays, SUT educates over 20,000 students at all three levels of study: Bachelor (and Engineering), Master and Doctoral studies. Those programmes are available both as full-time (over 15,000 full-time students) and part-time study. The Silesian University of Technology offers 11 programmes conducted in English.
The Silesian University of Technology is a higher education institution that respects the universal values and academic traditions. It is a modern and widely recognized European institution, one of the top Polish technical universities, educating the elite of the society and supporting the dynamic development of the economy with due regard for the ethical values and the highest quality of research and teaching activities. High position and prestige of the university are built through self-improvement, partnership and cooperation of the employees, students, PhD students and the social and economic environment. These conditions favour creativity, innovativeness and transfer of technologies.
Until now, the Silesian University of Technology promoted over 180,000 engineers, over 4,500 doctorates and almost 900 postdoctorals. Graduates of our university often occupy managerial, directorial and other high positions in industrial corporations, which can be proven by numerous rankings conducted by independent research institutions.
Wide range of courses and high quality of education are factors that distinguish the Silesian University of Technology among all technical universities in Poland. Its status is further highlighted by academic achievements of outstanding professionals, both at national and international level.
For a wide and successful cooperation with outside entities, the University has appointed a few specialized units, such as: Innovation and Technology Transfer Centre, Student Career Centre, Academic Entrepreneurial Incubator, as well as Project Management Centre.
The Faculty of Mining, Safety Engineering and Industrial Automation which is a coordinator of the project, runs the scope of researches concerning modern mining which covers appropriate geological identification of mineral deposits, economically effective extraction of raw materials, use of energy-saving and fail-save machines meeting requirements of safety and environmental protection.
SUT has interdisciplinary and long experience within the scope of CIRCEXTIN project. The Faculty of Mining, Safety Engineering and Industrial Automation is one the three mining faculties in Poland and as the only one was rated with the highest grade (A) among other mining faculties by The Committee for Evaluation of Scientific Research Institutions (KEJN) in 2017. KEJN is an advisory body to the Minister of Science and Higher Education appointed according to the rules stipulated in the Act of 30 April 2010 on the principles of financing science. The Faculty also received a positive evaluation by the Polish Accreditation Committee (PKA). PKA is an institution acting independently for the enhancement of the quality of education.
Graduates find employment in companies from the extractive industry sector (mostly coal mining) but also in research & development centersa and offices of regional authorities. Students of the Mining and Geology programme can choose one of 11 specializations, covering all aspects of mining. In the first cycle of study (first degree), during the first three semesters all students participate in common and general classes, the choice of specialization takes place after the third semester. Main specializations include: Electrical engineering and automation in mining; Underground construction and surface protection; Resource exploitation and waste management; Mining geodesy; Mining and exploration geology; Engineering geology and geotechnics; Surface mining; Computer science and management in mining; Mining construction and road machines; Mining and drilling machinery and equipment. Safety engineering programme includes specializations: Safety Engineering; Technology and organization of occupational safety and health; Security engineering and crisis management; Water management and flood risk. New study offer (from 2017/2018) includes Automation and Industrial Computing
The company's activities include all stages of research and development actions of the JSW Corp. Group to feasibility studies and supervision of the realization of projects and implementations
JSW Innowacje
JSW Innowacje S.A., operating from Katowice, uses its geographical location to engage the research and development communities from the area of Upper Silesia and Kraków in behalf of the JSW Group to stimulate the development of the entire Corporate Group. The mission of the company is to develop technologies and Systems that increase the potential and capabilities of the Polish mining industry. The main goal is to achieve a significant position in the supply of advanced technologies and services for mining. Cooperation with science insititutes from EU will create synergy effect in field of research and develeopment. The company hires 200 employees. The Company's organizational structure is created by departaments of projects: Departament of Mining Projects, Departament of Coke And Chemical Projects, Departament Of Cooperation And Environmental Projects , Division of breakthrough projects in the form of Breakthrough Technologies Division In Warsaw. Also, Division of Finance And Operations and Management Office. The Mining Project Division is structured by company of Composite Solid Fuels Plant - VARMO Pellet Production. It takes actions in order to establish cooperation with companies from private sectors, public sectors and scientific intitutions. The range of activities covers construction phase and project management R&D. Moreover it also covers information research and development consortian in order in order to obtain fund support on strategie large infrastructure projects, with the development of technologies, circular economy and Systems enchanging potential. Research actions have fundamental significance for stustainable development, especially environmental protection, improvement using of coal as clean energy source. JSW Innowacje has been develope strategie agenda innovations. It sets out 9 research areas in sector of Delevelopment Strategies GK JSW in which projects are realized such as R&D.
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To the main areas where the research effort is being undertaken, which is important for the responsible and sustainable development of mining, we can include:
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- occupational safety and health in the mines
- efficient protection of the environment and improvement of the use of coal as clean energy source
- process automation
- support the activities of environmental monitoring
- mining waste from hard coal
- reducing the negative impact on the environment and restoration of degraded land by reclamation
- knowing geological structure and management of mineral resources and groundwater
- reduction of nuisance resulting from the extraction of minerals.
Cobant Group S.A. is a research, development and coal recovery/production company active in the land reclamation, environmental services, and energy sectors, that has been operating on the market since 2017.
Cobant Group S.A.
The enterprise conducted industrial research, development works with strong support of scientific entities, as well as perform analyses, expert opinions and market research. The scope of its activities also includes devising an effective strategy and development, creation of innovations, implementation of revolutionary
solutions including the commercialization of knowledge in the field of environmental protection and fuel and energy industry. Cobant Group S.A. has established cooperation with World Organization for Sustainable Development and Polish Society Of Circular Economy for environmental protection, fight against smog upgrade and innovative technologists in line with the principles of waste management in a closed circulation.
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Cobant Group S.A. is carrying out research and development activities focused on post-mining waste treatment and contaminated land restoration in accordance with the principles of circular economy. The enterprise has developed an innovative technology for the management of fine-grained hard coal waste to produce full-value solid fuel, with ecological safety sign “Green Safety Label”
Montanuniversitaet Leoben (MUL) is located in Leoben in the heart of Austria, in the province of Styria, which is historically one of Austria's major industrial areas. Founded in 1840 as a motor of industrial development, MUL has a long tradition and competence in value chains and the transfer of knowledge and skilled people into the regional and national industry of Austria.
Montan Universität Leoben
It is well connected to all universities and industries in the wider region, as well as all raw materials related stakeholders nationally. MUL is one of the three technical universities in Austria and has been ranked the top university in Austria 6 times in a row and is specialized in the field of mineral resources, metallurgy, and material sciences. It is a technical university focusing on raw materials, their extraction and further processing and recirculation plus supporting sciences. The research and education profile is set along the value life cycle of products ranging from the extraction of raw materials to processing, production processes, product design, product distribution and recycling of end of life products to reintroduce them into the value life cycle. All study programs of MUL are located along this cycle. Further, the university philosophy is set along this value life cycle and the mentality of a new understanding of raw materials as a wholesome concept has long penetrated university thinking. There is a great experience with licensing, permits and allowances as a result of excellent cooperation with Austrian authorities and involvement of experts to those societal and juridical activities. Furthermore, MUL is experienced in explaining mining activities to citizens through activities at all types of schools and for the general public. This is also achieved through strong links with industrial associations and authorities. In 2018 the number of employed staff amounted 1304, professors 50 and the number of students came to 3822 in total.
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The Resources Innovation Center (RIC) at the Montanuniversitaet Leoben will be the organizational unit in charge of the consortium. Through the RIC, which is home to theinternational scientific and educational partnerships of the university, MUL has gained great experience in responsible consumption and production matters. RIC's partnership range from the EIT RawMaterials, a pan-European 125-partner network for raw materials, a so-called Knowledge & Innovation Community (KIC) of the European Institute for Innovation and Technology, across to the EIT Climate-KIC, a KIC concerned with climate change mitigation to other more local networks. Another pillar at RIC is sustainable development, in which the center is committed to achieving the UN SDGSs through various scientific and educational initiatives as well as the participation in strategic committees and associations. In its Resources Innovation Center RIC, MUL has bundled several relevant research and education activities that have accumulated expertise that will be relevant to the future activities of this project. One concrete project is the EIT Climate-KIC flagship project eCircular in which RIC is one of the leading partners. The project is concerned with the sustainable life cycle of plastics and polymers.
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As an organizational unit whose core business is SDG 12, project management and internationalization in education, the role of the lead partner and research responsible is coupled with experience in the field. As a technical university with a unique profile, Montanuniversitaet Leoben claims a special position in both the Austrian and international academic landscape. The necessity of a new understanding of raw materials as a holistic, circular and systemic concept full of complexities to be solved has become unnegotiable in today's world and is a central thought at MUL as it also represents the current global trends of environmental, societal, industrial and scientific development, as reflected by the United Nation's Sustainable Development Goals. In
its long history, MUL has gained experience in a continuous adaption of research and education to evolving realities and resulting necessary transformations. In sum, MUL is involved in more than 47 projects, and 12 of them are coordinated by MUL. Today, international interdisciplinary cooperation with strategic partnerships is essential to achieve sustainability goals. For this reason, strategic partnerships are a central element of MUL's development plan. Among other things, international cooperation, student and staff exchanges, as well as knowledge a best-practice exchange and international networks, are to be developed, established and promoted.
Universidad Politecnica de Madrid (UPM), founded in 1971 as a result of the merger of the Higher Technical Schools existing since the 18th century, is the oldest and largest Spanish technical university. It has almost 3,000 faculty members, 414 researchers and 1,900 administrative staff. Around 36,000 undergraduate and master's students and 1,900 doctoral students are currently studying at UPM.
Universidad Politecnica de Madrid
The 18 UPM schools cover most engineering disciplines, as well as architecture, computer science and geodesy and cartography, and even fashion design and sports. Thirty-five out of the 120 bachelor's and master's degrees are internationally accredited. UPM promoted the creation of a network of European, Latin American and Caribbean technology institutions. This network, called Magalhaes, has been running smoothly for eleven years now. Currently, around one thousand students move every year from one side of the Atlantic to the other within the framework of this network. UPM is currently a member of Heritage, a network made up of 24 technology universities, 12 European and 12 Indian institutions. UPM sends 1,800 and receives 1,300 students in the framework of different international programmes (Erasmus+, Magalhaes network, China Scholarship Council, etc) every year. UPM has an office exclusively dedicated to supporting incoming students and staff exchange, providing assistance with accommodation and immigration procedures, especially for people coming from non-EU countries.
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As a top quality academic establishment, UPM also has a strong commitment to R&D and innovation, boasting 200 research groups and 17 research centres and institutes, contributing significantly to the international scientific community with a high number of journal papers, conference communications, and PhD theses. UPM has a long tradition of collaboration with industry (around 50% of its R&D funding) and participation in international R&D programmes. As far as UPM participation in FP7 is concerned, the university has taken part in 242 European R&D projects with more than €64 M of funding, ranking as the top Spanish university in funding terms. It is a very active H2020 participant with an average success rate in the programme's six years of life of 24% as both project coordinator and full partner. According it's H2020 participation rate, UPM tops the ranking of Spanish universities. UPM is a member of four of the eight European Institute of Technology approved Knowledge and Innovation Communities (KICs), opening the way to participation in H2020 projects. UPM is also involved in on-line education, being a member of the OCW consortium (and occupying a place in the board), and is very active with respect to MOOC platforms like EdX, MiriadaX, etc. Its MOOC courses have received several awards (like the 2014 Ministry of Education Award to the best MOOC).
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Committed to entrepreneurship and innovation, UPM has a Technological Innovation Support Centre (CAIT). CAIT aims to consolidate the exploitation of R&D results by promoting technological innovation and connecting the university with the private sector. Its goals are to attract new innovative companies that work in alliance with UPM in R&D activities, increase technology development, develop spin-offs fostering its internationalization, create common service platforms for the campus start-up companies, support fundraising and external investment in R&D and identify needs and market trends.
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Higher School of Mining and Energy Engineering and, the Researchers involved in this proposal are expert on several areas which are relevant for the present proposal: use of the subsurface to store Energy (compressed air Energy storage) and CO2 storage are the main areas of interest. Biogas and biomethane is another R&D Branch, as well as Green hydrogen. Recently, this group has cooperate in different studies on sustainable regulations in spanish mining sector.
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Their main skills are related to Project Management and Environmental subjects, as well as Economic an Regulations issues.
TU Delft is the oldest and largest University of Technical in the Netherlands.TU Delft offers 15 university level teaching programs, of which 8 are unique. Eight faculties house more than 60 disciplines, with 2.700 scientific staff. The mission of the university is to contribute to solving global challenges by educating new generations of socially responsible engineers and expanding the frontiers of the engineering sciences.
TU Delft
The Faculty Civil Engineering and Geosciences houses the Department of Geoscience and Engineering, It is our strong conviction that our education and research should contribute to: Responsible Use of the Geosphere considering the Impact on System Earth and Society. We realize this vision by:
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inspiring our staff and students to be curious, creative, and work in an open and positive atmosphere that stimulates collaboration, internally within the department and also externally;
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creating fundamental, scientific, educational and anticipative understanding of the natural processes and anthropogenic impact on system earth;
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being pioneers in creating knowledge, skills and tools through collaborative research;
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disseminating knowledge by educating the next generation engineers;
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actively engaging in societal debate (e.g., influencers, stakeholders, general public);
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ensuring healthy finances.
We define the geosphere to be that portion of system Earth that includes Earth's interior, rocks, minerals and soils, landforms and the processes that shape the Earth's surface. Responsible use includes the activities related to exploration, cyclic exploitation and mitigation of natural and man-induced geo-hazards. The Department employs about 200 personnel including ca. 85 PhD candidates. It has a leading educational and research role in Environmental Geo-engineering and sustainable energy transition research regarding re-use of sub-surface reservoirs, among other on sub-surface cyclic energy production and reservoir engineering issues under in-situ conditions for geothermal energy, enhanced HC recovery and cyclic storage of CO2. Both, education and research are internationally recognised through participation in organizations like EPA and IEA. Most of them are funded by the Ministries of Economic Affairs and Climate, NWO-Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research , Industry (mostly energy-related companies) and EC Grants.
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The Faculty of Civil Engineering and Geosciences is an education performer for cyclic renewable energy production, enhanced sub-surface energy production and storage. Associated dissemination of knowledge on rock classification, characterisation and rock mechanics is tailored to the specific sub-surface use. In addition, related geo-mathematical modelling and geostatistics are a part of the lecture series. Proven and demonstrated prior experience of direct relevance and applicability to this proposed project is acquired in many research programs and inter-academic lecture series on sub-surface and surface subjects.
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The Department of Geoscience and Engineering at TU Delft has extensive experience in academic and applied educational research management. It coordinated and currently coordinates several national and multinational educational and related research projects, of which the CATO1 and CATO-2 are the most prominent (35 MEuro out of 100 MEuro) research programs for Spin-off into education. Momentarily a large international educational program on Geothermal Energy, between Indonesia and The Netherlands is running.
Furthermore, some smaller educational programs are developed based on research expertise over the past two decades.
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Research and Education at the Faculty of Technology, Policy and Management combines insights from the engineering sciences with insights from the humanities and the social sciences. It targets the development of Comprehensive Engineering from a complex systems integration perspective, specifically focussing on the interface of converging infrastructures and emerging technologies with markets, policies and behaviours. Most of their activities are in cooperation with partners from academia (from in and outside the university) as well as industrial and governmental stakeholders.
Tallinn University of Technology (Tallinna Tehnikaülikool) established in 1918 is the flagship of Estonian engineering and technology education. The Department of Geology (TalTechDG) (Geoloogia Instituut - GI) is a leading institution in the field of geosciences and rock mining in Estonia and one of the largest in the Baltic Region. CCUS and CO2 storage group of TalTechDG is a pioneer in CO2 storage research and education in Estonia, providing academic CO2 storage course to international students.
Tal Tech
We have multidisciplinary international expertise in CCS, including EU CCS regulations, economic modelling, CO2 storage capacity, CCUS for the cement industry, CO2-EOR+, properties of reservoir and cap rocks, seismic modelling, sustainability and cross-cutting issues. Since 2004 GI represents Estonia in the European Network for Research in Geoenergy (ENeRG), since 2014 in CO2GeoNet and BASRECCS networks.
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TalTechDG participated in EU FP6, FP7 and EC projects (EU GeoCapacity, CO2NetEAST, CGS Europe, CO2Stop, EstMap), made research and provides regular consultations to major national energy company Eesti Energia and to the Ministry of the Environment of Estonia. TalTechDG is an active member of the BASRECCS Network launched in 2014 and participated in the BASRECCS Board since 2018. TalTechDG disseminating information in the field of CCUS using CCS technology portal in Estonian and Russian and giving interviews to Estonian media. TalTech DG is a co-organiser of the annual Baltic Carbon Forum and organised the BASRECCS-ENOS workshop in Tallinn in September 2018.
TalTech DG is a leader of the CO2 use, transport and storage study for the cement industry (WP7) in the ongoing Horizon 2020 project CLEANKER. In the Horizon 2020 project ENOS TalTechDG took part in preparation of e-learning books: http://www.enos-project.eu/highlights/ and in teaching of International CO2 storage Master Course and in supervising of the Master thesis of Italian student.
In the ongoing Horizon 2020 project HyStorIES (Hydrogen Storage In European Subsurface) we will collect and analyse geological data for the Baltic States.
The main areas of our expertise are EU CCS Legislation; CO2 storage capacity, 3D geological, geochemical, petrophysical, geophysical and economic modelling in the Baltic Sea Region, techno-economic modelling of CCUS scenarios, CCUS for the cement industry, CCUS cluster projects. Our research results are included in our publications, PhD research of Kazbulat Shogenov and presented at the international conferences.