HERCCULES, an international research project, was born from an ambitious idea of researchers from LEAP (Laboratorio Energia e Ambiente Piacenza) and Politecnico di Milano, in particular Professors Stefano Consonni, Manuele Gatti, Matteo Romano and Federico Viganò from the Department of Energy and Professors Marco Derudi, Renato Rota and Giuseppe Storti from the Department of Chemistry, Materials and Chemical Engineering “Giulio Natta”. The consortium, made up of 23 partners, will work for five years to demonstrate the feasibility of the entire Carbon Capture, Utilisation and Storage (CCUS) chain in regions of Southern Europe with a high industrial density, in particular the Pianura Padana and Greece. The main focus is on the decarbonisation of cement production and waste-to-energy, two strategic sectors for the circular economy.

The project aims to trigger concrete actions to reduce CO2 emissions. It will aim to accelerate the application of CCUS in the Mediterranean region by building on the transport and storage initiatives already underway in Italy and Greece, and by developing innovative capture technologies that are not only efficient, but also particularly flexible and replicable in order to adapt to technological developments in the relevant industrial sectors.

Technological, infrastructural, safety, regulatory and financial aspects will be addressed with a multidisciplinary approach that will allow the creation of industrial communities capable of exploiting the synergies between the processes of the CCUS chain. Universities, research centres and consultancies will develop HERCULES technology business models designed for future large-scale applications.

Finally, one of the objectives of HERCULES will be to contribute to the improvement of information on CCUS: communication experts will organise dissemination and training events to communicate methodologies and technological solutions to schools, stakeholders and policy makers, thus accompanying the transition of our industrial fabric towards a sustainable future, not only for the environment, but also for European communities and the economy.

In particular, researchers from the Department of Energy will follow all the research activities related to the design of pilot capture plants in cement and waste-to-energy plants and the subsequent experimental campaigns, the activities and studies required for the full transfer of the technologies, as well as some communication activities in schools and towards the media.

HERCCULES has received funding from the Horizon Europe programme and has the support of numerous industrial partners. The application of CO2 capture technologies is an essential building block for achieving carbon neutrality by 2050, according to the scenarios outlined in the European Directives and the Commission’s own recommendations.

CONSORTIUM PARTNERS

LEAP (coordinator), EU CORE Consulting (Italy), Energan Oil&Gas (Greece), Buzzi Unicem (Italy), Titan cement (Greece), Sumitomo SHI FW (Finland), Air Liquide (Italy), Fraunhofer ISI (Germany), Politecnico di Milano (Italy), BCG (Italy), CSIC (Spain) Celitement (Germany), Utrecht University (Netherlands), Wietersdorfer Alpacem (Austria), Artidek (Ukraine), Shogenergy (Estonia), University of LUT (Finland), TPI (Italy), ClustER Greentech (Italy), CRES (Greece), A2A Ambiente and A2A Spa (Italy), ENI (Italy).