Intensive discussions at the kick-off to r+Impuls

The kick-off to the funding measure “r+Impuls – innovative technologies for resource efficiency – impulses for industrial resource efficiency” was attended by around 40 participants and took place on 9 and 10 June 2016 at the Fraunhofer-Forum in Berlin.

André Greif and Anja Degenhardt from the Projektträger Jülich explained the political funding background of the “r+Impuls” measures. Dr. Christian Sartorius (Fraunhofer Institute for Systems and Innovation Research ISI) and Professor Magnus Fröhling (Technical University Bergakademie Freiberg) presented “r+TeTra” – the transfer and accompanying project to the funding.

Alongside its role and objectives, there was a focus on the tasks of “r+TeTra” and the resulting interactionwith the “r+Impuls” projects, which can assume different forms over the course of the project depending on the requirements related to the projects’ contents.

Interaction is at the center of the networking activities

Interaction also makes up the core of the networking activities between the projects. One of the main objectives of the kick-off event was to get this interaction off to a good start. Dr. Katharina Eckartz (Fraunhofer ISI) described the synergy effects that can result from networking and how these can be exploited in the projects.

Attention was drawn to the potential links between the different “r+Impuls” projects right from the outset during their subsequent presentations. At the marketplace, where each research project was presented in the form of a poster, the first day drew to a close with lively discussions of shared interests and challenges.

Transfer project supports project partners

The second day began with a keynote presentation by Dr. Thomas Holtmann (Head of the BDI-Department Environment, Technology and sustainability) on the topic “Greater resource efficiency in industry: how can policy-makers provide better support?”

Katharina Eckartz then summarized the joint challenges in “r+Impuls” that had been identified in the discussions the day before, some of which also trigger further activities in the transfer project “r+TeTra”. One main challenge for several projects is the switch to decentralized process technology and the resulting modifications to licensing procedures and business models. The transfer project will help project partners master this challenge.

Approaches to identify and implement additional application potentials are another way the transfer project “r+TeTra” can support the “r+Impuls” projects. Different ideas were collected for this as part of an introduction by Christian Sartorius and in the subsequent discussions with all attendees.

To conclude, Christian Sartorius summarized the results of the workshop and presented an outlook. Along with André Greif, who gave the closing remarks, he thanked all the participants, especially the members of the advisory committee, for their active involvement, a necessary condition for the achieved results, and said he was looking forward to continued close cooperation.