EU‐Wide Advantages and Opportunities for "Safe and clean processing technologies and products (Processes4Planet partnership) (RIA)"

1. Single Market Access (450+ million consumers)

• Pan-EU market readiness: Developing safer, cleaner processes and products under a Horizon lump-sum RIA automatically fulfils EU-level environmental, occupational-health and product-safety standards, easing simultaneous roll-out in 27 Member States and EEA/EFTA countries.

• First-mover procurement potential: Industrial end-users can access green public procurement (GPP) channels worth ~€2 trn/yr across the EU, leveraging new Best Available Techniques (BAT) under the Industrial Emissions Directive revision.

• Unified labelling & conformity: Projects can co-create harmonised eco-labels or CE-mark extensions for “zero-pollution” industrial goods, avoiding 27 different national certification rounds and cutting time-to-market by up to 18 months.

2. Cross-Border Collaboration & Knowledge Exchange

• Mandatory multinational consortia lead to direct piloting in geographically diverse plants (e.g., steel in DE/PL, chemicals in NL/BE, ceramics in IT/ES), proving replicability under different climatic and regulatory conditions.

• Workforce empowerment: EU social-dialogue bodies & trade-union networks facilitate joint training curriculums on safer handling of chemicals, transferable across borders and supported by ESF+ up-scaling.

• Data spaces & digital twins: Alignment with the upcoming Net-Zero Industry Data Space allows secure sharing of real-time emissions and process data, accelerating learning curves and avoiding duplicate R&D.

3. Alignment with Key EU Strategies

• European Green Deal & Zero Pollution Action Plan: Direct contribution by cutting hazardous pollutants to air/water/soil, a headline Green Deal target.

• Chemicals Strategy for Sustainability (CSS): Substituting substances of concern supports the CSS “one substance, one assessment” vision and anticipates future REACH authorisation bans, de-risking business.

• Circular Economy Action Plan (CEAP): Cleaner inputs boost recyclability and secondary raw-material loops, vital for EU-level material resilience.

• Digital Europe & Data Governance Act: Encourages interoperable, FAIR emissions data and AI-driven monitoring that can be reused in other Horizon, Digital Europe and DEP-funded projects.

4. Regulatory Harmonisation Benefits

• Single permitting framework: Results feed into BREF updates under the Industrial Emissions Directive, simplifying permitting across Member States.

• Standardisation leverage: Early involvement in CEN/CENELEC and ISO committees positions partners to shape new standards for emerging pollutants, giving EU firms a first-mover advantage globally.

• Reduced compliance costs: Uniform sampling/monitoring methods avoid parallel national accreditation procedures, saving up to €0.5–1 M per industrial site.

5. Access to the EU Innovation Ecosystem

• World-class research infrastructures: Free or discounted beam-time and analytical services via ARIE (synchrotrons, neutron sources) and ESFRI environment/health RIs accelerate materials characterisation.

• Processes4Planet partnership: Guarantees strategic steering, matchmaking and visibility among >110 industrial and RTO members, shortening the path to demo plants (TRL 7+) backed by Innovation Fund/CEF.

• Cluster collaboration: Synergies with EIT Manufacturing and EIT RawMaterials enable entrepreneurship support, venture creation and skills programmes.

6. Funding Synergies and Leverage

• Innovation Fund (large-scale) & CEF2: Finance CAPEX-heavy first-of-a-kind deployments once Horizon prototypes prove viability.

• Regional Smart Specialisation (S3) & Cohesion Funds: Allow Member States to co-invest in pilot lines in less-developed regions, improving cohesion and project evaluation scores.

• InvestEU & EIB green loans: Lump-sum cost transparency strengthens bankability, unlocking blended finance.

• LIFE & EU4Health: Provide complementary grants for downstream air-quality and occupational-health pilots.

7. Scale and Impact Potential

• Replicability roadmap: Diverse EU industrial clusters (Port of Rotterdam, Upper Silesia, Asturias, etc.) offer ready-made sites to scale solutions, targeting >30 % penetration in EIIs by 2035.

• Quantified EU impact: Anticipated 20–40 % reduction of hazardous pollutant use and 15–25 % reduction in related occupational exposure across piloted sectors, contributing measurably to EU-wide DALY savings and biodiversity recovery.

• Export multiplier: Compliance with the world’s strictest pollution norms creates a competitive edge for EU exporters and sets de-facto global standards (Brussels effect).

8. Strategic Value of Operating at EU Level

• National projects lack the critical mass, regulatory influence and diverse test-beds that an EU-wide RIA delivers.

• The Horizon lump-sum model reduces administrative load uniformly across partners, making collaboration friction-less.

• Coordinating with the JRC (INCITE, EIGL) turns project data into policy-ready evidence, directly shaping upcoming legislation—a leverage impossible at single-country scale.

Bottom line: Leveraging the EU Single Market, harmonised regulations, cross-border research infrastructures and multi-funding architecture dramatically amplifies the scientific, economic and societal impacts of projects funded under this call, offering an unparalleled springboard from lab to continental deployment and global leadership in safe, clean industrial processing.