The first day of the recently launched 2016 marked the starting signal for the European project Biomasud Plus of the Horizon 2020 Programme, coordinated by the Spanish Association for the Energy Recovery of Biomass (AVEBIOM).
The project has a budget slightly less than two million euros and a duration of three years, and is part of the 'Low Carbon 14' call. Furthermore, the project was excellently received by the European Commission, if we look at the rating obtained: 15 out of 15, the highest possible in its evaluation.
The main objective is to improve the BIOmasud quality and sustainability certification system, in operation since 2013 for Mediterranean biofuels, by including new biofuels; the review of the system's sustainability criteria and the extension to other interested countries. Currently the seal is present in Spain, France and Portugal and, thanks to the Biomasud Plus project, it will also be implemented in Italy, Greece, Slovenia, Croatia and Türkiye.
In addition, actions will be carried out aimed at improving the sustainability of the residential market for Mediterranean biofuels such as: characterization and standardization of biofuels, study of emissions of these Mediterranean biofuels in order to generate a guide to optimize their use in boilers or stoves, and preparation of a market study of each of them in different countries.
The consortium is made up of ten more entities apart from AVEBIOM, such as: CIEMAT, PEFC Spain and Tercera Fase Software from Spain, AIEL (Italy), CBE (Portugal), Tubitak (Turkey), CERTH (Greece), GIS ( Slovenia), BIOS (Austria) and ZEZ (Croatia). This international group combines technical experience in biomass from several research centers, the power of communication and representation of several national associations and the knowledge on specific topics of several entities.
AVEBIOM also participates as a partner in the European projects Basis of the Intelligent Energy program and Enerbioscrub of the Life+ program.