Department of Environment, Climate and Communications

The PACIFIC consortium will develop a new, low-cost and environmentally friendly tool for exploring for mineral deposits beneath the surface. The approach will build on the "traditional" passive seismic method, which is capable of providing useful broad-brush background information about the geological and structural setting of mineralised regions, but lacks the resolution needed for reliable identification of ore bodies. Two radically new developments are planned; reflection passive seismics, which is appropriate from greenfields exploration, and the multi-array method, which will typically be deployed during drilling or in brownfields exploration. Both techniques have major advantages over current techniques, namely relatively low cost and minor impact on the environment. Through the participation of two mineral exploration companies in the project, the two techniques will be validated on test sites in Canada and Sweden, thus brought from TRL2 to TRL5. Research on social acceptance and public perception of risk for mining activities will accompany the deployment and testing of the techniques. The PACIFIC consortium comprises a major university and a research institute who will develop the theoretical background and codes for data treatment, a mid-tier mining company and a junior exploration company who will provide logistic support and access to test sites, two small service companies who will conduct the surveys and analyse the data, a geological survey who will conduct research on public opinion, and a company who will manage the project. The PACIFIC project will thereby transfer the fruits of cutting-edge scientific research to industry and launch the development and deployment of new mineral exploration methods. This will enhance the competitiveness of the European mineral exploration industry, contribute to the discovery of new European ore deposits and decrease the dependence of European industry on imported mineral products.

The ORAMA project focuses on optimising data collection for primary and secondary raw materials in Member States. A cornerstone to the EIP on Raw Materials is the development of the EU knowledge base on primary and secondary raw materials, commenced by a series of European-funded projects. As the next iteration, ORAMA addresses specific challenges related to data availability, geographical coverage, accessibility, standardisation, harmonisation, interoperability, quality, and thematic coverage in Member States. ORAMA will analyse data collection methods and recommendations from past and ongoing projects to identify best practices, develop practical guidelines and provide training to meet specific needs. These actions will demonstrate how to improve datasets for mineral occurrences, minerals intelligence data, economic, technical, environmental and social data for primary and secondary raw materials. For primary raw materials, the focus is on harmonisation and improved coverage of spatial and statistical data, ensuring compliance with the INSPIRE Directive where appropriate. For Mining Waste, Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment, End of Life Vehicles and Batteries, the focus is on developing ‘INSPIRE-alike’ protocols. The unified data model from the Minerals4EU and ProSUM projects will be applied to the datasets and outcomes will be combined with primary raw materials data. ORAMA will demonstrate how to create more robust Material Systems Analysis studies and reliable Sankey diagrams for stocks and flows of specific raw materials. Information is made accessible and compatible with the JRC’s Raw Materials Information System to feed, for instance, future Raw Materials Scoreboard and Criticality Assessment studies. In the long term, ORAMA empowers the wider EU raw materials community with necessary facts to support policy decisions and sustainable investments in the primary and secondary raw material industries.

Europe is challenged to increase the share of renewable energy for heating and cooling, industrial processes, power generation and energy storage. Geothermal energy is a vastly under-utilized indigenous, clean, low footprint and continuously available energy resource, and thus uniquely positioned to substantially contribute to a safe and secure energy supply of Europe’s Energy Union. Hitherto only utilized in choice markets and in only a few geographical regions, GEOTHERMICA’s objective is to combine the financial resources and know-how of 16 geothermal energy research and innovation programme owners and managers from 13 countries, to launch joint actions that demonstrate and validate novel concepts of geothermal energy utilization within the energy system and that identify paths to commerciality. Joint actions comprise joint calls and coordination activities, which will strengthen Europe’s geothermal energy sector by building a tightly interconnected and well-coordinated network of European funding agents. For a first joint call, some € 30 million will be made available for a small number of major demonstration projects. Joint calls will have a strong industry participation with a targeted 50% contribution towards work programs and budgets of successful proposals. In addition to joint programming and joint calls, a number of additional activities will be undertaken to develop shared and deep knowledge, to promote operational excellence, to exchange good practices in the realm of support policies, and to define strategic recommendations related to long-lasting and durable joint pursuits of research and innovation. Ultimately, a strong public sector will complement the research and innovation community as well as Europe’s geothermal industry sector to build an overall strong European geothermal energy sector ready to contribute to the European Energy Union, the implementation of the SET Plan as specified by the SET Plan Roadmap.

Access to mineral resources in Europe is one of the pillars of the RMI. Yet, competing societal interests, such as expanding cities, infrastructure development, agriculture and nature conservation, have had negative effect on the available area for exploration and mining of mineral resources. Consequently, the supply of mineral raw materials within the EU is at risk. Therefore, the integration of mineral resources policies into land-use planning at different scales and levels is a key factor for achieving the goals of the RMI. The MINLAND project is designed for addressing this challenge: to facilitate minerals and land-use policy making and to strengthen a transparent land use practice. MINLAND is composed around the acknowledgement that the call requires a broad and competent consortium with strong links to related projects and activities, a comprehensive and structured data repository, an efficient work flow and strong and broad stakeholder involvement. MINLAND will address the challenge by: collecting and structuring information from member states and EU activities (stocktaking), performing in-depth analyses and case studies on relevant issues and aspects, and compiling comprehensive and practically applicable guidance documents. Along the work flow, stakeholders will be involved through workshops and participation in case studies and through other dissemination activities.