Western Macedonia Cluster of Bioeconomy and Environment
The Cluster of Bioeconomy and Environment of Western Macedonia (CluBE) is a non-profit legal entity legally established on 14th February 2014. The mission of CluBE is to enhance collaboration and increase regional knowledge by promoting innovation and synergies between regional stakeholders in the fields of bioeconomy and the environment. Currently, it has 53 members from the public sector – R&D – SMEs – environment – social covering the entire quintuple helix of the regional bioenergy and environment sector.
Illustration : Image by John from Pixabay
Main activities
CluBE is developing R&D and business activities in the fields of bioeconomy, bioenergy and environment, in order to reinforce green, smart and circular economy in the region and the neighbouring areas. Those activities are supported by national and European funds. In fact, CluBE’s areas of expertise, regarding proposal preparation, writing and implementation are stakeholder engagement (mainly local and regional but also National and European), local and regional replication, coordination of local demo sites, communication, and dissemination as well as knowledge transfer and mobilisation of entrepreneurship.
Specifically, at the moment CluBE is a partner in:
- 10 HORIZON Europe project
- 6 HORIZON 2020 projects
- 2 Interreg IPA CBC Projects
- 1 Direct assignment from the Municipality of Kozani about support for their EU Mission becoming 100 climate Neutral Smart City by 2030
- 1 International investment (I3) under the ERDF for Hydrogen
- 1 Life project about implementing the EE1st principle at a regional level.
- 3 consulting projects in energy and circular economy
- 8 Finalised projects
- 4 Erasmus+ projects
The aforementioned projects are divided in the following sectors:
- Circular Economy and Energy Savings (15 projects)
- Bioeconomy and Social Innovation (7 projects)
- Clean Technologies and H2 (6 projects)
- Digitalization and Climate Policies (8 projects)
Which focus on:
- Energetic exploitation of biomass for household and industrial use, and especially for district heating
- systems for small, medium or large cities.
- Mobilisation of regional biomass supply chains.
- Development of the green hydrogen economy.
- Increase of the share of biofuels in the energy mix of transportation fuels.
- Co-firing biomass with lignite in existing power stations and/or future heating plants.
- Optimisation of heating systems.
- Improvement of energy efficiency for households, public and private buildings.
- Promotion of the concepts of smart cities and villages.
- Promotion of the New European Bauhaus and its principles
- Support of the entrepreneurship in the field of circular bioeconomy.
CluBE’s activities are concentrated in the Western Macedonia area, although there are members from neighboring regions.
Members and Staff
CluBE’s members are a rich ecosystem with more than 53 members of the Quintuple helix.
- Public sector
- R&D
- SMEs
- Environment
- Social
Concluding, the members of CluBE, as well as its staff, have a vast experience in the field of bioeconomy, biomass, bioenergy and green hydrogen. CluBE’s staff is consisted of over 40 experts, mainly engineers and 1/3 of them are PhD holders. They currently manage and have successfully completed in the past several European and Transnational Projects in the fields of Research, Innovation, and Dissemination of Knowledge and have assisted the regional business sector in promoting and fostering entrepreneurship in Western Macedonia.