Managed by the Lead Partner (DPIA of the University di Udine), this Work Package will focus on co-ordinating the initiative and providing the best possible supervision and reporting of planned activities and expenses. To facilitate proceedings, a Steering Committee will be set up consisting of one representative for each beneficiary and the Lead Partner acting as the chair. It will be tasked with following-up and monitor project activities and outputs, thus ensuring progress, the achievement of the ambitious expected outcomes, proper implementation and correct financial management of the initiative.

In this Work Package, under the coordination of Certottica scrl, partners will implement targeted communication and awareness-raising activities addressed to the entire cross-border area, with the aim of involving the greatest number of beneficiaries possible. A project communication strategy will be designed to include visual identification, a project web site and communication actions targeting each identified public entity (research institutions, local authorities, SMEs, local communities in the pilot sites). Both conventional and more innovative means will be used, including web and social media tools. The partners will draft and disseminate information and promotional material on each stage of the project. Media relations will be promoted in each individual territory.

A final scientific paper will be published at the end of the project to bring together the outcomes achieved. To reach beyond the project’s target groups, a final cross-border event open to the broader public will be organised to disseminate the actions developed together by the project partners.

Within the WP, partners will use their complementary know-how and skills to investigate innovative integrated models for planning energy investments in urban areas taking into account energy, environmental and economic aspects. The work will build on and expand the results of a previous project called Urban Energy Web whose focus was primarily on assessing the thermal performance of buildings for the purpose of drawing up territorial maps of energy losses and requirements. In the framework of IDEE, those maps will be integrated with design models which can help identify and assess new energy solutions -with a focus on heat recovery and district heating and cooling systems powered by renewable energy sources – and interventions to increase energy efficiency in buildings, also improving their performance when needed.

Integrating advanced spatial analysis tools (specially adapted to fit the needs of smaller urban areas) with analytical tools to measure thermal requirements and planning tools for designing energy systems at municipal level is a real challenge for research, since this type of integrated approach is unprecedented and has never been described in the literature: it can be developed only by combining the complementary competences of the IDEE project partners.

There is no such thing as models of energy systems existing only “in theory” since they are commonly conceived for concrete applications, which in turn are needed to validate the models. Far from being solely theoretical, research carried out for the IDEE project will be beneficial for the territories involved because the proposed framework will be applied and tested in pilot areas. In this WP, simulations will be run and the framework will be optimized for the purpose of reducing costs and environmental impacts of proposed models. Such models will be then implemented in some pilot regions, to incorporate the perspective of local decision makers and communities into the project. The aim is to enable local authorities to identify and help plan measures and systems capable of reducing both energy costs for the community (improving also local competitiveness ) and environmental impacts (cutting local and other greenhouse gas emissions) by using a life-cycle approach while increasing the resource-efficiency and quality of life of the cross-border region through the circular economy. Tests will have 2 main goals: 1) validate research by means of real-life case studies and 2) make the cross-border research network effective, so that it can act as a single working group to address the concrete challenges of the areas under investigation. To expand the range and maximise the reach of the proposed model, selected pilot sites include urban, industrial and tourist areas. The results obtained will be used in WP5 to strengthen the research network and consolidate the developed framework.

After developing and testing the modelling framework for planning energy systems in urban areas, partners will collaborate to consolidate such framework as a benchmark, also by developing indicators and guidelines for local authorities which consider the perspective of the circular economy and resource-efficient measures. In spite of being primarily targeted to public bodies, thanks to the IDEE project these guidelines will be made available also to SMEs, utility companies, real estate developers, builders and ESCO (local stakeholders) who will have the chance to learn about and experience advanced analytical and planning tools which can help them become more competitive when preparing commercial offers for the international market. To that end, joint materials will be produced and disseminated to key target groups. A permanent scheme for research cooperation will be set up by networking research institutes so that they can build a solid scientific reputation in the field of integrated energy system analysis at regional and international level. This initiative is consistent with the Science and innovation Strategy Salzburg 2025, which promotes cross-border research activities capable of generating added value for the region. The active integration of Land Salzburg into cross-border research clusters is seen as a priority by that strategy.