22 January 2026 | Florence, Italy
The REUSE project consortium convened for its 2nd Progress Meeting on 22 January 2026 in Florence, Italy, hosted by partner ETA Florence at a stunning 15th-century venue transformed into a modern meeting space. The event marked a significant milestone as the project is soon to reach the halfway point of its implementation, and provided opportunity to review technical progress, align next steps, and strengthen collaboration across work packages.
Since the 1st project progress meeting held in Vienna in June-July 2025, the project has made substantial advances. By the time of the 2nd meeting, the consortium has successfully submitted 9 project deliverables, achieved 4 key milestones, and is on track to reach 2 additional milestones by the end of this January. This demonstrates strong momentum across both research and system integration activities.
Progress on bioenergy combustion and materials
Significant progress was reported on the bioenergy and gasification work, building on the extensive biomass assessment presented in Vienna. The consortium has completed the selection of optimal biomass blends and successfully developed in-situ abatement strategies through catalytic activity to reduce contaminants and improve gas quality.
The project has now moved into the next experimental phase. The University of Aveiro (UAveiro) will conduct further testing of new catalyst formulations aimed at enhancing contaminant reduction. These trials, designed using DoE and PoE approaches, will generate critical data to support system optimisation and future pilot operation.
Advances in CO₂ Capture Solvents and Materials
The work on solvents and materials for CO₂ capture is nearing completion, with several objectives already achieved. The consortium has successfully established methods for immobilisation of carbonic anhydrase (CA), characterized the activity and reusability of the immobilised product, and integrated the product into Rotating Packed Bed (RPB) reactors.
Immobilised packings developed within the project have been exchanged among partners. Encouragingly, significant enzymatic activity of pmCA has been retained when used with AMP and DMCA solvents, supporting both technical feasibility and sustainability goals.
Final kinetic and equilibrium performance measurements of CA-doped materials are currently underway at CERTH, with the last experimental runs scheduled for completion by the end of January 2026. While this work package is approaching its conclusion, Novonesis continues to support the project through ongoing cloth production, ensuring continuity into the testing phases.
Testing of CO₂ capture and utilization components
Testing activities are ahead of schedule. Cloth packings used for CA immobilization have been successfully tested in RPBs, confirming effective liquid transport through the cloth structure. Results show that increasing the number of cloth layers enhances surface area, albeit with an associated increase in pressure drop, which is an important design trade-off to be considered in system optimisation.
CO₂ reduction (CO₂R) catalyst development, characterisation, and membrane electrode assembly (MEA) design have been completed and will be formally reported in the upcoming deliverable. The University of Leicester developed tin-based catalysts through electrodeposition, while Manchester Metropolitan University designed a reactor for plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition to produce manganese-doped tin-based catalysts. CERTH investigated electrochemical reduction using KOH electrolytes, with an appropriate concentration selected to ensure compatibility with carbonic anhydrase.
Testing of both commercial and REUSE-developed MEAs is currently ongoing in model CO₂R cells, supported by newly set-up pilot systems.
Pilot System Testing, Modelling, and Next Steps
This work package has officially started. The CO₂ capture plant with RPB is already operational, with successful tests conducted using KOH and AMP solvents, and ongoing trials with DMCA. Biomass samples supplied by UAveiro have also been tested.
In parallel, system modeling and cross-cutting activities have commenced. Numerical models for the RPB absorber, gasifier, and CO₂R cell have been developed and validated for CO production, with further refinements underway for formate production. MMU has also completed and validated a 2D numerical simulation for the gasification process, including sensitivity analyses exploring trade-offs between CO₂ and CO production.
On Dissemination and Exploitation Pathway
Dissemination and exploitation activities under REUSE have continued to gain strong momentum, reinforcing the project’s visibility while laying out the foundations for future market uptake of the developed technologies.
The project’s first public webinar proved highly successful, attracting over 100 live attendees and reflecting strong interest from the research community, industry stakeholders and policy-relayed audiences in REUSE’s bioenergy-based carbon capture and utilisation approach. The first project video was also published.
From a scientific dissemination perspective, two peer-reviewed journal papers have been published, with six additional manuscripts submitted for publication. Furthermore, two to three conference papers are scheduled for submission by CERTH and YSquared by the end of January 2026 to the PRES 2026 conference, further strengthening the project’s academic and technical impact.
Exploitation activities are progressing in parallel with technical development, supporting the maturation of the REUSE CCU pilot plant to TRL 5. A Technology Development and Exploitation Plan is well underway, with two business concepts already defined. Under Clean Energy Solutions CES’ leadership, the consortium is developing a structured launch-to-market strategy, including market demand analysis, identification of target users, competitor monitoring, and continuous review of emerging technologies.
The first exploitation workshop, held in Vienna in July 2025, supported concept selection and early business planning. Additional application areas, such as synthetic fuels, and future TRL 6-7 deployment sites are currently under assessment.