Funded by the EU Horizon 2020 program (GA No 101000441), the VIVALDI project – a name that recalls the famous 18th-century composer – aims to transform industrial off-gases into high-value organic acids through innovative and sustainable biotechnology. Standing for "innoVative bIo-based chains for CO2 VALorisation as aDded-value organIc acids," VIVALDI offers a cost-efficient solution to not only reduce greenhouse gas emissions from bio-based industries but also repurpose them as a novel feedstock. This groundbreaking approach aims to reduce the industry’s greenhouse gases emissions while lowering the dependence on fossil fuels and the exploitation of essential resources such as energy, raw material, freshwater, and land.
Why VIVALDI's vision matters: Towards a carbon-negative industry
The VIVALDI concept – turning industrial CO2 emissions into sustainable bio-products – is a game-changer for biorefineries, enabling their transformation into carbon-negative facilities. This creates a significant opportunity for a transformative CO2-based industrial sector, offering an environmentally responsible and economically competitive alternative to today's fossil fuel-driven industries.
“The VIVALDI project introduces a novel integrated technological framework for the conversion of CO2 into value-added organic acids. This framework synergistically combines several methodologies, encompassing MDEA-based CO2 absorption/desorption, electrochemical processing, yeast-mediated fermentation, and downstream purification. The uniqueness of VIVALDI lies in the individual optimization of each constituent methodology to facilitate its integration within a unified CO2 conversion pathway.” Albert Guisasola, Professor of Chemical Engineering and Coordinator of VIVALDI, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona.
VIVALDI's roadmap to market: Highlights from the 2nd Innovation Workshop
The final meeting of the EU-funded VIVALDI project, held from May 5th to 7th, 2025, in Barcelona, included a key event: the second and final Innovation Workshop of the project, organised by project partner Isle Utilities.
Innovation Workshops are crucial for bridging the gap between cutting-edge research and real-world industrial application, providing a platform for partners to showcase their technologies to relevant stakeholders and gather invaluable feedback to accelerate market adoption and foster future collaboration. The event focused on three of the main innovations developed within the project: (i) biolectrochemical systems to recover nutrients from wastewater; (ii) production of organic acids by fermentation using Komagataella phaffii (Pichia pastoris), and (iii) the downstream process of these organic acids. The event brought together the project partners with a group of expert professionals in biology, biotechnology, environmental and chemical engineering from both public and private sectors, facilitating engaging discussions focused on the potential and pathways for successful market integration of these advancements. The input provided by these experts will play an important role in refining the VIVALDI project’s solutions as they move toward scale-up, a crucial step preceding commercialization.
“The workshop facilitated valuable discussions with stakeholders on the current state, potential, challenges, and concerns surrounding bioelectrochemical (BES) technologies for ammonium removal from wastewater and its recovery as ammonium sulphate. These insights will help guide the next steps in scaling-up of BES.” Pau Bosch, Principal Researcher, LEITAT
“The VIVALDI Innovation Workshop presented innovative solutions which can pave the way for more sustainable and energy-efficient processes for by-product valorisation from wastewaters, and for the transformation of these by-products. The collaboration between the participating entities has a very high potential to result in the development of new and sustainable solutions that can respond to the current needs of companies”. Júlia Miragall, Sustainability Consultant at ACCIÓ, invited to participate as external independent stakeholder
VIVALDI’s Final Conference
Complementing the workshop, the VIVALDI Final Conference, titled “Unlocking the Potential of CO2 as Feedstock for the Chemical Industry,” also took place during the final meeting. Elvira Serra, Principal Consultant at Isle Utilities delivered a key presentation on “Seizing the future: the path to industrial adoption,” exploring the crucial steps necessary to translate research innovations like those developed within VIVALDI into widespread industrial implementation.
A key takeaway from Elvira’s insightful presentation was the challenge many promising technologies face in advancing beyond early-stage development. These technologies often encounter what is known as the “valley of death” – the critical gap between low Technology Readiness Levels (TRL) and full commercialisation. The VIVALDI project, currently at TRL 5, has successfully passed the proof-of-concept stage but is not yet ready for full-scale deployment. Elvira also emphasized VIVALDI’s strong business case, supported by a growing market demand for bio-based products, and noted that industrial clusters offer an ideal environment for scaling up such innovations Successfully overcoming this “valley of death” and achieving industrial adoption for VIVALDI's solutions will depend on several crucial factors. These include securing early-stage funding, conducting effective pilot demonstrations, fostering robust collaboration between industry and policymakers, and implementing clear market readiness strategies.
“As a member of the Isle Utilities’ VIVALDI project team. I spoke at the project’s Final Conference, presenting our key outcomes to diverse stakeholders. My talk highlighted Isle Utilities’ role in driving knowledge valorisation and industrial adoption, as well the strategies we developed to support the scaling and future uptake of VIVALDI’s groundbreaking innovations.” Elvira Serra, Principal Consultant, Isle Utilities.
The road ahead: Scaling innovation and seeking partnerships
As the four-year VIVALDI project approaches its conclusion, partners are moving towards scaling up their technologies to validate these technologies within real-world industrial settings. Guided by Isle' strategic commercialisation roadmaps, the focus is now on securing strategic partnerships and exploring new opportunities to continue this research.
VIVALDI invites stakeholders to join its mission to turn CO2 emissions into sustainable bioproducts.
About VIVALDI:
The VIVALDI project (2021-2025), funded by the EU Horizon 2020 program (GA No 101000441), is a nearly €7 million initiative involving a multidisciplinary and international consortium of 16 partners from 9 countries. VIVALDI is developing an integrated solution for the conversion of CO2 into added-value organic acids, driven by advances in CO2 purification, electrochemical catalysis, microbiology, synthetic biology, and bioprocess engineering.
The international and multidisciplinary VIVALDI consortium brings together key players from bio-based industries (SunPine AB, Damm, Bioagra), cutting-edge technology developers (VITO, Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research - UFZ, LEITAT, Processium, Avantium, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Vienna – BOKU, Luleå University of Technology, Novamont), and an end-user (Nutrition Sciences). The project benefits from the expertise of three knowledge hubs: BETA Technological Center (Universitat de Vic) for sustainability and circularity, Isle Utilities for technology and innovation consultancy, and CO2 Value Europe, representing the Carbon Capture and Utilisation community.
Discover the results achieved throughout the past four years on the VIVALDI Project website: Vivaldi Project
