CIRCULOOS work started with the analysis of the pilot scenarios it terms of circularity challenges and new value chains. It examined current business practices to identify gaps and opportunities for adopting circular business models and digital tools. Already employed circular practices are further analyzed to see how CIRCULOOS tools can enhance them and be applied in related industries. This analysis bridges the gap between end-users and the technical team, helping to understand user needs and business practices, and explores the potential for broader industry changes.
The first version of an open and reusable reference architecture for circular and sustainable supply chains in manufacturing was created. The Circular Manufacturing Reference Architecture (CMRA) aims to accelerate the development of innovative solutions that enhance sustainability, resilience, and circularity in existing supply chains, and support the creation of new circular supply chains.The architecture has two main areas: the first outlines the fundamental principles and design elements of the CMRA, and the second provides an overview of target architectural scenarios and the ongoing development of an open CMRA-based platform, to support circularity and sustainability in manufacturing supply chains.
Furthemore, the technical components of the CIRCULOOS platform were specified at a high-level description, guiding the development of the Circular Manufacturing Reference Architecture (CMRA). The specifications are based on stakeholder requirements and use cases from leading to the identification of requirements, categorized into functional and nonfunctional requirements. This work supports the ongoing development of the CMRA components.
The technical work included progress on:
• Extending an open-source workflow orchestration tool to integrate with RAMP and the data platform, enabling process monitoring and new use cases like supplier onboarding and risk assessment.
• Developing a 3D Digital Twin for real-time simulation of supply chains and production processes.
• Adapting the Sustainability & Circularity Engine to calculate environmental indicators using pilot data and the ECOINVENT database.
• Focusing the supply chain optimization module on sustainability metrics to compare different production processes.
• Creating a computer vision system to classify plastic recyclable components, with promising experimental results despite challenges with dark-colored plastics.
All tasks are on track, showing promising results in enhancing circularity and real-time visibility across the supply chain. Early demonstrations were developed to showcase early concepts of the tools.
The CIRCULOOS data platform is a key component for the project, based on the Circular Manufacturing Reference Architecture. An early version is now fully operational and hosted on ED infrastructure. The codebase is publicly available on GitHub. The platform, built on the RAMP IIoT platform, includes customizations to meet the project's unique requirements and serves as a repository for data from current and future pilots. It also supports material transactions on the RAMP marketplace and addresses cybersecurity aspects.
The Blockchain platform, built on the Alastria Besu Network, uses the Hyperledger Besu client for tamper-proof evidence registration of database information via a REST API.
Key services supporting the platform include:
• Python csv to NGSI-LD agent for integrating local csv data.
• 2D object to NGSI-LD agent for integrating 2D objects like fabric or leather offcuts.
• CIRCULOOS registration to entities for implementing the NGSI-LD federation scheme securely.
The CIRCULOOS data platform was built considering the topic of data privacy & sovereignty and uses primarily two isolation mechanisms: (a) on the level of user authentication (access control) and (b) on the level of data collection (exposure of data to multiple recipients). Access control is implemented on top of widely applicable open source tools (Keycloak) and uses standard authentication and authorization mechanisms to enable secure connectivity of 3d parties (coming potentially from the Open Calls).
Regarding the development of the pilot scenarios, the first six months of the task were dedicated to consolidate the preliminary work and completely define the pilots’ to-be behaviour and structure the plans for their implementation. In order to ensure consistency and relevance of the work, a methodology has been defined and followed during the whole process. A preliminary analysis on the goals of each pilot related to the industrial, business and circularity aspects has been initially carried out. Starting from its outcome, the steps constituting the backbone of each scenarios have been identified For each of them, a mapping has been developed that includes the tools from WP3 that are used in each step, the data flows from legacy systems to those tools identifying also the data sources needed and available for feeding the resulting system. Clear responsibilities have been drawn for each step, tool and connection. The resulting murals representing the to-be scenarios have been compared and harmonised with the Service Blueprints developed at project level in order to ensure the alignment of the decisions taken with the overall goals and set behaviour of the project.
CIRCULOOS’s visual identity was consciously created and validated amongst the consortium partners and adopted on the website and social media visuals or presentations to adapt it aesthetically to the needs of the project. These changes were transferred and adapted to the rest of communication and dissemination materials such as social media visuals and templates, videos, flyers, events promotion outlets, etc.
