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Greenrail, innovative and sustainable railway sleepers: the greener solution for railway sector

Objective

Greenrail S.r.l. winner of SME Phase I and Seal of Excellence SME Phase II has designed an innovative composite railway sleeper. Greenrail Sleeper, patented in 122 countries, combines the advantages of concrete sleepers with the ones of composite sleepers. It is made of an inner core in concrete, covered by an elastic outer shell obtained from recycled plastic and ELT (End-of-Life Tyres), which reduces maintenance costs, vibrations and noise and allows to recover 35 tons of ELT and 35 tons of plastic from urban waste for each kilometer of line (1 km = 1670 sleepers). It is the sustainable substitute of pre-stressed concrete sleepers and it has a longer lifespan, estimated in 50 years from the first installation. Moreover, it is the only existing sleeper that can integrate sensors and systems for energy production and/or data transmission for safety and/or telecommunications. Besides the Greenrail Basic sleeper the company has planned further R&D for Greenrail Solar (a sleeper able to transform every km of line into a photovoltaic field producing from 150 kWh to 600 kWh), Greenrail LinkBox (a Greenrail Solar which also incorporates systems of data transmission for safety and telecommunications able to communicate with remote control rooms) and Greenrail Piezo (Greenrail Basic sleeper which incorporates piezoelectric systems and dynamometers that activate themselves at every train transition, producing energy able to power integrated systems for analysis and diagnostics of the railroad line). The goals of the project are: - obtain the homologation of Greenrail Basic sleeper through the pilot activity with RFI (Rete Ferroviaria Italiana), following the certification regulations; - R&D investments on Greenrail Solar, LinkBox and Piezo by 2018; - commercialisation and manufacturing plant.

Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)

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Keywords

Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)

Programme(s)

Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.

Topic(s)

Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.

Funding Scheme

Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.

SME-2 - SME instrument phase 2

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Call for proposal

Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.

(opens in new window) H2020-SMEInst-2016-2017

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Coordinator

GREENRAIL SRL
Net EU contribution

Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.

€ 2 290 836,00
Address
VIA BELSIANA 71
00187 Roma
Italy

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SME

The organization defined itself as SME (small and medium-sized enterprise) at the time the Grant Agreement was signed.

Yes
Region
Centro (IT) Lazio Roma
Activity type
Private for-profit entities (excluding Higher or Secondary Education Establishments)
Links
Total cost

The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.

€ 3 272 623,75
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