Deploying innovative wastewater management, treatment and valorisation solutions in European cities and regions in the context of climate change
Joint Call between the Climate-Neutral and Smart Cities Mission and the Adaptation to Climate Change Mission · HORIZON-IA · TRL 7–8 · Needs partners
What this call funds
This call funds large-scale demonstration projects that deploy innovative wastewater and stormwater management technologies in real cities and regions across Europe. It supports solutions like nature-based treatment systems, energy recovery from sewage, and water reuse, aiming to help cities adapt to climate change while recovering resources. Projects must test solutions in real 'demonstrator' cities and share lessons with 'replicator' cities to spread adoption.
water management · climate adaptation · renewable energy · circular economy · smart cities · environmental monitoring
Who wins this
A consortium of city/regional authorities, water utilities, and technology providers from at least four different EU or Associated Countries, ready to demonstrate and scale wastewater innovations in real urban settings.
Could you win this call?
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The call in detail
- Indicative grant size
- €9.5M
- Funding model
- Budget-based — reimbursement of actual eligible costs
- Submission
- Single-stage submission (full proposal at once)
- Type of action
- HORIZON Innovation Actions
- Partners
- Required. The call asks for a consortium — at least 4 partners, from 4 countries.
- Eligible applicants
- public body, local water management organisation
- Also required
- Entities from at least four cities/regions in different Member States or Associated Countries must participate; at least one entity must be from the 112 EU Mission Climate-Neutral Smart Cities, and at least one from a signatory of the Adaptation Mission Charter; local water management organisations must be part of the consortium; must test in at least two demonstrator cities/regions and engage at least two replicator cities/regions.
- Eligible countries (45)
- Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czechia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Norway, Iceland, Switzerland, United Kingdom, IL, TR, UA, RS, MK, ME, AL, BA, XK, GE, AM, MD, TN, NZ
Read the full conditions from the official call ›
General conditions 1. Admissibility conditions: Proposal page limit and layout described in Annex A and Annex E of the Horizon Europe Work Programme General Annexes. Proposal page limits and layout: described in Part B of the Application Form available in the Submission System. 2. Eligible countries described in Annex B of the Work Programme General Annexes. A number of non-EU/non-Associated Countries that are not automatically eligible for funding have made specific provisions for making funding available for their participants in Horizon Europe projects. See the information in the Horizon Europe Programme Guide. 3. Other Eligibility Conditions The following additional eligibility criteria apply: Entities from at least four cities or regions, each from a different Member State or Associated Country, must participate as beneficiaries. At least one entity in each project must be from one of the 112 cities selected for the EU Mission on Climate-neutral and Smart Cities[[ The EU Mission on Climate-Neutral and Smart Cities aims to deliver 100 climate-neutral and smart cities by 2030 and ensure that these cities act as experimentation and innovation hubs to enable all European cities to follow suit by 2050. On 28 April 2022, the Commission announced the 100 EU cities that will participate in the Mission. In addition, 12 cities have been selected from countries associated or expected to be associated the Horizon Europe programme.]] and at least one must be from a signatory to the Adaptation Mission Charter[[See the list of Charter Signatories https://climate-adapt.eea.europa.eu/en/mission/the-mission/regions-and-local-authoritie]]. described in Annex B of the Work Programme General Annexes. 4. Financial and operational capacity and exclusion described in Annex C of the Work Programme General Annexes. 5a. Evaluation and award: Award criteria, scoring and thresholds described in Annex D of the Work Programme General Annexes. 5b. Evaluation and award: Submission and evaluation processes described in Annex F of the Work Programme General Annexes and the Online Manual. 5c. Evaluation and award: Indicative timeline for evaluation and grant agreement described in Annex F of the Work Programme General Annexes. 6. Legal and financial set-up of the grants Grants awarded under this topic will be linked to the following action(s): Collaboration with the Cities Mission Platform[[Conceived through the Horizon 2020 project NetZeroCities - Accelerating cities' transition to net zero emissions by 2030, Grant Agreement n. 101036519, and scaled up through the topic HORIZON-MISS-2021-CIT-02-03: Framework Partnership Agreement (FPA) for the Climate-Neutral and Smart Cities Mission Platform. ]] and the Mission Adaptation’s Platform[[Initially established by MIP4Adapt and extended under the contract CINEA/2025/OP/0014]] is essential and projects must ensure that appropriate provisions for activities and resources aimed at enforcing this collaboration are included in the work plan of the proposal. The collaboration with the Mission Platform must be formalized through a Memorandum of Understanding to be concluded as soon as possible after the project starting date. described in Annex G of the Work Programme General Annexes. Specific conditions described in the topic conditions
Who has won calls like this
No past winners are recorded for this call family yet.