EU-Raw Materials Intelligence Capacity Platform (EU-RMCP) – Technical system specification

EU-Raw Materials Intelligence Capacity Platform (or EU-RMICP) integrates metadata on data sources related to primary and secondary mineral resources and brings the end users an expertise on the methods and tools used in mineral intelligence. The system is capable of bringing relevant user ‘answers’ of the type 'how to proceed for …' on almost any question related to mineral resources, on the whole supply chain, from prospecting to recycling, taking into account the environmental, political and social dimensions. EU-RMICP is based on an ontology of the domain of mineral resources (coupled with more generic cross-functional ontologies, relative to commodities, time and space), which represents the domain of the questions of the users (experts and non-experts). The user navigates in the ontology by using a Dynamic Graph of Decision (DDG), which allows him/her to discover the solutions which he/she is looking for without having to formulate any question. The system is coupled with a 'RDF Triple Store' (a database storing the ontologies), factSheets, doc-Sheets and flowSheets (i.e., specific formatted forms) related to methods and documentation, scenarios and metadata.JRC.B.6-Digital Econom

Prospecting Secondary Raw Materials in the Urban Mine and mining wastes (ProSUM) Recommendations Report

This Report presents the recommendations arising from the ProSUM Project. It contains recommendations designed to continue to improve the knowledge base for secondary raw materials with the overarching objective of increasing recycling and supply of such materials. It specifically addresses data availability, data quality, data harmonisation, data structure and data presentation.The report contains a complete list of recommendations arising from the work undertaken in the project covering the ‘urban mine’ of electrical and electronic equipment, batteries and vehicles, their wastes, and mining wastes. It is the culmination of three years’ work which has resulted in:• The characterisation of products in terms of CRM content;• A comprehensive review and screening of all available data to characterise products;• An assessment of the factors affecting CRM content in products and the future trends for products;• A comprehensive review of existing and development of new methodologies for sampling and analysisof products;• An assessment of the current stocks of products held in households and business;• The quantification of flows of waste products not captured by national reporting on producer compliance;• A new model to quantify stocks and flows of products, their waste and material flows;• A comprehensive review and screening of all available data to characterise waste flows;• A comprehensive review of existing and development of new methodologies for sampling and analysisof wastes;• An evaluation of relevant product waste flows and mining wastes deposits;• Creation of the Urban Mine Platform (UMP) including a unified data model and code lists and meta datasystem;• Expansion of the Minerals Knowledge Data Platform (MKDP) for mining wastes;• And a new harmonised classification system to describe data in the urban mine

Prospecting Secondary Raw Materials in the Urban Mine and mining wastes (ProSUM) - Final Report

Batteries, electrical and electronic equipment, vehicles and mining waste contain both significant amounts and a large variety of raw materials, ranging from base metals to plastics, as well as precious metals and critical raw materials (CRMs). The EU is reliant on imports for many of these raw materials and aims to a Circular Economy. Securing responsible sourcing of those materials as well as increasing recycling rates is a complex societal challenge, partly because of the lack of structured data on the quantities, concentrations, trends and final whereabouts in different waste flows of these secondary raw materials in the Urban Mine in Europe. Currently, data on primary and secondary raw materials are available in Europe, but scattered amongst a variety of institutions including government agencies, universities, NGOs and industry. The aim of the ProSUM project was to provide a state of the art knowledge base, using best available data in a harmonised and updateable format, which allows the recycling industry and policymakers to make more informed investment and policy decisions to increase the supply and recycling of secondary raw materials

ORAMA Project - D6-6 Technical Final Report and Recommendations

Securing the sustainable access to and supply of raw materials, and particularly of Critical Raw Materials (CRM), is of high importance for the European economy. Complex primary and secondary resources contain many different raw materials. The inability to easily produce reliable statistics about reserves, resources, stocks, and flows of raw materials limits the understanding of global trends in resource availability and hampers formulation of mineral and waste policies. This ultimately affects supply chain security and strategic decisions by industry. Hence, it is an issue of great concern for the European Commission (EC) and many other stakeholders. The ORAMA project (Optimising quality of information in RAw MAterial data collection across Europe) seeks to contribute to better supply of raw materials by improving the quality of harmonised raw materials data collection and information sharing among the different levels within the European Union (EU).Data collection practices for primary and secondary raw materials (PRM and SRM) face specific challenges in EU Member States (MS). For PRM data, the main concerns are related to data availability, geographical coverage, accessibility, harmonisation, interoperability, quality, and thematic coverage. The reporting of primary mineral resources and reserves statistics is currently carried out by a wide variety of systems, standards or codes which are not directly comparable. Hence, it is currently impossible to produce reliable pan-European figures for resources for any mineral commodity. ORAMA addresses these issues by recommending a single standard for reporting of resource data, the United Nations Framework Classification (UNFC), a framework for reporting mineral resource data developed by the UN. To enable and encourage data providers to adopt this standard for European PRM data, the ORAMA project has developed resources in the form of a range of training materials and good practice examples.The ORAMA project demonstrates that the analysis of various classifications and reporting systems that sit within the INSPIRE (Infrastructure for Spatial Information in the European Community) concept and data services, are not opposing but rather integral elements of the proper European level data collection and production of information for PRM and SRM. The use of UNFC/UNRMS (United Nations Resource Management System) in the framework of the INSPIRE compliant data service can significantly contribute to sustainable resource management taking into account not only geological knowledge and raw materials potential but also environmental and social issues, based on using the national/regional legislative elements for exploration and exploitation as well.In the case of SRM, the challenges are somewhat different. Regarding mining waste (MIN), the lack of information on deposit characteristics (composition, volumes, and suitable processing technology) is a huge barrier in the identification of recovery potential of the valuable materials that remain in the waste. Furthermore, the lack of a single reporting standard commonly accepted at EU level has created a dispersion of existing information in various systems and project deliverables. In the case of electrical and electronic equipment (EEE) and batteries, beyond the lack of harmonisation, substantial data gaps exist for the market inputs, materials consumption and stocks, and for waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) for unaccounted flows ending up being scavenged, metal scrap and export channels. For vehicles, huge amounts of data, both on stocks and flows and on composition, are systematically collected by authorities and the manufacturing industry, but are only publicly available in a somewhat too aggregated form (placed on market (POM), stock, waste flows) or not at all (composition data).Even when collected, the reporting of the composition of these flows on a product, component and materials level are currently poorly described across all MS, and when actually ending up in recycling processes, the recovery efficiency for all elements and CRMs, in particular, is disappointing. In order to improve the data collection and reporting practices for SRM a structured review and inventory were made followed by a data gap analysis which resulted in the developments of recommendations and subsequently the selection of 6 case studies. The SRM case studies tackle the main data gaps encountered in the analysis and developed tools that will enable the improvement and harmonisation of collection and reporting practices in MS, treatment facilities, data providers, academia among others.The ORAMA project recommends to establish more structured and continuous funding for realising and maintaining a European data infrastructure for tracking both PRM and SRM. The current project-by-project based financing is insufficient and not sustainable to properly track and understand Europe’s strengths and weaknesses in the early resource intensive stages of global supply chains

Semantic Hubs for Geological Projects

International audienceThis paper describes a service-oriented architecture for accessing resources through semantically designed portals called hubs. The services are dedicated to: (a) ontology management, (b) annotation generation from texts based on linguistic or machine learning techniques, (c) persistent storage ofontologies and metadata, and (d) semantic search in annotation bases or ontological databases. These services are, themselves, semantically annotated in order to facilitate their identification and composition. The application of our methodology is carried out within the e-WOK_HUB project in the geological domain

Semantic Hubs for Geological Projects

International audienceThis paper describes a service-oriented architecture for accessing resources through semantically designed portals called hubs. The services are dedicated to: (a) ontology management, (b) annotation generation from texts based on linguistic or machine learning techniques, (c) persistent storage ofontologies and metadata, and (d) semantic search in annotation bases or ontological databases. These services are, themselves, semantically annotated in order to facilitate their identification and composition. The application of our methodology is carried out within the e-WOK_HUB project in the geological domain

Semantic Hubs for Geological Projects

International audienceThis paper describes a service-oriented architecture for accessing resources through semantically designed portals called hubs. The services are dedicated to: (a) ontology management, (b) annotation generation from texts based on linguistic or machine learning techniques, (c) persistent storage ofontologies and metadata, and (d) semantic search in annotation bases or ontological databases. These services are, themselves, semantically annotated in order to facilitate their identification and composition. The application of our methodology is carried out within the e-WOK_HUB project in the geological domain