The Industrial and Digital Innovations Research Group (indigo) of the School of Production Engineering and Management of the Technical University of Crete (TUC) is proudly participated in the Research and Innovation Action project Plooto – Product Passport through Twinning of Circular Value Chains, aiming to support manufacturers to achieve a green, digital and circular transition.
The organisation
The indigo research group is a team of multiple-spectrum background researchers engaged in conducting meticulous research to develop innovative solutions for delivering high-value services that traverse four pillars: Process Engineering, Circular Economy, Environmental Engineering and Digital Innovation. Taking advantage of the experience and expertise gained from the 14 EU and nationally funded research projects (13 ongoing), indigo-TUC contributes to Plooto project providing high quality technical services, designed and developed by the research team.
TUC role in Plooto and main activities
TUC is in charge of developing the modelling and simulation service of the overall supply chains of the Ploooto use cases, using the stand-alone tool PSM – Process Simulation & Modelling Tool. PSM has been developed by the indigo-TUC to address modelling and simulation industrial requirements and needs, following the principles of Modular Function Net – MFN, a graphical modelling notation based on the Petri-Net (PN). PSM Tool features and capabilities are extended with respect to the specific needs of the project. Within Plooto, TUC is responsible for the Process Modelling and Simulation service, delivering dynamic models of the production processes of the three pilot case studies. TUC advances its contribution to Plooto project by integrating into the Process Modelling and Simulation Service the overall industrial environment, encompassing the critical actors and stakeholders of each use case, developing a virtual representation of the overall industrial value chain.
Moreover, TUC is responsible for designing and delivering the Plooto Balanced Scorecards, a service dedicated to the assessment of circularity and traceability assessment of the industrial value chains. Exploiting the Sustainability and Traceability Framework developed together with Maggioli, the project coordinator, TUC amplifies the PSM tool for delivering the Balanced Scorecards. TUC team follows a dedicated implementation plan that includes the perceptions, goals and active involvement of the pilot use cases, selected Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and the analysis of the cause-and-effect pattern of the value chain processes and actors. TUC organises and coordinates the activities and tasks under the Work Package 1 – Digital Circular Value Chain Framework, being responsible for the Reference Processes and Digital Traceability Strategies (Task 1.2). Moreover, TUC leads the activities under the Process Modelling and Simulation Services (Task 2.6), and the Balanced Scorecard and Sustainability Assessment Services (Task 3.3).
Next Steps
In alignment with the Plooto project scope and timeline, the TUC team enhances its endeavours to develop the process models of all three use cases, leveraging these models to simulate alternative scenarios according to the pilots’ partners’ needs. To this end, TUC strives to deliver a high-quality service to be integrated into the main Plooto result, the Circular and Resilient Information System – CRIS. Moreover, TUC boosts its efforts in developing and completing the Balanced Scorecard, incorporating cause-and-effect pattern among the targeted industrial process and KPIs, and their interconnection. TUC aims to develop a high-quality Sustainability and Circularity Assessment Service, scalable across the industrial ecosystems, with the potential to enhance circularity across industrial value chains. Representing a high-level educational institution, dedicated to research and innovation, the indigo-TUC team participates in numerous conferences, events, and workshops to present the achieved results, publishes the project outcomes in high-end scientific journals, and focuses on activities that will maximise the impact of Plooto project and increase its recognition.
