IECO - Institute of Eco-Industrial Development
KIT is establishing a virtual institute for eco-industrial development, the Institute of Eco-Industrial Development- IECO, with three Chilean cooperation partners. The project initiated by KIT with its partner universities Universidad de Chile (UCh) in Santiago de Chile, Universidad de Concepción (UdeC) in Concepción, and Universidad Austral de Chile (UACh) in Valdivia has been funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) with almost 900,000 Euros since November 2017.
IECO is a network project that designs and builds a research structure around the topic of industrial ecology in Chile. As a binational and multilateral institute, IECO will conduct interdisciplinary research on the topic of industrial ecology, i.e. improving the sustainability of industry by imitating ecosystem principles. The goal is to develop strategies for sustainable industrial regional development in Chile that also include urban areas. IECO is based on three action fields: (1) science and research, (2) higher education, and (3) innovation and technology transfer.
IECO promotes, supports and clusters the research projects of KIT actors with their Chilean counterparts of the three universities. Five topics on industrial ecology have been selected:
- Sustainable use of water and energy in an urban context;
- Sustainable material and energetic use of biomass;
- Eco-industrial use of subsoil resources;
- Urban eco-industrial development in South America;
- Land use and industrial sustainability.
In all Topics, researchers collaborate in an interdisciplinary, inter-institutional and international way and activities take place in all three IECO action fields.
IECO is coordinated by Prof. Dr Michael Janoschka (Institut für Regionalwissenschaft, IfR). International Affairs supports the project, which is also accompanied by Prof. Dr. Thomas Hirth from a strategic point of view. Contact persons at International Affairs is Pascale Kohler.
The IECO network is constantly expanding. Interested KIT researchers can contact the IECO team by e-mail for further information..
Financial support is provided, for example, for initiation workshops for the development of new German-Chilean research projects.
