AJUNTAMENT DE GRANOLLERS

Their core work

Granollers is a mid-sized Catalan municipality (~60,000 inhabitants) that participates in EU research projects as an urban pilot site and local implementation partner. In practice, they provide real city infrastructure, local governance access, and citizen communities for testing sustainable urban solutions — things a lab or university cannot offer. Their H2020 track record covers two distinct urban challenges: optimising local thermal energy networks (district heating and cooling planning) and restoring urban ecosystems through nature-based solutions in cooperation with Latin American cities. They act as the "real world" component in research consortia, grounding theoretical models in actual municipal planning decisions.

What they specialise in

How they've shifted over time

Their first project (THERMOS, 2016) had no extracted keywords, suggesting a supporting technical role around data provision and pilot testing for energy infrastructure — a common entry point for municipalities new to H2020. By their second project (INTERLACE, 2020), a clear thematic shift is visible: away from energy systems engineering and toward ecosystem restoration, co-production of knowledge with communities, and international city-to-city exchange. The trajectory suggests Granollers is deliberately repositioning from passive energy pilot to active partner in urban sustainability and green infrastructure, with a growing interest in south-north knowledge transfer.

Granollers is moving toward urban resilience and green infrastructure projects — particularly those involving citizen co-production and international city networks — making them a likely fit for future Horizon Europe missions on climate-neutral and smart cities.

How they like to work

Granollers has never led an H2020 project — both participations are as consortium partner, consistent with a municipality that contributes a real urban context rather than research leadership. Despite this, their network is broad: 37 unique partners across 16 countries from just two projects, indicating they join large, internationally diverse consortia rather than small bilateral arrangements. Working with them means access to a committed local authority that can open doors to city data, planning departments, and resident communities, but project management and scientific leadership will always come from elsewhere.

With 37 unique partners across 16 countries from only two projects, Granollers has an unusually wide network for its size — a direct result of joining large RIA consortia. Their INTERLACE connection extends the network explicitly into Latin America (CELAC region), which is rare among Spanish municipalities.

What sets them apart

Granollers offers something most research institutions cannot: a functioning mid-sized European city willing to open its infrastructure, planning data, and communities to EU-funded experimentation. Unlike capital cities, which are common in H2020 consortia, a city of Granollers' scale provides a more replicable and representative urban testbed for solutions intended to scale across European municipalities. Their dual presence in energy planning and urban ecology also makes them cross-sectoral in a way that suits complex urban sustainability projects.

Highlights from their portfolio

• INTERLACE
  The larger-funded project (EUR 258,062) and the more ambitious in scope — linking European and Latin American cities on urban ecosystem restoration, giving Granollers a rare intercontinental urban cooperation profile.
• THERMOS
  Granollers' entry into H2020 via a technically sophisticated energy modelling project, demonstrating the city's willingness to engage with data-driven infrastructure planning tools at a research frontier.