GreenShift, an EU-co-funded initiative for Europe’s transport and mobility sector under the Digital Europe Programme, has formally launched following its consortium meeting in Dublin on 9–10 October, hosted by the National College of Ireland (NCI).
The project signals a commitment to further bolster Europe’s advanced digital expertise, particularly in Artificial Intelligence (AI) and High-Performance Computing (HPC), with the aim of equipping the workforce and public sector to meet the strategic goals of the EU’s Path to the Digital Decade by 2030.
A European effort to build critical digital capacity
The transition to sustainable, low-carbon mobility demands more than new vehicles: it requires robust computational infrastructure and talent capable of designing, simulating and deploying complex transport and energy-efficient systems. Yet across Europe many SMEs, startups and public authorities still lack the AI and HPC proficiency needed to implement data-driven solutions at scale.
GreenShift responds to this deficit by mobilising a pan-European network of higher education institutions, supercomputing centres, technology and innovation organisations, and training providers. The project represents a long-standing commitment to harness computational science for sustainable societal impact.
The Consortium’s mission is to strengthen the EU’s digital skills pipeline by generating experts ready to apply advanced computational methods to climate-relevant transport and mobility challenges.
This initiative aligns directly with the priorities of the Path to the Digital Decade, which sets clear EU-wide targets for increasing digital skills, expanding adoption of HPC/Cloud and AI in enterprises, and reinforcing digital infrastructure.
“Our mission is to convert advanced computation into practical climate action in the transport sector,” said Professor Horacio González-Vélez, Project Coordinator and Head of the Cloud Competency Centre at NCI. “GreenShift is a skills-first initiative that will produce the human capital Europe needs to make data-driven, energy-aware mobility a mainstream capability rather than a niche experiment.”
GreenShift seeks not only to skill up individuals, but to create a shared digital capacity across institutions, industry and public stakeholders, enabling collaborative development of low-carbon mobility systems, data-driven urban planning, and HPC-powered simulation for sustainable transport infrastructure.
Institutional strength and broad European collaboration
The Consortium brings together a diverse set of partners: from national supercomputing centres to higher education institutions, innovation hubs and industry organisations. This reflects a pan-European commitment to bridge the skills gap in computational science, support the digital transformation of businesses, and embed advanced AI and HPC capabilities into the green mobility sector.
The full list of GreenShift partners incorporates:
- National College of Ireland (Ireland)
- Universitatea Națională de Știință și Tehnologie POLITEHNICA București (Romania)
- Università di Pisa (Italy);
- NOVA Information Management School (Portugal)
- HLRS Universität Stuttgart (Germany)
- CINECA Consorzio Interuniversitario (Italy)
- Hrvatski Telekom d.d. / Croatian Telecom Inc. (Croatia)
- Digital Technology Skills Limited (Ireland)
- Transition Technologies PSC S.A. (Poland)
- ScoutInScience (Netherlands)
- Adecco Italia S.p.A. (Italy)
- Fastrack into Information Technology (Ireland)
- Matrix Internet Applications Limited (Ireland)
- Unicorn Factory Lisboa (Portugal)
Dr Massimiliano Guarrasi (HPC specialist at CINECA) further adds that, “by developing cutting-edge digital learning tools and industry-recognised certifications, we aim to foster collaboration across sectors and deliver tangible impact in green mobility.”
Dr Gabriele Mencagli (Associate Professor at the Computer Science Department of the Università di Pisa) emphasises the importance of aligning computational training with real-world demand: “We are building the next generation of AI and HPC experts capable of accelerating digital green innovation in transport.”
Policy alignment and strategic relevance
GreenShift exemplifies the kind of multi-stakeholder, cross-border initiative envisioned by the Path to the Digital Decade: large-scale digital cooperation that advances both skills and industrial capacity, while contributing to broader EU goals for sustainable growth, digital sovereignty and regional competitiveness.
By investing in human capital and computational capacity now, GreenShift helps ensure that Europe will not only meet its 2030 digital targets, but also maintain strategic autonomy in critical technologies, support the twin green-digital transition, and build a resilient knowledge-based economy.
