
Promoting circular economy in the construction sector: Técnico researchers participate in projects with a total allocation of more than 1M€
CERIS leads the C+D project and participates in the CirMat project. The CircularEcoBIM project also involves CERIS researchers, as well as IN+ and INESC-ID researchers.
Several Técnico researchers are involved in three projects aimed at promoting circular economy in the construction sector, selected by the Ministry of the Environment within the scope of the EEA Grants Environment programme. CERIS – Civil Engineering Research and Innovation for Sustainability leads the C+D project and participates in the CirMat project. The CircularEcoBIM project involves a research team from the Center for Studies in Innovation, Technology and Development Policies (IN +), the Institute for Systems and Computer Engineering, Research and Development (INESC-ID) and also from CERIS. The three projects will receive more than 1M€ in funding.
José Dinis Silvestre, professor at the Department of Civil Engineering, Architecture and Geo-Resources (DECivil) and researcher at CERIS, leads the C+D project – “Close the loop by Disclosing the benefits of buildings’ deconstruction and materials re-use”, which received 49 thousand euros. The project includes a partnership with NORSUS (Norwegian Institute for Sustainability Research), and aims to create a web-based platform to calculate the economic and environmental benefits associated to the processes of deconstruction of buildings and of reuse of construction and demolition wastes. The Técnico team also involves the CERIS researchers Manuel Duarte Pinheiro, Vera Durão and Imtiaz Ahmed.
Professor José Dinis Silvestre also leads the CERIS ‘participation in the CirMat project – “CIRcular aggregates for sustainable road and building MATerials”. The CERIS team also includes the researchers Jorge de Brito, Vera Durão and Bruno Nunes. The CirMat project aims to develop the industrial sector and to promote multiple products / materials with a high degree of incorporation of waste from the construction and steel industry sectors. The project is coordinated by the construction company dst s.a, and includes a partnership with University of Minho and the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU). The CirMat project received 499 thousand euros.
The Circular EcoBIM project aims to create a BIM standard type Product Data template, i.e., a data structure for BIM objects, and a set of applications that allow the calculation of building and component circularity passports, integration and development of product EPD and the calculation of LEVEL(S) system indicators for buildings from building models, thus contributing to the implementation of circularity practices in construction. The project is coordinated by 3drivers, and involves the participation of Instituto Superior Técnico, CentralBIM, Atelier dos Remédios, PotentialSketch, VIC Properties group, and NTNU. António Aguiar Costa, professor at DECivil and researcher at CERIS, leads the Técnico’s participation in this project. The Técnico professors Amílcar Arantes, José Dinis Silvestre and Teresa Ferreira (CERIS), Paulo Ferrão (IN +) and Paulo Carreira ( INESC-ID) are also part of the team.
Through the EEA Grants, Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway established the objective of reducing social and economic disparities in Europe by strengthening bilateral relations with the Beneficiary States. Portugal will benefit from an amount of 102,7M€. This amount will support five programmes: Blue Growth; Environment; Conciliation and Gender Equality; Culture; Active Citizens. In addition to these five programmes, it also exists the Fund for Bilateral Relations. This fund supports initiatives aimed at strengthening the relations between Portugal and Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway.
Source: Técnico
Upcoming Events
11th Lisbon Machine Learning Summer School

LxMLS 2021 will take place July 7th to July 15th in online format (via zoom and slack). It is organized jointly by Instituto Superior Técnico (IST), a leading Engineering and Science school in Portugal, the Instituto de Telecomunicações, the Instituto de Engenharia de Sistemas e Computadores, Investigação e Desenvolvimento em Lisboa (INESC-ID), Unbabel and Cleverly.
Click here for information about past editions (LxMLS 2011, LxMLS 2012, LxMLS 2013, LxMLS 2014, LxMLS 2015, LxMLS 2016, LxMLS 2017, LxMLS 2018, LxMLS 2019, LxMLS 2020) and to watch the videos of the lectures (2016, 2017, 2018, 2020).
Call for Participation
Important Dates
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* Application Deadline: May 15, 2021
* Decision: June 1, 2021
* Early Registration: June 15 – July 1, 2021
* Summer School: July 7 – 15, 2021
Topics and Intended Audience
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The school will cover a range of Machine Learning (ML) topics, from theory to practice, that are important in solving Natural Language Processing (NLP) problems that arise in the analysis and use of Web data.
Our target audience is:
- Researchers and graduate students in the fields of NLP and Computational Linguistics;
- Computer scientists who have interests in statistics and machine learning;
- Industry practitioners who desire a more in depth understanding of these subjects.
Features of LxMLS:
- No deep previous knowledge of ML or NLP is required, but the attendants are assumed to have some basic background on mathematics and programming
- Lecturers are leading researchers in machine learning and natural language processing (see speakers)
- Days are divided into morning lectures and afternoon lab sessions and practical talks (see schedule)
- The Labs guide will be provided one month in advance. Last year’s guide can be found here
- A day zero is scheduled to review basic concepts and introduce the necessary tools for implementation exercises
- Both basic (e.g linear classifiers) and advanced topics (e.g. deep learning, reinforcement learning) will be covered
Online Format:
Due to the current COVID-19 pandemic, the 11th Lisbon Machine Learning School will be held online (via zoom and slack). Similar to last year, we are excited for the opportunity to create a virtual school, where you will be able to attend all the lectures, and participate in the Q&As and labs remotely. We will also provide the tools for students to engage with each other remotely. The lectures will also be streamed to YouTube, and will become freely available later in our YouTube channel. The Q&A, labs and social activities will remain restricted to the accepted students only.
List of Confirmed Speakers
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LUIS PEDRO COELHO Fudan University | China
MÁRIO FIGUEIREDO Instituto de Telecomunicações & Instituto Superior Técnico | Portugal
ANDRE MARTINS Instituto de Telecomunicações & Unbabel | Portugal
IRYNA GULEYVICH Technical University Darmstat | Germany
NOAH SMITH University of Washington & Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence | USA
SLAV PETROV Google Inc. | USA
XAVIER CARRERAS dMetrics | USA
GRAHAM NEUBIG Carnegie Mellon University | USA
BHIKSHA RAJ Carnegie Mellon University | USA
CHRIS DYER Google Deep Mind | UK
ELIAS BARENBOIM Columbia University | USA
ADELE RIBEIRO Columbia University | USA
STEFAN RIEZLER Institut für Computerlinguistik, Universität Heidelberg | Germany
BARBARA PLANK IT University of Copenhagen | Denmark
SASHA RUSH Cornell Tech | USA
Please visit the webpage for up to date information: http://lxmls.it.pt/2021
To apply, please fill the form in https://lisbonmls.wufoo.com/forms/application-form-lxmls-2021/
Any questions should be directed to: lxmls-2021@lx.it.pt.
International European Conference on Parallel and Distributed Computing

The 27th International European Conference on Parallel and Distributed Computing (Euro-Par 2021) will take from August 30 to September 3 2021 in Lisbon.
Euro-Par is the prime European conference covering all aspects of parallel and distributed processing, ranging from theory to practice, from small to the largest parallel and distributed systems and infrastructures, from fundamental computational problems to full-fledged applications, from architecture, compiler, language and interface design and implementation, to tools, support infrastructures, and application performance aspects.
The 2021 edition of Euro-Par will be organized as a collaboration between INESC-ID and Instituto Superior Técnico (IST).
Important Dates:
– Abstract Submission: February 5, 2021
– Paper Submission Deadline: February 12, 2021
– Author Notification: April 30, 2021
– Camera-Ready Papers: June 6, 2021
More information is available here.