West Brabant is characterized by an extensive presence of the chemical, agri-food and energy sectors, which are currently largely focused on the use of fossil fuels and raw materials. These sectors offer a lot of employment opportunities in the region. However, due to the transition to biobased, on the one hand, job losses occur in the fossil fuel industry and, on the other hand, new knowledge and skills are required from employees in terms of green chemistry and the new manufacturing industry. Innovation and the training, upskilling and reskilling of sufficient staff in green chemistry are necessary conditions for achieving the climate transition and to overcome the regional socio-economic effects resulting from the transition. Millvision is therefore investing, together with the partners BioscienZ (producer of various mycelia strains), B4Plastics and UHasselt, in this project in the development and demonstration of a new innovative circular and bio-based additive for the paper industry that, if successful, will be produced in the JTF core region of West Brabant. The West Brabant region is centrally located between Flanders, with some very large paper mills, and Gelderland/Limburg, which is why this region was specifically chosen. The Dutch paper industry produces about 2.7 Mt/year at 21 production sites. At the moment, mainly oil-based additives/excipients are used to obtain the desired process and product properties. Retailers and brand owners (business) explicitly ask for more sustainable additives in primary and secondary packaging, this also applies to public opinion (consumers) who are concerned about the use of micro-plastics, PFAS and the like. There will also be stricter legislation and regulations from the government regarding ‘waste’ in the waste water that is ultimately discharged to surface water from Rijskwaterstaat and Water Boards with a challenge to guarantee drinking water quality; Water Framework Directive. To make the paper production process more sustainable, additives are used. The process additives ensure, for example, to dewater better or to have less foam in the process, the product additives ensure, for example, to make the paper more printable, to make it grease-resistant as with chips or to be strong when in contact with water as with towels. This project focuses on the product additives because of their higher added value. The product additives ensure that with a relatively small addition you can save a lot of mass of fiber while maintaining or even improving performance; More with less! The mostly oil-based polymers actually always result in a ‘plastic’ component in the paper and cardboard, which eventually ends up in the surface water. The main objective of the application-oriented development project is to develop and demonstrate pilot scale fermentation and application (Millvision pilot paper machine (mass and glue press) on a semi-industrial scale (in real industrial environment based on batch production) of the added value of mycelium based additives on 2D and 3D packaging. We start at TRL 5 and develop the business towards TRL 8 towards the end of the project. This provides a concrete description/business case of the demo factory for scaling up. Due to the fact that it is relatively easy to exchange one additive with a green variant, no cost of change is expected from the end user and the introduction is realistic. After the project in 2026, a pilot installation is operational (mycelium pilot fermentor, pilot paper machine and pilot glue press) and there are concrete results of a Mill-trial. We will initially obtain larger amounts of mycelium biomass through subcontracting and then be modified to introduce it to other factories. With this route, with limited CAPEX in the beginning, we create speed of impact, we learn on-the-job and it gives clear direction to the continuity of (market) development. This provides the basis for the business case in terms of costs (scale size) and benefits (in the chain). After a successful market introduction, Millvision expects that this green mycelium additive can be produced on a large scale! The investment in this green chemistry will create a CO2 reduction of around 35.2 M tonnesCO2eq/year at a plant of 16,000 tonnes of Mycelium per year. The new plant will lead to a turnover growth of several million Euros for the consortium through the production of the mycelium additive. This new plant to be built will also lead to growth in employment. In large-volume production and marketing on an industrial production line, the additive is expected to be competitive in terms of pricing with current alternatives in the market and distinctive in terms of properties, durability and processability. The total volumes of paper-only paper in Europe are 80 million tonnes per year, a quarter of which 20 million tonnes of wood fibre in an aqueous stream of 2% dry matter is lost as wet too short fibre and can be converted to this new product. When the conc