A regional waste incineration plant will provide the learning focus, on-site and virtual. An e-learning platform will function as the „out-of-school“-learning location of the power plant. Likewise, students should be made aware of cognitive and affective elements in the „Resource Management“-module for the omnipresent topic of sustainability. The inclusion of society in science and innovation plays an important role, as well as competences in the area of RRI (Responsible Research and Innovation: i.e. inclusion of society in questions, strategies and activities of science) should be taught.

As part of an inquiry-based teaching for fifth and sixth graders, students learn in small groups, how to dispose of, reuse or avoid waste. In addition to reusable raw materials of garbage, energy recovery from residual waste should be made tangible and understandable.Via the e-learning platform, students will get access to virtual animations, webcams, measuring sensors and registered measurement data as live data, which are to be edited and graphically displayed in the sense of competence orientation.

What should be learned in this accelerator:

• Students get an insight into the tasks and processes in a waste-to-energy plant.
• Students get know the possibilities of waste reduction.
• Students know the construction of a waste-to-energy plant and name technical applications of the central components and transfer them to the original object.
• Energy transformation and sustainable action are the focus of this intervention.
• Students learn the use of the waste-to—energy plant for the local society

The e-learning platform requires students to feel like a real member of the society. Pupils should be prepared for everyday situations out of the “real life”. This kind of teaching aims to educate them to responsible citizens of the society by teaching pronciples in RRI.

The following RRI Priciples ar focused:

a) Public engagement:

• Students create solutions to reduce waste in small peer groups and share their ideas to the other groups, to find creative ideas to have more public engagement
• Students compare the recycling circle to the circle of life in nature

b) Ethics:

• Students see the hudge ammount of waste people produce which can not be reused in the usual way
• Students reflect their conclusions about consumer behavior and really needed wrapping material
• Aligning research to social values of the society

c) Science education:

• Students know the construction of a waste-to-energy plant and name technical applications of the central components and transfer them to the original waste powerplant.
• Connction between the subjects biology, physics
• Researchers and stakeholders work together to solve social challenges
• Creating a functional model of a power plant helps to understand crucial steps in the waste-to-energy plant