In the future, the vast majority of people will live in urban areas. The use of the third dimension, not only upwards but also underground, will be an essential part of urban development. Its goal is to use the surface space as open space and living space for people and social interaction, and to include the underground as part of the usable space. Potential underground applications include for instance automated freight and passenger transportation systems, high-security data centers, low-emission wastewater treatment plants, vibration-free precision factories, and climate-stable crop farms.

SCAUT bundles the accumulated knowledge, competences and technologies from underground construction as well as from other industrial sectors in order to further develop them as the first competence center of its kind worldwide and to make them available for various applications in the underground space.

SCAUT acts as a platform. It has an open know-how network and promotes the exchange of partners from a wide range of industries in order to jointly drive innovation. SCAUT regularly organizes events and workshops on current trend topics to promote the exchange between industry partners and to discuss new project approaches. In projects, SCAUT takes over the coordination & project management on behalf of the industry partners and supports in the area of promotion & marketing. All intellectual property rights (IPR) remain with the project partners.

The SCAUT working method in a nutshell (English subtitled):