Future Focused Solutions for Climate Mitigation and Adaptation – Open Call and Investment Forum for UK and UAE Businesses

The COP28 – Net Zero Mitigation & Resilience Solutions for the UAE programme is seeking to develop long-term, business led research and innovation collaborations between UAE based investors and SMEs and the UK to address pivotal climate change mitigation and resilience challenges.  
 
Funded by the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office’s Gulf Strategy Fund, this programme is responding to three opportunities outlined in the 2023 iteration of Dubai Future Foundation’s The Global 50 future opportunities report. The challenges have been chosen to create collaborations that merge local and UK expertise.  
 
We will work with Dubai Future Foundation and Expo City Dubai to offer UK and UAE SMEs the opportunity to connect and collaborate on solutions to three challenges focusing on minimising environmental risks, harnessing nature’s capacity to restore itself and radically changing ways of life by replacing the models that countries, communities and individuals live by. 
 
For each challenge, we will select 4 SMEs, two based in the UK and two based in UAE to showcase their solution to the challenge in Dubai at the end of March 2024. The selected companies will also present their business to a selected group of UAE– based investors at an Investor Pitch Evening. Where appropriate and viable, the showcase presentations may be selected to be installed at Expo City Dubai, or other suitable venues, for a period of 3 months.

Point of contact

If you have any questions about the programme and application, please contact:

Megan Ford, SME Ecosystem Support Officer, megan.ford@cp.catapult.org.uk  

Application Support Webinar

Register for our application support webinar on 8 Janaury 2024

This webinar will cover the background to the programme, the challenges it is aiming to address, how the programme will benefit SMEs, guidance on how to apply and information on the application process.

Visit the UK Pavilion Powered by Connected Places Catapult in Hall P1, stand 61, to discover exciting technological innovation from partners from across the UK.

Sam Markey, our Ecosystem Director, Place Leadership, will co-host an insight-rich event on innovation-friendly procurement with pioneering place leaders from across the world, on the UK Pavilion on Tuesday, 7 November, from 14:00.

On Wednesday, 8 November, our Principal Place Development Leader, Catherine Hadfield, will Chair a session on the role of Innovation Districts in the digital future of cities and regions, from noon.

Heavy Goods Vehicles (HGVs) are vital to industry and represent the backbone of trade and commerce worldwide. They are responsible for ensuring we have access to food, medicines, and goods of all kinds.

Almost 90% of domestic goods transported in the UK in 2022 were moved by road – the vast majority of which by heavy goods vehicles (HGVs). These vehicles currently produce approximately 19% of all UK domestic transport greenhouse gas emissions. By 2050, this must be reduced to zero, in line with the UK Government’s Net Zero Strategy.

Connected Places Catapult is supporting Innovate UK and the Department for Transport with the Zero Emission Road Freight Demonstration programme (ZERFD). ZERFD represents a public investment of up to £200 million, match-funded by industry. The programme will see the launch of the first large (40+ tonne) zero-emission HGVs in significant numbers, together with supporting infrastructure, which will enable freight operators to determine the suitability of the new technology for their operations. Public-facing battery-electric charging stations and hydrogen refuelling stations will enable HGVs to go beyond ‘back to base’ operations.

Further information regarding the ZERFD programme can be found here and a full list of the winning consortia partners has been published here.

Together with BSI, Connected Places Catapult is supporting partners involved in the Innovate UK-funded demonstrations and stakeholders in the wider zero-emission HGV ecosystem.

There are four strands to our DfT-funded project.

• Standards – in partnership with BSI
• Commercial and Investment Strategy
• Safety and Security Best Practice
• Infrastructure Planning Best Practice
• Joined Up Thinking

Standards – in partnership with BSI

Standards are crucial in ensuring zero-emission HGVs can roll out in an efficient and safe manner, with interoperability embedded from the start, and to create a market that delivers on required outcomes. Through the standards work, in partnership with BSI, we have formed a Standards Advisory Group for ZERFD that will provide the decision making and governance for the standards development work.  Three ‘flex’ standards, which are well suited to fast-moving areas of innovation, will be developed through the project.

You can see the latest on our standards work, here.

Commercial and Investment Strategy

The public / private investment through ZERFD is crucial in helping to bring stakeholders together and roll out the initial vehicles and infrastructure, but it is just a starting point. Much more finance will be needed to fully transition the 600,000 HGVs across the UK and the millions around the world. These investments will ultimately be offset by reduced total cost of ownership with lower fuel costs, increased driver satisfaction and improved sustainability as we move towards circular supply chains. We are speaking to the UK-based and international investor ecosystem to create a long-term and sustainable programme of decarbonisation. We intend to create a trade and investment bridge for the programme, raise the profile of ZERFD activities to local and international markets and position the UK as a thought leader and green partner of choice.

Safety and Security Best Practice

Safety is top of the agenda when developing zero-emission demonstrations of HGVs. We are seeking industry consensus on best practice in terms of safety and security to inform both demonstrations and longer term roll out of vehicles and infrastructure.  Standards and guidance documents must work together with regulations to ensure safe practices are embedded as existing industries transition and new industries are formed.

Our best practice document, to be published in December 2023, will consider the operation, refuelling/charging, maintenance, and recovery of the vehicles. The focus is on new hazards that are novel to heavy duty battery electric and hydrogen fuel cell vehicles.

Infrastructure Planning Best Practice

Planning and regulatory hurdles are a key barrier to wide-scale infrastructure deployment for zero emission HGVs.  In December 2023, we will publish a reference document for stakeholders involved in planning, design and roll out of battery-electric charging and hydrogen refuelling infrastructure.

We will consider the overall system of HGV charging / refuelling, and the decisions needed from the earliest concept stage through to operations. Our scope includes barriers, existing and emerging guidance, charging/refuelling location, the planning and regulatory landscape, funding and case studies.

Joined Up Thinking

Our subject areas overlap considerably. For example, one of the biggest safety concerns is allocating sufficient space for public HGV refuelling/recharging facilities, which has an impact on the financing of the site and on the infrastructure planning. We will consider these interdependencies in our reporting, and would welcome further discussion with other sectors.

How do I get involved?

If you’d like to find out more, please email us at zeroemissionroadfreight@cp.catapult.org.uk.

You can also register for our showcase event, the Connected Places Summit, in March 2024, which will include the latest on ZERFD.

Phase 1 reports

These reports were produced in the first phase of the ZERFD programme, and are being developed in the next phase.

Seven companies have been selected to join a carbon reduction competition organised by National Highways and Connected Places Catapult.

Innovative ideas put forward to proceed to the second phase of the National Highways Accelerating Low Carbon Innovation Programme include a climbing robot that carries out structural inspections, ‘smart fibre’ plastic bridge beams that monitor structural performance and low carbon fencing materials.

Each shortlisted company will receive between £15,000 and £30,000 to develop their proposals in collaboration with National Highways and several Tier 1 suppliers. Connected Places Catapult will provide coaching, help with marketing strategy and investment support.

The seven companies and their ideas making it through to the next stage of the competition are:

Asset International Structures (Cwmbran) – Developing smart fibre reinforced plastic bridge beams that incorporate optical fibre, enabling structural performance monitoring in real time.

Circular11 (Ferndown) – Providing durable, low carbon fencing and acoustic insulation products; turning mixed low-grade plastic waste into composite material.

HausBots (Birmingham) – Delivering a series of structural inspections using a unique climbing and crawling robot fitted with inspection sensors.

Loopcycle (London) – Creation of a whole life carbon measurement and circular economy tool for use across highway estate assets.

Low Carbon Materials (Seaham) – Delivering a carbon negative aggregate for use in carbon neutral asphalt.

PRG (Scotland) (Hamilton) – Turning waste tyres into useful materials such as a bitumen-like substance for use in road construction and repairs.

Xeroc (London) ­­–­­ Recycling old concrete into new concrete, returning each component to its original form with as little contamination as possible.

Alex Weedon, Executive Director, Connected Places Catapult, SME Development and Academic Engagement said: “National Highways’ goal of achieving net zero emissions involves finding innovative solutions to support decarbonisation, particularly in the maintenance and construction of the strategic road network.

National Highways aims for its maintenance and road construction activities to generate net zero emissions by 2040.

The competition set four challenges for innovative companies to address with their new ideas: alternative materials; decision making enablers for asset management and the whole life value of assets; enablers for the circular economy; and an open challenge.

Connected Places Catapult has been funded by the UK Government via Innovate UK to support an Indian city to pilot and scale a shared electric micro-mobility (shared two wheel electric vehicle) solution and sustainable business model. 

Through this project we will collaborate with New Town, a planned satellite city within the Kolkata Metropolitan Area in West Bengal, and the New Town Kolkata Development Authority to design and deliver a pilot project which will demonstrate and refine a solution in partnership with the private sector. 

A greener approach to travel 

 Shared micro-mobility models are being adopted by cities across the world to shift trips to a greener mode of transport to help cities meet emissions reduction targets.  

A study in Paris estimated that shared e-bikes could reduce transport emissions in cities by 23 tonnes of CO2 in a month. In addition, these models offer the potential to improve both air quality and transport accessibility. 

 In contrast to some private sector electric micro-mobility initiatives, the model we will develop will be designed to integrate with the city’s wider transport planning objectives. We will use a data-driven approach to ensure it serves the right areas of the city and target groups, and design the pilot to test and validate the operational and commercial model such that the solution can then be deployed at scale.  

The Catapult team along with locally based partners will focus on convening relevant stakeholders to help create solutions, and design a pilot scheme with a view to enabling it to be scaled up and be commercially self-sustaining. 

They will also look to design and implement a suitable means of data collection, and promote the innovative pilot to showcase its impact to the Indian government and its potential for deployment elsewhere. 

Contact the project team 

If you’d like to work with us or find out more, please email Roxana.Slavcheva@cp.catapult.org.uk or globalbusinessgrowth@cp.catapult.org.uk  

Funding to develop innovative trials of net zero carbon approaches to road construction and maintenance will be offered to up to ten small to medium sized businesses in a competition launched today by National Highways and Connected Places Catapult.

Phase one of the National Highways Accelerating Low Carbon Innovation Programme will see winning UK based firms awarded between £15,000 and £30,000 each to develop feasibility studies in collaboration with the strategic road operator and its tier one suppliers.

Phase two will see further funding of up to £80,000 provided to support a selected number of organisations to trial their solutions.

Applicants are invited to put forward proposals that address at least one of three challenges:

• Development or application of alternative materials and techniques;
• Innovations that can improve asset management decision-making;
• Innovations which can contribute to reusing, redeploying and recycling construction materials and assets.

There is also an open challenge category for other ideas that can contribute to National Highways’ target of zero emissions in maintenance and construction by 2040.

Up to five larger tier one organisations will also be selected to develop net zero solutions either on their own or in collaboration with an SME, but will not be eligible for funding as part of the programme.

Firms interested in putting themselves forward for the competition have until midnight on 30 April to enter.

The aim of the competition is to reach a wider pool of innovators, exploring firms with potential outside of National Highways’ existing supply chain, that promise to make a difference in lowering its carbon footprint.

The innovation accelerator seeks to take new materials and solutions described as being ‘low maturity’ and put them through a consistent, standardised process of prioritisation, feasibility and initial trialling, with the aim of assessing viability for wider testing and adoption.

Successful firms will be offered coaching and help with marketing strategy and investment support, as well as trial design training, deployment support, trial monitoring and evaluation. There will also be the chance to take part in a demonstration day for investors, industry and potential customers and ten months’ tailored business support.

Connected Places Catapult is pleased to invite you to celebrate the success of the Future of Air Mobility Accelerator 2022-23!

This will be an opportunity to meet key stakeholders in this sector, including the 9 innovators in this year’s cohort, and learn about the programme as a tool for accelerating innovations to market. We will showcase the programme-sponsored trials the cohort have delivered and celebrate their development thanks to the commercial support provided.

This event will take place in partnership with the Sustainable Skies Summit, which is also taking place at Farnborough International Conference Centre from the 17-18th April.

We will be hosting networking drinks and a dinner on the 18th April. Seats are limited, if you would like to attend the dinner please register your interest as soon as possible and we will get back to you if you have been successful.

The SME’s will be exhibiting at the show for the full two days and by registering to attend the dinner you are automatically registered for the Sustainable Skies Summit and will have access to the full two day show and all it has to offer!

Come and network with the cohort, programme partners and other key players and investors in the Air Mobility sector and hear about how, by collaborating across the industry, we can test, validate and accelerate these technologies to market successfully.

About the programme
The Future of Air Mobility accelerator is a challenge-led, 6-month programme in partnership with the Future Flight Challenge from UK Research and Innovation (UKRI). Alongside access to funding for trials and testbeds for demonstrations, the SMEs received mentorship and support from a consortium of experts, industry partners, academic institutions and regulatory bodies.

Our partners on this programme were Supernal, BAE Systems, GKN Aerospace and Heathrow; academic collaborators Cranfield University and Coventry University; and the UK Civil Aviation Authority and BSI.

Co-hosted by:

Sponsored by:

Connected Places Catapult and WeSprint invite you to a Future of Air Mobility insights event at the Urban Innovation Centre. Join us to hear industry insights from corporate, investor and technology leaders and to network with disruptive technologies in this space. We will have conversations around challenges within the sector with a focus on Future Airport & Vertiport Operations, Aviation Sustainability, Future Air & Space Traffic Management and Enabling End-to-End Mobility.

Who will attend?

At this event we expect a variety of stakeholders from the venture community to attend, including public, private and defence leaders from funds, fund of funds, venture studios, and technology providers, buyers and partners.

We will also be joined by representatives from the Future of Air Mobility Accelerator 2022-23 cohort who have been selected by a consortium of partners a cross industry, government, academia and regulation to test and scale new technologies, de-risking innovation in the marketplace.

We are pleased to welcome Supernal as the sponsor for this event. Supernal is Hyundai Motor Group’s Advanced Air Mobility company and are a valued industry partner on the Future of Air Mobility Accelerator programme.

We will also be joined by special guest Sanjeev Gordhan, General Partner at Type One Ventures

Please apply to attend and we will get back to you shortly if you have secured a spot! If you have any questions please contact natasha.giroux@cp.catapult.org.uk 

The scale of the challenge is clear. Heavy Goods Vehicles (HGVs) are vital to industry and represent the backbone of trade and commerce worldwide. They are responsible for ensuring we have access to food, medicines, and goods of all kinds. 89% of domestic goods transported in the UK in 2020 were moved by road – the vast majority of which in HGVs. However, these vehicles produced 16% of UK domestic transport greenhouse gas emissions in 2019, and this needs to be reduced to zero by 2050.

The Pathway to Long Haul HGVs report was, itself, a culmination of extensive research and stakeholder consultation. Connected Places Catapult investigated the promising technologies for zero-emission road freight and started to build the business case for large scale trials and wider deployment. We consulted widely on state of the art and barriers to deployment.

Potential pathways to zero or low emission HGVs, produced by Professor Neville Jackson on behalf of Connected Places Catapult.

Within the Pathway document, we set out actions that we felt would enable the transition, which included:

• Setting a clear vision
• Funding and de-risking the transition
• Developing trust in the technology
• Deploying initial infrastructure
• Progressing regulations and standards
• Building the UK supply chain
• Enabling a sustainable market

The key recommendation was to gather evidence and mature the technologies through large-scale demonstrations operating in real-world conditions in the UK.

The Catapult’s business case work helped to secure £20m of funding to accelerate the rollout of zero-emission road freight, and following the publication of our study in March 2021, Innovate UK launched the Zero Emission Road Freight competitions, covering areas such as hydrogen fuel cells, electric road systems, supply chain technology, battery electric HGVs and supply chain technologies. The winners of these competitions were published in August 2021.

This funding enabled industry partners, such as vehicle manufacturers, infrastructure providers and technology companies, to come together with local authority representatives, freight operators and academics to develop detailed plans for the rollout of large-scale trials. The Catapult has been at the heart of these conversations, which have included representatives from the Department for Transport, Innovate UK, National Highways, National Grid, the Zemo Partnership, Logistics UK, the Road Haulage Association, and many others.

Further good news arrived earlier this year, as it was confirmed that major funding has been secured to deploy the significant infrastructure and large number of vehicles needed for successful trialling of zero-emission HGVS, in a real-world commercial context in the UK. Again, the Catapult’s technical and cost modelling inputs contributed to this funding award.

In addition, the Catapult has produced a suite of outputs to help inform partners and build robust foundations for the trials. The Catapult’s focus areas have included trial data strategy, export potential, safety and regulations, standards and market operations. This has included publication of the following reports which are available to download.

The purpose of this report is to document findings from a review of global standards and provide recommendations on a standardisation programme that would enable safe and effective roll out of Zero Emission Road Freight Trials and establishment of a longer-term sustainable market.

The purpose of this report is to examine the UK’s export opportunity in three emerging zero-emission HGV technologies: Hydrogen Fuel Cells, Battery Electric Vehicles, and Electric Road Systems.

The purpose of this report is to set out the safety activities that are required for safe on-road Zero Emission Road Freight Trials.

The purpose of this report is to set out findings from a review of the hazard landscape and key safety considerations for the proposed Zero Emission Road Freight Trials.

The purpose of this report is to identify what data needs to be collected from trials for evaluation purposes, to outline necessary data collection methods and to identify key stakeholders that would need to engage with this data collection approach.

The purpose of this report is to explore Connected Places Catapult decarbonisation projects across road, rail, maritime and aviation. To consider potential alignment, pre-empt interoperability challenges, highlight operational and implementation synergies and accelerate industry learning.

What’s Next?

Now that funding has been secured and foundations have been laid, the next step is to progress with the design of the demonstrator projects, and consider how such demonstrations can progress to wide-scale commercial deployments of the right infrastructure and vehicles to meet the needs of freight operators.

Meanwhile, the Catapult will be undertaking work on a host of enabling actions, as per the recommendations detailed within reports, to ensure technology can be deployed in a safe and secure manner. This will include investigations into standards, regulations, safety and security and UK export potential. If you would like to be involved in these discussions, please send an email to zeroemissionroadfreight@cp.catapult.org.uk.

Connected Places Catapult is looking forward to continuing on this exciting journey towards a cleaner future!