It is already nearly the end of the year, Christmas is approaching real fast and we hope you are all set to have some relaxing time off. 

Just before you head off, the IDRIC team is pleased to announce that since our October 2021 update, we have welcomed 6 new team members: Clare Howard (Centre Manager), John Ferrier (Policy Research Officer), Isobel Marr (Knowledge Exchange Manager), Helen Kibby (Public Engagement Co-ordinator), Danny Cowe (Business Development Executive) and Stella Gouzon (Centre Administrator). 

Please feel free to visit our Meet the Team webpage to see the members of the team. 

The past 3 months have been extremely busy not least due to COP26 in Glasgow with face to face and hybrid online accessible events; the NZTC Global Summit took place online and the wider IDRIC team held 3 workshops on our Multidisciplinary Integrated Programmes (MIPs). A big thank you for your continued support.

COP26: 

Mercedes Maroto-Valer along with Anna Pultar and John Ferrier, IDRIC Policy Officers, attended and presented at several events at COP26. 

During the summit, the IDRIC team discussed with a range of stakeholders how a systems approach can speed up the journey to net zero, minimising the costs and risks involved of technological solutions, and increasing its economic and societal benefits. A key question underpinning the debate at COP26 was the role that technology and innovation will play in helping to reach the target of net zero emissions by 2050.  However, the summit was marked by the difficult politics of committing to joint global action. 

There was unprecedented consensus on the urgency of action needed, and in particular, on the need for departing from fossil fuels as the backbone of economies across the globe. Ultimately, no unanimous commitment to phasing out of fossil fuels was included in the concluding declaration, the Glasgow Climate Pact.  

At COP26, Prof. Maroto-Valer also discussed the most recent advances in decarbonising energy systems and industries with 10 other world leading research centres from the UK, US, Canada, Brazil, Australia and Netherlands. Reaching net zero is a team effort.  

IDRIC will continue working with industry and academic partners, with policy makers and local communities, to co-develop innovative, inclusive, and sustainable pathways for industrial decarbonisation and mitigating climate change. 

At the invitation of Prof. Heather McGregor, some students of the Edinburgh Business School went to COP26. They attended the Wood PLC’s Diversity and Equality Day. Annabel, a student at Edinburgh Business School said ‘It was the first COP event that dedicated a day to the issue regarding the lack of equality within the race to net zero and encouraged everyone at the event to reflect on the matter. It was an amazing day and so encouraging to hear the work being done to ensure women do not get left behind during the race to net-zero.’  

Net Zero Technologies Centre (NZTC) Global Summit: 

Mercedes launched the Summit by sharing this urgent message: ‘We need to work together, share skills and pace for economic recovery; and Net Zero is an area that by innovating we are going to thrive, increase trade and attract more investment’. We invite you to watch the regional presentations of this Summit – here. 

Visit of HRH at the University of Bath:  

HRH, the Earl of Wessex and Chancellor of the University of Bath, visited the Centre for Sustainable and Circular Technologies (CSCT) in Bath to learn more about sustainable technologies research. 

Prince Edward, Earl of Wessex, was briefed on the industrial decarbonisation and sustainable energy systems initiatives at Bath, including the UK Industrial Decarbonisation Research and Innovation Centre (IDRIC) and the SuperGen Bioenergy Hub. 

Please visit https://www.csct.ac.uk/chancellor-visit/ for further details. 

Awards: 

Professor Mercedes Maroto-Valer received two awards this Autumn! She was honoured with the prestigious ACES-Margarita Salas award in its very first edition, this was presented by the King and Queen of Spain in a private ceremony in Sweden. – https://idric.org/mercedes-maroto-valer-receives-prestigious-aces-margarita-salas-award/  

Mercedes was also awarded best research project of the year at the Disruptors & Innovators (D+I) awards in Madrid. – https://idric.org/mercedes-maroto-valer-awarded-best-research-project-of-the-year-at-di-awards/  

Publications: 

We take this opportunity to highlight recent publications from IDRIC researchers and look forward to highlighting many more in the coming months: 

IDRIC Principal Investigator Gail Taylor and her team at the University of Southampton/UCAL published a paper on Land-use change from food to energy: meta-analysis unravels effects of bioenergy on biodiversity and cultural ecosystem services – https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/ac22be.

IDRIC Research Co-Director Professor Benjamin Sovacool and his team at University of Sussex published a paper on Decarbonising the glass industry: A critical and systematic review of developments, sociotechnical systems and policy options – https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1364032121011527?via%3Dihub  

To view papers that have been published by our Academic Partners, please visit https://idric.org/bibliography/  

Coming Up:  

Activities will continue to ramp up in 2022, including a series of policy workshops, enhanced cluster engagement and ongoing engagement across the academic projects under the Multidisciplinary Integrated Programmes (MIPs). We will also be working on the scoping and implementation of applications for Wave 2 academic projects. 

Follow our news at https://idric.org/news/ or via our social medias: LinkedIn and Twitter. 

On this note, we would like to thank you all for your energy, ongoing engagement and commitment to IDRIC.

We wish you all a Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays. 

Enjoy the bubbles, nice food and most of all take care! 

IDRIC’s reflections on COP-26 and our post-COP agenda

Innovation in low carbon technologies is key for drastically reducing carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from industrial sites and the UK economy more widely – but can technology alone drive the transition to net zero?

From the high-level negotiations to the protests on the streets, the 26th UN Climate Change Conference (COP26) held early November in Glasgow, centred on how we can step up our efforts to reduce CO2 and other greenhouse gas emissions across all sectors and aspects of our daily lives.

The IDRIC-team at COP-26

The UK Industrial Decarbonisation Research and Innovation Centre (IDRIC), launched this year, supports industry and policy makers in accelerating industrial decarbonisation and unlocking the wider social and economic benefits of decarbonisation.

Working closely with key partners in industrial clusters, IDRIC combines engineering, environmental and technical knowledge with economic, social and policy expertise to develop innovative, inclusive, and sustainable pathways for industrial decarbonisation and mitigating climate change.

During the summit, the IDRIC-team discussed with a range of stakeholders how a systems approach can speed up this journey to net zero, minimising the costs and risks involved of technological solutions, and increasing its economic and societal benefits.

COP26: setbacks and breakthroughs

A key question underpinning the debate at COP-26 was the role that technology and innovation will play in helping to reach the target of net zero emissions by 2050, and therefore our chances of preventing the rise of average global temperatures beyond 1.5C.

The summit was marked by the difficult politics of committing to joint global action. There was unprecedented consensus on the urgency of action needed, and in particular, on the need for departing from fossil fuels as the backbone of economies across the globe.

But how fast this global departure can occur and which countries or sectors should make the biggest contribution, remained contentious. Ultimately, no unanimous commitment to phasing out of fossil fuels was included in the concluding declaration, the Glasgow Climate Pact.

Global warming trends call for urgent action – installation at the UKRI Exhibit in the Green Zone

And yet the Glasgow Climate Pact also embodies an unprecedented ambition for intensifying global efforts. Among other key initiatives, it also calls upon its 127 signatory nations ‘to escalate the development, deployment, and dissemination of technologies and the adoption of policies, to transition towards low-emission energy systems’.

The Breakthrough Agenda, a parallel initiative driven by the UK and 42 other countries, mirrors this emphasis on technology and innovation. In the ‘Glasgow Breakthroughs’, a first set of actions was agreed for governments and businesses ‘to dramatically accelerate the innovation and deployment of clean technologies’ in five sectors – power, road transport, steel, hydrogen, and agriculture – which together account for 50% of all emissions.

A technology driven transition

If technology will drive the transition to net zero, what progress have we made in low carbon technologies and how scalable are they?

At COP-26, Prof. Maroto-Valer, UK Champion for Industrial Decarbonisation and IDIRC Director, discussed the most recent advances in decarbonising energy systems and industries with 10 other world leading research centres from the UK, US, Canada, Brazil, Australia and Netherlands.

The discussions at the Technology Driven Transition Summit clearly showed that many technology solutions have already been developed and can be deployed at scale. Besides an unprecedented expansion of renewable electricity, in particular from off-shore wind, major advances have taken place in the production and use of low-carbon fuels like hydrogen and biofuels.

These technologies will be key for reducing emissions from transport, heat and industrial processes and can complement each other, such as the use of hydrogen for balancing the intermittency of renewable energy.

Prof. Mercedes Maroto-Valer

Technologies for carbon capture, utilisation and storage (CCUS) will be particularly important for industrial processes, where electrification or complete emissions reduction is not yet possible, for example in cement production.

Important advances have already taken place in capturing carbon emissions directly at the point at which they arise from power generation or during industrial processes, and then either safely storing it in geological formations including deep saline aquifers or depleted gas fields, or turning these emissions into useful carbon-based products and fuels.

Innovative approaches do not need to start from scratch. IDRIC’s collaborations with industry clusters highlight the benefits of building on existing skills, expertise and infrastructure for speeding up the development of the most promising low carbon solutions.

Besides reducing emissions in some of the most energy-intensive sectors of the economy, technological innovation that is tried and tested in industrial settings can also lead the way for decarbonising other sectors.

Conversations with city leaders and the UK Cities Climate Investment Commission and during the UKRI Exhibit at the Green Zone, clearly showed that demonstrating and deploying low carbon technologies in industrial clusters will help to unlock innovations and investment for decarbonising other sectors.

For example, the large-scale production of hydrogen in UK’s industrial clusters will be key to decarbonise heat in cities and providing clean fuels for maritime transport and aviation.

No silver bullet

COP-26 showcased important advances in technical innovations. From small-scale applications that help to reduce the carbon footprint of individuals and companies to large-scale technological change that helps to decarbonise whole industries, technology and innovation clearly play a major role in the transition to a net-zero economy. But technology cannot do it alone.

Political will and leadership will be crucial in managing transitions, securing private sector buy-in and facilitating behavioural change needed for a sustainable transition to net zero. Supportive policies are also needed to balance the economic and societal costs and benefits of technological change.

A major concern at this year’s COP was the need to ensure a just transition which ensures that the change towards clean energy and net zero industries does not entrench existing social inequalities.

The Scottish Just Transition Commission has recently shown the importance of close collaboration between government, industries, unions and local communities for effectively managing transitions, providing safety nets, opportunities for re-skilling and jobs in green industries.

With a research portfolio that combines technological innovation with social, economic, policy and skills research, IDRIC welcomed the opportunity to take part in workshops around the launch of the Scottish Government’s new Energy Strategy and Just Transition Plan. We discussed with policy makers, representatives from the energy industry and the Scottish Just Transition Commission the political solutions that need to accompany technological change.

A portfolio of solutions

Meeting net zero emissions by 2050 will require a drastic reduction of greenhouse gas emissions, including finding ways of removing past emissions which have accumulated in the atmosphere over centuries.

As part of the UK Universities’ Climate Innovation Showcase, Prof. Maroto-Valer chaired a debate on whether nature or technology provides the best solution for carbon sequestration. The lively debate with geologists, industry and rewilding experts revealed the diversity and also complementarity of nature-based and technological solutions.

Tree-planting, for example, has become a cornerstone in carbon off-setting efforts, yet the frequent use of commercial plantations has raised concerns about land use, verification and permanence of this form of carbon sequestration. Alternatives, like protecting and restoring existing carbon-sinks such as peat lands and rewilding native woodlands have gained attention for their additional contributions from biodiversity to flood prevention, but often still struggle to attract sufficient funding.

Technological solutions, such as capturing CO2 emissions from industrial processes, from energy production with biomass, or directly from the atmosphere, require higher up-front investments, but have the potential to remove very large quantities of CO2 and store them safely underground for long periods of time.

The debate clearly showed that given the urgency and scale of emissions reductions required, we need to expand our efforts across nature- and technology based solutions.

Towards a post-COP agenda: collaboration and innovation

Technology and innovation are crucial for decarbonising our economies. But there is no silver bullet. We need a portfolio of solutions to mitigate climate change and we need collaboration to speed up the development and deployment of such low-carbon technologies at the local and global scale.

Reaching net zero is a team effort and IDRIC will continue working with industry and academic partners, with policy makers and local communities, to co-develop innovative, inclusive, and sustainable pathways for industrial decarbonisation and mitigating climate change.

Mercedes Maroto-Valer, IDRIC Champion and Director, has been awarded best research project of the year at the Disruptors & Innovators (D+I) awards in Madrid.

The event, which took place at the Royal Tapestry Factory in Madrid, brought together more than 300 professionals and leaders of this industry, with the sponsorship of SAP, Amazon Web Services, Entelgy, Sothis, EVO, Globant and Qualcomm. Thus, it was the largest event of its kind held since the outbreak of the pandemic in our lives, consolidating the role of D+I as the backbone actor of the innovative ecosystem in our country.

The Awards recognised the highest achievements in digitization and related areas during 2021.

Collecting the award, Mercedes said ‘I am very grateful for the D + I Award that recognises the impact of the research carried out by my team. We are working together university-industry-government to co-create solutions to decarbonise sectors that are particularly challenging, like industry and aviation. After the intense days during COP26, now more than ever we need to be disruptive and innovative to stop the climate crisis. I want to thank my team and collaborators for making this award possible, and specially for being disruptors and innovators for a sustainable future.’

An expert in energy systems, Mercedes is also director of the Research Centre for Carbon Solutions (RCCS) and has more than 500 pioneering scientific contributions. Her team is at the forefront of innovative and disruptive solutions in carbon capture, utilization and storage technologies and solar fuels; as well as the development of new materials as disruptive as clay-like sponges that capture carbon dioxide or the development of aviation fuels from agricultural and forestry residues and carbon dioxide.

As an innovator, she is developing the best solutions to avoid the climate crisis. As a citizen, she demands active policies and immediate actions by governments. Because, she warns: “If in 2030 we do not have the research and innovation developed, we will no longer have time and the effects of climate change will be irreversible.”

The executive president and director of El Español, Pedro J. Ramírez, inaugurated the Spanish Economic Forum of the Map of the Digitization held throughout the day, and emphasized on his opening speech the need of administrations and companies to “continue innovating” to “continue growing”. He also announced that Wake Up, Spain! will have a second edition next year 2022 and that, as for the first edition, will also be inaugurated by the President of the Spanish Government, Pedro Sánchez.

There were ten winners of the D + I Innovation Awards 2021, the awards that celebrate innovation in Spanish.

References:

• https://www.hw.ac.uk/news/articles/2021/innovation-award-for-one-of-the-world-s.htm 
• https://www.elespanol.com/invertia/disruptores-innovadores/innovadores/investigacion/20211016/mercedes-maroto-valer-investigadora-espanola-triunfa-estudiando-energias/619688556_0.html