Projects
Projects: Projects for Investigator |
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| Reference Number | EP/N029488/1 | |
| Title | The systemic city: Infrastructure interdependency and complex value business models | |
| Status | Completed | |
| Energy Categories | Energy Efficiency(Transport) 15%; Fossil Fuels: Oil Gas and Coal(CO2 Capture and Storage, CO2 capture/separation) 15%; Renewable Energy Sources(Bio-Energy, Applications for heat and electricity) 15%; Other Power and Storage Technologies(Electricity transmission and distribution) 15%; Other Power and Storage Technologies(Energy storage) 15%; Other Cross-Cutting Technologies or Research(Energy Models) 15%; Not Energy Related 10%; |
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| Research Types | Basic and strategic applied research 100% | |
| Science and Technology Fields | ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES (Geography and Environmental Studies) 10%; SOCIAL SCIENCES (Town and Country Planning) 50%; PHYSICAL SCIENCES AND MATHEMATICS (Applied Mathematics) 10%; ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY (Electrical and Electronic Engineering) 15%; ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY (Architecture and the Built Environment) 15%; |
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| UKERC Cross Cutting Characterisation | Systems Analysis related to energy R&D (Energy modelling) 50%; Systems Analysis related to energy R&D (Other Systems Analysis) 50%; |
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| Award Type | Standard | |
| Funding Source | EPSRC | |
| Start Date | 01 July 2016 | |
| End Date | 30 June 2019 | |
| Duration | 36 months | |
| Total Grant Value | £266,491 | |
| Industrial Sectors | Civil eng. & built environment | |
| Region | ||
| Programme | LWEC : LWEC | |
| Investigators | Principal Investigator | |
| Web Site | ||
| Objectives | ||
| Abstract | There is huge potential for the infrastructures of UK cities to be better configured to reduce the impacts of climate change. The infrastructures of the energy, telecoms, transport and water sectors are all delivered in isolation and by different mixes of companies and government agencies. For a long time this approach has delivered secure, dependable services such as reliable electric power, clean water,rapid advances in ICT connectivity and smarter transport networks. However, the challenge of climate change also means these critical infrastructures must be leveraged to enable low carbon development, and be resilient to climate change impacts such as increased overheating, more severe flooding and longer drought spells. Many of the providers of critical infrastructures have started to mitigate and adapt to climate change pressures and plan for more uncertain futures. However, much of this activity is limited to single sector approaches and does not seek synergies with infrastructure providers across systems and sectors. Infrastructure continues to be delivered in industry silos, even when it is physically interconnected.This is a problem because there are exciting opportunities to fundamentally change the way infrastructure systems are organised in major cities by taking a more systemic approach; this means researching cross sectoral benefits that can only be realised by linking mitigation activity across systems. These opportunities not being captured in UK cities due to the fact they rely on complex values. Simply put complex values are missed opportunities to benefit cities, economies, and the environment that can only be captured by linking infrastructure provision across systems, i.e. transport and electricity, heat and green infrastructure. Historically this resource sharing has been very difficult, as each infrastructural sector in the UK has been operated in isolation.This research uses two examples of the complex value problem for climate change mitigation in cities. The first is the systemic links between electric vehicles, cities and electricity networks. Here it would make sense for cities, EV infrastructure providers and electricity networks to share the costs of intercity charge infrastructure, especially if smart grid approaches are taken. Currently this is not possible because the investment priorities, system regulation and decision frameworks of electricity networks, EV infrastructure providers and cities do not match in space or time. Secondly the link between green infrastructure systems and urban heat networks will be explored. Biomass energy with carbon capture and storage could provide a source of 'negative carbon' heating for cities through urban heat networks. The complex values this would deliver span mitigation, adaptation and sustainable economy benefits; but rely on linking diverse decision makers across the urban built environment and the bio energy and green infrastructure sectors.Using these case studiesthe research will then use methods from infrastructure systems research, as socio-technical approaches and decision science, to look into the consequences of adopting these 'systemic' approaches to urban infrastructure on: resource management, infrastructure resilience, GHG mitigation and urban economic performance. This research will work with decision makers across these systems to identify new strategies for 'whole systems' management of urban infrastructures. Complex value identification and decision science methods will be used to generate solutions for these problems.The outcome of this research will be a new understanding of how cities can reconfigure infrastructure networks for climate compatible development and local economic resilience. | |
| Data | No related datasets |
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| Projects | No related projects |
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| Publications | No related publications |
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| Added to Database | 21/02/19 | |
