The latest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in 2018 highlighted the need for urgent, transformative change, on an unprecedented scale, if global warming is to be restricted to 1.5C. The challenge of reaching an 80% reduction in emissions by 2050 represents a huge technological, engineering, policy and societal challenge for the next 30 years. This is a huge challenge for the transport sector, which accounts for over a quarter of UK domestic greenhouse gas emissions and has a flat emissions profile over recent years. The DecarboN8 project will develop a new network of researchers, working closely with industry and government, capable of designing solutions which can be deployed rapidly and at scale. It will develop answers to questions such as: 1) How can different places be rapidly switched to electromobility for personal travel? How do decisions on the private fleet interact with the quite different decarbonisation strategies for heavy vehicles? This requires integrating understanding of the changing carbon impacts of these options with knowledge on how energy systems work and are regulated with the operational realities of transport systems and their regulatory environment; and 2) What is the right balance between infrastructure expansion, intelligent system management and demand management? Will the embodied carbon emissions of major new infrastructure offset gains from improved flows and could these be delivered in other ways through technology? If so, how quickly could this happen, what are the societal implications and how will this impact on the resilience of our systems? The answer to these questions is unlikely to the same everywhere in the UK but little attention is paid to where the answers might be different and why. Coupled with boundaries between local government areas, transport network providers (road and rail in particular) and service operators there is potential for a lack of joined up approaches and stranded investments in ineffective technologies. The DecarboN8 network is led by the eight most research intensive Universities across the North of England (Durham, Lancaster, Leeds, Liverpool, Manchester, Newcastle, Sheffield and York) who will work with local, regional and national stakeholders to create an integrated test and research environment across the North in which national and international researchers can study the decarbonisation challenge at these different scales. The DecarboN8 network is organised across four integrated research themes (carbon pathways, social acceptance and societal readiness, future transport fuels and fuelling, digitisation, demand and infrastructure). These themes form the structure for a series of twelve research workshops which will bring new research interests together to better understand the specific challenges of the transport sector and then to work together on integrating solutions. The approach will incorporate throughout an emphasis on working with real world problems in 'places' to develop knowledge which is situated in a range of contexts. £400k of research funding will be available for the development of new collaborations, particularly for early career researchers. We will distribute this in a fair, open and transparent manner to promote excellent research. The network will help develop a more integrated environment for the development, testing and rapid deployment of solutions through activities including identifying and classifying data sources, holding innovation translation events, policy discussion forums and major events to highlight the opportunities and innovations. The research will involve industry and government stakeholders and citizens throughout to ensure the research outcomes meet the ambitions of the network of accelerating the rapid decarbonisation of transport.

Hydrogen and alternative liquid fuels have an essential role in the net zero transition by providing connectivity and flexibility across the energy system. Despite advancements in the field of hydrogen research both in the physical sciences and engineering, significant barriers remain to the scalable adoption of hydrogen and alternative liquid fuel technologies, and energy services, into the UK's local and national whole system infrastructure policy. These are technical barriers, organisational barriers, regulatory and societal barriers, and financial barriers. The vision as Co-ordinator of the Centre for Systems Integration of Hydrogen and Alternative Fuels (CSI-HALF) is to deliver a fundamental shift in critical analysis of the role of hydrogen in the context of the overall energy landscape, through the creation of robust tools which are investment-oriented in their analysis. A Whole Systems and Energy Systems Integration approach is needed here, in order to better understand the interconnected and interdependent nature of complex energy systems from a technical, social, environmental and economic perspective. This 6-month proposal is to deliver key stakeholder engagement, to develop a comprehensive, co-created research programme for the Centre. The Centre is led by Prof Sara Walker, currently Director of the EPSRC National Centre for Energy Systems Integration, supported by Prof David Flynn of Heriot Watt University and Prof Jianzhong Wu of Cardiff University. The team have extensive experience of large energy research projects and strong networks of stakeholders across England, Wales and Scotland. They bring to the Centre major hydrogen demonstrators through support from partners involved in InTEGReL in Gateshead, ReFLEX in Orkney, and FLEXIS Demonstration in South Wales for example. This 6-month phase is an engagement exercise. It is our responsibility to engage with the community in a manner which respects and supports their motivations. Our philosophy in undertaking this engagement work is based around principles of inclusion, authenticity and tailoring. We will de-risk the integration of HALF into the UK energy system, through full representation of the hydrogen spectrum with open and integrated analysis of top-down and ground-up perspectives, including representation of the immediate and wider stakeholder group e.g. financial markets. We shall engage with this broad section of stakeholders with the support of experts in citizen and community engagement. These expert partners will enable us to produce the highest possible quality of engagement in the 6-month period. Our initial approaches to key stakeholders have been extremely positive. We have already engaged with, and have support from representatives of: pink, green and blue hydrogen production; hydrogen transportation stakeholders; hydrogen end users; policy makers and community groups; financial and consultation organisations; and key academics. We shall engage to create a vibrant, diverse, and open community that has a deeper understanding of whole systems approaches and the role of hydrogen and alternative liquid fuels (HALF) within that. We shall do so in a way which embeds EDI in the approach. We shall do so in a way which is a hybrid of virtual and in-person field work consultation, and develop appropriate digital tools for engagement. This builds on accredited practices and inclusive key performance indicators. The network created as a result of the engagement activity will be consulted on with respect to key research questions for the Centre, to co-create a research programme. Through relationship building, webinars and focus groups, we shall deliver an expertise map for hydrogen integration, an information pack containing the state of the art "commons", and a full proposal with comprehensive research programme which has extensive community buy-in.

The global energy sector is facing considerable pressure arising from climate change, depletion of fossil fuels and geopolitical issues around the location of remaining fossil fuel reserves. Energy networks are vitally important enablers for the UK energy sector and therefore UK industry and society. Energy networks exist primarily to exploit and facilitate temporal and spatial diversity in energy production and use and to exploit economies of scale where they exist. The pursuit of Net Zero presents many complex interconnected challenges which reach beyond the UK and have huge relevance internationally. These challenges vary considerably from region to region due to historical, geographic, political, economic and cultural reasons. As technology and society changes so do these challenges, and therefore the planning, design and operation of energy networks needs to be revisited and optimised. Electricity systems are facing technical issues of bi-directional power flows, increasing long-distance power flows and a growing contribution from fluctuating and low inertia generation sources. Gas systems require significant innovation to remain relevant in a low carbon future. Heat networks have little energy demand market share, although they have been successfully installed in other northern European countries. Other energy vectors such as Hydrogen or bio-methane show great promise but as yet have no significant share of the market. Faced with these pressures, the modernisation of energy networks technology, processes and governance is a necessity if they are to be fit for the future. Good progress has been made in de-carbonisation in some areas but this has not been fast enough, widespread enough across vectors or sectors and not enough of the innovation is being deployed at scale. Effort is required to accelerate the development, scale up the deployment and increase the impact delivered.

Abstracts are not currently available in GtR for all funded research. This is normally because the abstract was not required at the time of proposal submission, but may be because it included sensitive information such as personal details.

Abstracts are not currently available in GtR for all funded research. This is normally because the abstract was not required at the time of proposal submission, but may be because it included sensitive information such as personal details.