• Swindon & Wiltshire News
• Wednesday July 12 2023
• Author Name: Peter Davison

Energy research hubs at Bristol and Bath awarded funding to help UK reach Net Zero targets

The UK-HyRES research hub at the University of Bath has been awarded £11 million in funding to lead the way on the UK’s future approach to hydrogen and alternative liquid fuels, while the The Supergen Energy Networks has received £5 million.

UK-HyRES, the UK Hub for Research Challenges in Hydrogen and Alternative Liquid Fuels, aims to become a global centre of excellence in hydrogen research and to deliver practical hydrogen and alternative liquid fuel technologies that are safe and environmentally, economically and socially sustainable.

UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) today (Wednesday) announced the hub will receive £11 million as part of a larger £53 million investment in research to decarbonise the nation’s energy sector.

The hub will be led by Professor Tim Mays, from the University of Bath’s Department of Chemical Engineering. Core universities within the hub include Portsmouth, Sheffield, St Andrews, Surrey, University College London and Warwick.

Finding ways to use hydrogen and hydrogen-based low-carbon liquid fuels, such as ammonia, is essential for the UK to reach net zero emissions by 2050. Hydrogen is a highly versatile clean energy carrier suitable for use in many hard-to-decarbonise sectors where other energy options, such as electricity, are not suitable.

UK-HyRES will identify, prioritise and seek sustainable solutions to research challenges that will accelerate the take-up of hydrogen and alternative liquid fuels (H&ALFs) on the journey to a Net Zero economy.

Prof Tim Mays said: “Research into how we make, store, distribute and use hydrogen and other alternative liquid fuels to power the energy, heating and mobility systems in our society is absolutely essential if we are to achieve our national targets of reaching Net Zero by 2050.

“At Bath we have the expertise and ambition to deliver this important work, and this major funding from UKRI is crucial for us to develop the UK-HyRES hub into a research centre of national strategic importance and global impact.”

The University of Bristol-led SEN hub, which is run in partnership with Leeds, Cardiff, Manchester, Bath, Birmingham, Newcastle Universities and Energy Systems Catapult, carries out highly impactful interdisciplinary research so that energy networks are not just enablers of the low carbon transition but are a driving force towards a rapid, safe and just transition to net zero.

Electricity, gas and heat networks are vitally important enablers for the UK energy sector and UK industry and society as a whole. However as technology and society evolves, planning, design and operation of energy networks need to be revisited and optimised to maximise impact.

SEN research will be strongly aligned with the Government’s Net Zero Research and Innovation Framework and feed directly into the Net Zero Delivery plan through its membership of the Net Zero Innovation Board.

Professor Philip Taylor, pro vice-chancellor for research and enterprise at the University of Bristol, and head of the SEN Hub, said: “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 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 modernisation of energy networks’ technology, processes and governance is a necessity for the energy sector 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.

“This project will accelerate the development, scale up the deployment and increase the impact delivered.”

Pictured: The University of Bath library published under Creative Commons licence