The Innovate UK Energy Game Changer fund is aimed at encouraging new entrants into the energy sector and the NDA particularly wants to bring fresh thinking into nuclear decommissioning, so we have added £500,000 to the £1.5 million of Energy Game Changer funding recently announced by Innovate UK.
Innovative solutions can mean that decommissioning work across our estate is achieved more safely, sooner, or at a lower cost for the taxpayers. We want to stimulate the development and adoption of novel and emerging technologies as alternatives to established technologies to improve the way we do things. It’s all about being more efficient.
We believe that “game-changing technologies” can solve existing problems, either by the development of completely new ideas or through technology transfer from other sectors. Whilst innovation can come from continual improvement of existing practices there is the opportunity to benefit from stimulated technology innovation also.
For example, could we adopt virtual reality techniques from the UK’s world class gaming industry or use methods from forensics and progressive medical research to help us characterise and simulate some of our challenges?
Perhaps the way that other industries use sensors and deal with advanced materials could be applied to nuclear decommissioning?
We need those people who are currently working elsewhere, in industries such as defence, aerospace, automotive and telecommunications, to grasp this opportunity to consider how their techniques can be applied to our challenges.
Opportunity
This competition is being led and managed by Innovate UK, the UK’s innovation Agency. NDA have collaborated successfully with Innovate UK over the last few years supporting the development of innovative ideas and this competition will focus on how to bring in technologies from outside our sector and ensure we are “horizon scanning” for what is out there.
Scope
Whilst the full scope of the call covers oil and gas, nuclear or energy systems, we are interested in projects that take inspection to the limit and help us deal with data in relation to our mission of nuclear decommissioning.
| We particularly encourage applications from businesses engaged in, but not limited to: | We also welcome technology transfer proposals from other sectors, such as: |
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We expect projects to:
- last 6 to 12 months
- range in size from total costs of £25,000 to £100,000
Available funding
The call is worth to £2million with the percentage of project costs you would receive dependent upon the size of your organisation. NDA will contribute up to £500k on projects with potential application to nuclear decommissioning.
Eligibility
Projects must be led by an SME whose main business lies outside the energy sector. They can work alone or collaboratively with partners of any size from any sector.
Key dates
| Competition opens | 28 March 2016 |
| Briefing event | 6 April 2016 |
| Registration deadline | noon 4 May 2016 |
| Deadline for video submissions | noon 11 May 2016 |
| Deadline for invited written proposals | noon 7 July 2016 |
| Pitch sessions | 5–7 September 2016 |
Further information
Brokering events have also been arranged. These will provide an opportunity for you to:
- hear more about the challenges
- network with sector experts
- meet potential partners
We strongly recommend potential applicants to attend one of these events:
There will also be a briefing event for potential applicants in London on 6 April 2016.
NDA will support these events through representatives from our Site Licence Companies attending to provide potential end-user perspectives.
2 comments
Comment by billy giles posted on
This is not very well advertised, maybe you should advertise it to some of the UKs largest corporations in the desired fields, such as manufacturing- Rolls Royce, and then ask them to filter it down to all their suppliers, who are only going to be top notch companies themselves.......maximize the uptake by the best in the field.
I run a work wear business but have been an engineer for almost 20 years and would have loved an opportunity to get involved with my company in something like this......
Comment by Melanie Brownridge posted on
Thanks for your comment and please do help us by sharing with any of your engineering colleagues. This funding award is led by Innovate UK. As a public sector organisation, their policy is to avoid favouritism and use all the public sector channels available to them to push the information out to the wider community. There is a web page that pulls together a whole load of information and links that are useful to any business interested in applying for funding awards to support their innovation: Guidance on how to apply for funding for innovation