Our Cohort 1 researchers successfully completed the Bath residential last month that focussed on whole systems and transformative change. The key aims of the residential were to immerse our students in the social and policy considerations that are needed to drive the net zero transition, as well as looking at the life cycle assessments to better understand the interventions needed across the life cycle of certain technologies.

The residential included site visits at RWE’s Didcot B power station, which enabled us to see how increased renewables on the grid affect the wider system and to think about what happens next in terms of dispatchable power systems and opportunities for hydrogen and/or CCUS. The wonderful RWE staff also set our researchers a task to provide a stakeholder engagement strategy for either their transition to hydrogen or the deployment of CCUS at Didcot. The students successfully presented their strategies on the last day to RWE and UoB staff. It was remarkable to see how each team looked at the challenge from different perspectives – excellent presentations.

Other key highlights include:

• A seminar from Rt Hon Chris Skidmore, the author of the UK’s Net Zero Review, who highlighted the urgent need for policy certainty that will encourage investment in emissions removals and reduction.
• A site visit to Bath Abbey to see their energy transformation and how they installed heat exchangers to utilise the geothermal energy of the Roman Baths next door – a great example of how we can decarbonise historic assets.
• A seminar from Sara Grimes from Bath & West Community Energy who talked about community engagement and the future we should be shriving for.
• Tutorials in using life-cycle assessment tools to highlight the systems approach of different technologies.
• Many more incredibly interesting presentations, seminars and workshops. Many thanks to the University of Bath staff for all of their contributions.