ENVIRONMENT AEROSPACE
DON’T SHOCK THE BIRDS
Wildlife hit by electric roll-out
CHASING SATELLITES
CONSUMER GAME ON!
Is space debris issue returning to Earth?
Is debris issue to Earth?
Tech pioneers in gaming continue to push boundaries
21st May
Lancaster 11th June Bristol 26th June
TIM FRYER, EDITOR
The transition to electricity has added impetustowards a net zero approach. Historically one of the big criticisms of plans to reduce greenhouse gases was that the roadmap to get there was sufficiently vague and non-committal that actual action was always a can that could be kicked down the road. And while recent COPs have again replaced specifics with aspiration, the majority of the world is making steps in the rightdirection.
In the UK, the trend for overall energy consumption has been downward for nearly a quarter of a century, while despite the gradual switch to electricity, it too decreases year on year (typically by 1-2%). However, transport remains an outlier, gathering pace and still using an increasing amount of fossil fuels. The switch to EVs, as discussed in the
While much of this issue is taken up with some of the very different aspects around electrification, there is plenty more for you to digest.
We know near-Earth space is getting a bit cluttered, but is the proliferation of space junk burning up in the
article on p32, is slow for a number of reasons, but we have to assume that there is a massive lump of electrical capacity that will ultimately need to be satisfied when we are all channelled toward EVs in the 2030s. Space heating and industrial processes too represent further transitional mountains of electricity that need to be generated and movedaround.
Electricity generation, transmission and distribution is a therefore a complex game and a costly one. Itneeds commitment, vision, planning and money and, if we were to look at the UK, we have to question if the lack of the latter is stifling the first three.
I’ll harp back to an opinion I have expressed before, albeit for a different sector. Governments are designed to win the next election, which means a maximum period of relevant vision of
atmosphere affecting the health of the planet? To find some answers, a pioneering experiment involved chasing a redundant satellite on reentry. This is tricky business when the satellite is travelling over 14,000km/h. Read how they did it on p54.
five years. Projects that take longer than that – building nuclear power stations for example – cost money that will have no bearing on the next election. In some ways the EU, for all of the inertia created by governing through committee, has the advantage of sidestepping political fluctuations –the common path is ultimately followed. This continuity from one government to the next would be a blessing in the UK. Surely a cross-party standing committee would prevent these massively expensive reviews, delayed decisions, and these plans then reversed by the next government.
If carbon-reducing goals are ever to be achieved, then electrification is one of the key components, and if that component is to be realised it will require vision, commitment andcontinuity.
Gaming has been one of the key technology drivers of electronics, but have the investment sums involved in the new mega-games slowed progress? Not a bit of it –see p62.
Fighting the obstinate appeal that the internal
combustion engine retains for some, one project proves a whole car can be a beacon of sustainability. The Waste2Race project (p58) shows how a car – a fast car –can be made with every single component demonstrating its green credentials.
6 NEED TO KNOW
All the latest ‘must know’ updates and developments
10 NEWS ANALYSIS
With President Donald Trump’s America an uneasy ally to the UK, what will the future of technology cooperation between countries look like – especially concerning defence?
12 WORLD NEWS
Hackers spread spyware disguised as utility apps; bullet train put through its paces; record internet shutdowns in 2024; coolant leak at nuclear reactor; Neom costs soar
14 PROJECT WATCH
Scottish loch picked for large-scale storage hydropower project; Great Sea Interconnector project linking Greece, Cyprus and Israel back on track
How can my snake assassination start-up succeed?
How can community projects fill the gaps in the UK’s energy infrastructure? 22 TROUBLE DOWN THE LINE
A major challenge facing the UK’s net zero programme is our transmission network keeping pace
“If you’re an engineer, one thing you learn early on is that individual physical strength is neither here nor there – it’s all about the tools you have”
50 INTERVIEW
Engineer and author Fiona Erskine on her journey to writing 54 CHASING SATELLITES
Scientists look at the impact falling satellites have on the environment here on Earth
58 FROM THE WASTE UP In motorsport this Le Mans Prototype car combines speed and power with sustainability
62 GAME ON Gamers are hungry for ever more impressive and immersive experiences in what they play
66 FROM LAB TO FAB
Materials science is undergoing a watershed moment, assisted by vast resources from the tech giants. With AI supercharging the rate of discovery, are we on the brink of a new era?
The first European rover designed to explore the surface of Mars will be delivered with a landing system built in the UK.
Airbus UK has won the £150m project to design the mechanical, thermal and propulsion systems necessary to ensure a safe touchdown for the Rosalind Franklin rover in 2030.
The platform is being produced for the European Space Agency’s ExoMars mission, which was restarted last year after being suspended in 2022 because of the war in Ukraine.
A lander developed by Roscosmos named Kazachok (‘little Cossack’) was originally going to deliver the Rosalind Franklin, but all Russian involvement in the project ended once the war began.
The rover itself was built by Airbus Defence and Space between 2018 and 2019, but has been awaiting a launch date ever since.
The new contract is being directly funded by the government through the UK Space Agency and will sustain around 200 high-skilled jobs.
The rover’s mission is to explore the red planet and drill two metres down into the surface to hunt for signs of ancient life, such as fossilised microbes, in
an effort to find out how the Solar System came to be. Exploring Mars is crucial to furthering our knowledge of climate shifts and may help answer whether life exists beyond our home planet.
The mission is also made possible by advanced UK robotics and autonomous navigation technologies, which can also be deployed in challenging environments on Earth such as nuclear power plants and the deep ocean.
CERN has unveiled its proposal for the supersized Future Circular Collider (FCC), enabling more advanced science experiments than its predecessor the Large Hadron Collider (LHC).
The FCC would cost an estimated $17bn (£13bn), with a circumference of 90.7km, an average depth of 200 metres and eight surface sites for up to four experiments. In comparison, the LHC is
just 27km long, which limits the number and type of experiments that can be carried out. The high cost of investment would be distributed over 12 years, starting in the early 2030s.
An FCC feasibility study outlines two stages: an electron-positron collider serving as a Higgs, electroweak and topquark factory, followed later by a protonproton collider, similar to the LHC, but achieving much greater collision energy.
Major cyber-security holes have been found in technology made by leading solar panel brands, raising the risk of blackouts due to remote attacks on the energy grid.
A report by software company Forescout has identified vulnerabilities on three leading solar power system manufacturers: Sungrow, Growatt and SMA.
The most affected components are solar monitors, which let owners track the realtime performance of solar panels.
Other vulnerabilities were detected in cloud backends and sometimes solar inverters directly, which convert the DC electricity generated by solar panels into AC.
Forescout also said there were “growing concerns” over the dominance of foreignmade solar power components, which risks targeted state-led attacks.
The firm recommended that photovoltaic inverters be treated as critical infrastructure, which would necessitate strict cyber-security protocols.
The Lower Thames Crossing project – a £10bn road that connects Kent, Thurrock and Essex in the UK – has been given the go-ahead by the government.
Approximately 14.5 miles in length, it will connect to the existing road network from the A2/M2 to the M25 with two tunnels – one southbound and one northbound – running beneath the River Thames.
The crossing is designed to relieve the pressure on the existing A282 Dartford Crossing. This new approval from the Planning Inspectorate will see construction begin next year, with an expected completion date of 2031.
Writing on X, Prime Minister Keir Starmer said: “When I said I would back the builders, not the blockers, I meant it. Giving the Lower Thames Crossing the green light will drive growth and make journeys quicker, safer and more reliable. That is my Plan for Change in action.”
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Researchers have detected earthquakes in the Pacific for the first time using a subsea telecommunications cable.
The Southern Cross Next seafloor cable, which connects New Zealand to Australia, was converted into an array of sensors for earthquakes and currents.
The technique uses the optical bre inside the cable as the sensing element and gathers environmental data from the seabed, where no other permanent sensors exist.
The team has already recorded more than 50 earthquakes since October 2024 – even when the epicentre was tens to hundreds of kilometres from the cable.
The National Physical Laboratory team says the high rate of detection could “drastically accelerate” the research and the refinement of the technique, which was previously tested in the less seismically active Atlantic.
The technology could be adapted to develop a worldwide monitoring network of seafloor sensors using the existing subsea infrastructure.
Remote-controlled robot dogs could help decommission the defunct Sellafield nuclear plant after successful trials.
Workers at the Westlakes Science Park in Whitehaven, eight miles from the defunct Sellafield nuclear plant, “safely and securely” remotely operated a custom Boston Dynamics Spot Quadrupedal Robot ‘dog’ that could carry out tasks such as remote inspections, data gathering and cleanup work.
Energy generation at the plant stopped in 2003, but the painstaking decommissioning process typically takes decades and presents radioactive hazards to workers.
The decommissioning challenge at Sellafield encompasses early nuclear research and nuclear weapons programmes.
The Nuclear Decommissioning Authority is not expecting full-site remediation to end until 2125.
But robotics could now play a major role in the future. The latest trial took remote operations a step further by removing the operator from the nuclear site altogether, thanks to a highly secure virtual access network and live-streamed footage.
“This successful trial marks a significant milestone in our journey towards integrating advanced robotics into our operations at Sellafield,” said Deon Bulman, ROV equipment programme lead at Sellafield.
“By collaborating with [engineering firm] AtkinsRéalis, we are exploring cutting-edge solutions that not only support our decommissioning mission, but also pave the way for future advancements in remote operations.”
The smart meter roll-out reached a milestone in February with the 25 millionth smart meter installed in the UK, according to telecomms service provider ElectraLink.
Originally, the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero planned to fit a smart
meter in every home in the country by 2020.
However, this goal post has moved numerous times. In February 2025, the government launched a consultation on plans to have smart meters installed in 80% of homes and 73% of small businesses by the end of 2025.
With the government falling short of its initial targets, the issue now is that the Radio Teleswitch Service (RTS) meters will stop working in June 2025.
The RTS service switches electricity meters between peak and off-peak rates at certain times of day.
. 2025
With longwave radio becoming obsolete on 30 June, those with RTS meters may find their heating or hot water provisions are affected.
The cost of repairs to rid England and Wales of their pothole problems and bring the road network up to ‘ideal’ conditions has reached almost £17bn.
Pothole fury has come to the fore in recent years. At the end of last year, the government promised that an extra £1.6bn investment would be distributed to local councils, but a new report from the Asphalt Industry Alliance (AIA) has found that far more than this is needed to tackle road repairs.
The AIA’s annual local authority road maintenance report found that £16.81bn is needed, as a one-off, to tackle the backlog of repairs and bring the network up to local authorities’ ‘ideal’ conditions.
Based on the responses from local authorities, almost all (94%) of them revealed there had been no improvement in the condition of their local road network in the last year, with nearly two-thirds (65%) saying that conditions have in reality declined.
The report found that less than half (48%) of the local road network was reported to be in good structural condition.
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“We are calling on the government to set a minimum fiveyear funding horizon and a substantial, sustained increase in investment with budgets ringfenced specifically for local roads maintenance,” said David Giles, chair of the AIA.
AMID STORMY CLASHES AT PRESIDENTIAL LEVEL, HOW IS THE TECHNOLOGY LANDSCAPE EVOLVING THROUGH THE
WORDS
PAUL DEMPSEY
Since 2021, the UK has aligned and allied with the US on AI. But continuing to do so since Donald Trump replaced Joe Biden as President is making European allies nervous. AI is increasingly viewed in terms of national (and regional) security, and alarm has grown over Washington’s changed attitudes to the invasion of Ukraine and Nato.
With Trump briefly freezing military aid and intelligence sharing with Ukraine in March, and not signing off on any new packages, Prime Minister Keir Starmer faces a dilemma. There is the UK’s commitment to Ukraine’s sovereignty, but also its economic and military links to the US – links that have persisted
until now, regardless of the colour of the presidency.
At a late February press conference with Trump in Washington DC, Starmer unveiled another Anglo-American AI tie-up.
“We’re the only two western countries with trillion-dollar tech sectors – leaders in AI - and we take a similar approach on this issue. Instead of over-regulating these new technologies, we’re seizing the opportunities they offer,” Starmer said.
“So we have decided today to go further to begin work on a new economic deal with advanced technology at its core. Our two nations, together, shaped the great technological innovations of the last century. We have a chance now to do the same for the 21st century.”
Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Donald Trump’s disastrous meeting has had a ripple effect on countries’ relations with the US
A UK win, everyone thought. One day later came Trump’s unprecedented Oval Office berating of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, followed – even in the light of a Starmerchaired summit of European leaders – by the US aid freeze.
Already, senior figures in Europe had been raising the prospect of an economic, military and technological decoupling from the US. “The free world needs a new leader,” wrote EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas on X.
“It’s up to us, Europeans, to take this challenge.”
For the UK, with one of the continent’s two largest armed forces, that is easier said than done.
The new deal will build on numerous existing US-UK AI vehicles. These include:
● The AUKUS defence alliance with Australia (AI is Pillar II)
● A safety, test and interoperability initiative between the UK’s Defence Science and Technology Lab and the US Air Force
● A collaboration agreement between AI safety institutes
● A tripartite AI and cyber-security agreement in September 2024 with Canada
● June 2023’s technology-rich and overarching Atlantic Declaration. The latest deal is the first since Trump returned and began to rewrite rip up US trade and foreign policies. Even before its unveiling, Starmer’s government had been moving towards him on AI.
In mid-January’s AI Opportunities Action Plan, the UK watered down the Rishi
Sunak government strategy’s focus on safety in favour of economic and adoption priorities, and the promise of light-touch regulation. Its launch came days before Trump cancelled a Biden executive order that also leaned more towards regulation and safety.
Then in mid-February, the US and UK refused to sign the ‘Statement on Inclusive and Sustainable Artificial Intelligence for People and the Planet’ issued at the end of the AI Action Summit hosted by French President Emmanuel Macron.
The closeness is in many ways unavoidable. The US and UK armed forces are the most tightly integrated in the West at virtually every level, including interoperability, intelligence sharing (Five Eyes with Canada, Australia and New Zealand), senior embedded personnel and technology (notably the F-35 fighter). Then, most global AI rankings place the UK third – albeit a distant third – behind the US and China.
In his first term, Trump commissioned an AI strategy report from former Google CEO Eric Schmidt. It received bipartisan support when published at the start of Biden’s presidency. One core recommendation was that, though the US is the clear leader in AI, it must strike technology alliances with key allies.
Meanwhile, AUKUS showed Washington and Whitehall being quickest in the northern hemisphere to react to Xi Jinping’s push in China for “the intelligentisation of warfare”.
Although the latest focus is economic, defence cooperation is likely to set much of the context for what is ultimately agreed.
The ongoing UK strategic defence review is expected to place AI capabilities high up its priorities. Submissions are even being
analysed using AI software from contractor Palantir.
In the US, vice-president JD Vance has a similar view. His political career has been heavily backed by Palantir and PayPal founder Peter Thiel. Vance will lead the discussions around the economic pact and a possible trade deal with the UK.
Nevertheless, there is a clear economic objective for this US administration. It wants the UK to stay out of and preferably at several removes from the EU – a long-standing Trump bugbear. The UK was hit with 10% tariffs on its US exports in April, half what was imposed on the EU, which the government said vindicated its ‘softly, softly’ strategy with the US (all reciprocal tariffs except those with China had been paused at the time of going to press). And a UK-US trade deal continues to be negotiated behind the scenes. Already, the UK and US have broadly balanced trade activity – because they use different ways to calculate it, both typically declare surpluses – and are each the largest inward investor in the other.
But Starmer is in an undeniably delicate position. While the potential economic benefit of maintaining a close US partnership is clear, aligning too closely with Trump’s AI and defence strategies could strain UK relations with Europe – relations that Starmer is striving to repair. Despite Trump’s pro-Russia actions, Starmer believes there is still the vital need for a transatlantic ‘bridge’, and that the UK is best able to provide it because of both history and Brexit.
Yet even at home, a significant number of Brits are asking: “Whose side do we want to be on?”
Most likely, the many aspects of US-UK cooperation in AI and militarily have become and will remain prominent among ‘the ties that bind’. But these perhaps do not bind quite as tightly as they have for the last seven decades.
North Korean hackers have infiltrated the Google Play app store, uploading spyware masquerading as utility apps.
Cyber-security firm Lookout said the spyware – known as KoSpy – had been propagated by the APT37 hacking group, which is thought to be backed by the North Korean state. The group, believed to have been created in 2012, has previously been involved in attacks on various
financial institutions. These have primarily been in South Korea, although they have actively been targeting other countries in recent years.
KoSpy can collect extensive data, such as SMS messages, call logs, audio and screenshots via dynamically loaded plug-ins on Android phones. As well as on Google Play, the apps have been found on third-party app stores such as APKPure.
It was observed using fake utility application lures – such as ‘File Manager’, ‘Software Update Utility’ and ‘Kakao Security’ – to infect devices.
The apps were found to contain basic interfaces that opened up the related internal phone settings view. For instance, the Software Update Utility opens up the software update screen under the system settings.
China’s CR450 high-speed train prototype is currently undergoing rigorous testing and evaluation in Beijing.
In December 2024, the train – the latest model in the Fuxing bullet train series – was officially unveiled after seven years of development. Its top speed surpasses its predecessor the CR400 Fuxing, which could operate at 350km/h.
According to China State Railway Group, the CR450 will be able to reach 400km/h or even 450km/h in some cases. The CR450 is 10% lighter than the CR400 due to the use of new materials including carbon fibre composites and magnesium alloys.
During testing, weight control will be monitored via sensors installed on the tracks. This will provide real-time insights into the weight of each of the eight wheels that are located on both sides of every carriage.
Finnish nuclear power company TVO reported that about 100 cubic metres of radioactive reactor coolant had leaked into containment rooms at Finland’s Olkiluoto 3 (OL3) nuclear power plant during the reactor’s annual
pp g outage for maintenance activities.
Internet rights group Access Now issued a report showing how authorities imposed at least 296 internet shutdowns in 54 countries, causing chaos across borders and exacerbating trauma during conflict.
AFRICA or the second d owns as a or collective so said nceal human
The findings reveal that 21 shutdowns impacted 15 countries in Africa – the highest number of shutdowns ever recorded in a single year for the region. For the second year in a row, authorities and warring parties used internet shutdowns as a weapon of war and a tool for collective punishment. Access Now also said they were sometimes used to conceal human rights abuses.
The leaked reactor coolant flowed from the containment rooms into the floor drain system.
The incident occurred as a result of “human error through a hatch of the reactor pool that had not been closed properly”
Today under construction in the Saudi Arabian desert, the highly ambitious megacity Neom has become a financial disaster, according to a report by The Wall Street Journal
It was first announced in 2017 by the project’s mastermind Mohammed bin Salman, the crown prince of Saudi Arabia. But work on the project has been slow, plagued by delays, cost overruns and controversy.
The project so far has cost $50bn – a small slice of its estimated $500bn total. However, according to the report, the project could face another 55 years of construction, with a projected cost of $8.8tn.
HYDROPOWER
Coire Glas is a proposed large-scale pumped storage hydropower project located on the shores of Loch Lochy in the Scottish Highlands.
The £1.5bn project received planning consent in 2020, and in December 2022 renewable energy developer SSE Renewables started ground investigation works at the site.
Water will be pumped 500 metres up from the lower Loch Lochy to a vast upper reservoir. The plant will have a total generating
AROUND THE WORLD, MANY GREAT PROJECTS ARE CHANGING THE BUILT ENVIRONMENT AND OUR INFRASTRUCTURE – BUT SOMETIMES PROGRESS IS SLOW AND THEY SLIP OFF THE RADAR. THIS COLUMN FOLLOWS THEIR DEVELOPMENT
WORDS TANYA WEAVER
capacity of 1.3GW with up to 30GWh of storage capacity –enough to power three million homes for 24 hours.
In early 2023, SSE announced a £100m investment boost to the project. This has
PLANNING CONSENT: 2020
COST: £1.5bn
CAPACITY: 1,300MW
BUILD TO START: 2026
COMPLETION
DATE: 2033
The €1.9bn Great Sea Interconnector project will connect the power grids of Greece, Cyprus and Israel through a subsea power cable. With a length of 1,208 km, the high-voltage direct current interconnector will exchange up to 1,000MW of electricity, with the capability increasing to 2,000MW.
The project aims to end the energy isolation of Cyprus by creating an energy highway between Europe and Asia.
gone towards investigation works, including the construction of a 1.2km-long and five-metre-high by 4.5-metre-wide tunnel.
The tunnel works have enabled SSE to gather geological data to help inform the main construction.
The next phase, February to September 2025, includes tree felling and further ground investigations to develop the access to Coire Glas.
SSE hopes to make a final investment decision on the project in late 2025 or early 2026. It said this was subject to the government’s cap and floor investment regime, a scheme that supports the roll-out of longduration energy storage projects by providing developers with a guarantee minimum income. If all goes to plan, construction will start in the second half of 2026, with full completion in 2033.
While work started in 2022 on the Crete-Cyprus section, there have been doubts as to whether the Cyprus-Turkey section will ever be completed.
The past couple of years have seen significant challenges, including financial disagreements and escalating maritime boundary disputes between Greece and Turkey.
Early in March 2025, Greece’s Independent Power Transmission Operator announced that the
interconnector project had been officially placed on hold and it had halted funding until further notice.
However, a week after this announcement, Greece’s foreign minister Giorgos Gerapetritis told Associated Press that the project was back on track.
“The Great Sea Interconnector will be completed as planned. We are taking steps to ensure there are no obstacles to its progress,” Gerapetritis said.
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The UK energy infrastructure is pulling on local resources to balance demand – progress is slow, but it is happening
On the side streets of Bacup, Lancashire, UK, in two-up two-downs nestled around a former mill, work began in January to convert the first properties as part of a new project. It could be indicative of methods to bring low-cost green heating to millions of homes that otherwise seem to be locked out of the planned transition to net zero. Rossendale Valley Energy’s Net Zero Terrace Streets (NZTS) project is an attempt to find a way to fit often bulky heat pumps in homes with little free space. A householder in a more suburban setting is more likely to be able to live the net zero ‘Good Life’, in an echo of the suburban self-sufficiency enthusiasts at the centre
rst aired on the BBC 50 years ago. But even they might have trouble with some of it. At about 1.5 times the size of an average suburban English garden, Tom and Barbara’s was not only unfeasibly small for hosting a farm, but it would also probably be unable to take all the pipework for a ground-source heat pump capable of keeping the detached house warm.
Even so, such properties offer reasonable prospects for electrification in other ways. An electric vehicle (EV) parked behind a dropped kerb in the front garden or in a garage at the back delivers something like 30kWh of stored energy, possibly added to another 50kWh sitting in a battery bolted onto the house. Add a heat pump – probably of the airsource variety – and the property is ready to take advantage of two factors. One is free energy, once the upfront cost is . The other is the ability to take
areas could do with the savings more than others. A study by Imperial College London published last year mapped how the distribution network would come under stress with high peak usage as EV and heat pump penetration increases in the UK’s attempt to meet net zero targets. Though the effect goes into reverse in the densest parts of London, they found the long feeders typical of these areas – coupled with higher household density in urban areas –makes them susceptible to overloading and voltage excursions.
lead to cost reductions in the distribution system of up to £2.5bn in the UK. Some paid o lem network operators
get cheaper energy when the grid has a surplus, which will help meet government targets. That, in turn, may head o a problem faced by the electricity
rst ai e ith so the size o gard ta probl distribution n The EnergyREV consortium estimates cost t system up in the UK
So far, around 1.5 million UK homes have solar panels, but far fewer have battery storage. In 2019, just 10,000 homes were thought to have them. Standards body MCS claimed that reported installations have hit 30,000 in the three years since it introduced its certification scheme in 2021, with dramatic growth through recent years. This suggests the installed total may have reached close to 50,000 by now.
Some
But to get to the 2030 government target of using domestic flexibility to shave 12GW off the power demand during evening peaks, at least 20 times as many householders will need to invest in the upfront cost in the next half-decade.
That assumes another 2.5 million will continue to participate as they have done during this past winter in schemes such as the National ESO Demand Flexibility Service, which calls on users to explicitly change when they use high-consuming appliances or charge EVs.
Community projects like NZTS, if replicated in other parts of the UK, could yield a quicker way of getting to enough suitable local renewables and storage. In theory, they can take better advantage of shared infrastructure to find the space needed to install more efficient heat pumps and larger communal batteries instead of forcing residents to find space for the equipment in already cramped homes. And they are, in the case of projects such as NZTS, organising finance to avoid the need for residents to pay for the conversions upfront. Instead, the costs will be recouped partly through a standing charge and partly from energy sales to the grid.
One of the three homes intended to demonstrate the practical feasibility of Energy’s plan was to drill deep boreholes
cooperative distribution network operator
South Bank University (LSBU) researcher Eshagh Goudarzi, the scheme would
work by pumping water between cooler, shallow seams and warmer deep seams in a former coalmine supplemented by heat from a glassmaking plant. This could overcome the pumping costs
associated with pumping water from even deeper shafts – the technique employed by an earlier proposal to recover heat from mines around Gateshead. Though not part of the GreenSCIES group of community-focused projects, LSBU is looking at using the chalk aquifer on which its urban campus sits to act as a thermal reservoir.
fro eshead. Tho CIES ts, chalk sit
Despite many ambitious proposals, the total capacity installed so far has fallen far short of a 2014 forecast assembled by Peter Capener, co-founder of Bath & West Community Energy. Standing at 130MW at that point, ministers hoped to see as much as 3GW added by 2020. The eventual 2020 total was 319MW, tallied by Community Energy England. This was much closer to Capener’s more pessimistic forecast, which estimated just 300MW if the government did not follow through with a stable policy for renewables or community projects. And the past decade has been far from stable, though Scotland has seen greater relative progress in wind power through its separate Community and Renewable Energy Scheme (CARES).
In the most recent of its State of the sector reports, Community Energy
England estimated that plans to install some 270MW of potential capacity across 80 projects had stalled. A few months before the 2024 general election, Rishi Sunak’s administration decided to investigate the barriers facing community energy projects that had emerged since the coalition’s strategy document appeared a decade earlier.
In its response to the consultation, Community Energy England pointed to no fewer than 11 different policy changes since 2014’s Community Energy Strategy that had put the biggest barriers up. For just a few years after the launch of the strategy, community energy doubled annually before slowing dramatically. Energy UK pointed out in its own response that community energy wound up being “deprioritised since 2015” when it rolled it into the local energy team working at the
Department for Energy Security and Net Zero that replaced the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy.
Many groups see the biggest culprit as the decision to curtail the feed-in tariff before being cut completely in 2019. The government argued at the time the feed-in tariff represented too large a bonus. The Energy Saving Trust argues that since the feed-in tariff ended “community energy projects have lacked any form of revenue certainty mechanism”. Beyond the first year, the Smart Export Guarantee designed to replace feed-in tariffs only has the guarantee the local electricity supplier will pay at all. There is no floor price. And most projects are simply too small to qualify for the contracts for difference that solar and wind farms beyond an output of 5MW use to guarantee stable revenue over the long term. Many groups involved in community projects have reported to an inquiry launched by parliament in November that the financial uncertainty over revenue has made raising finance extremely difficult.
Groups in the sector hope that policy from the Labour government will change as part of the Local Power Plan announced in the Clean Power 2030 strategy published at the end of last year. And though it is the briefest of mentions, an amendment made in the Lords wrote explicit support for community projects into the Great British Energy Bill.
The Local Power Plan aims for 8GW of locally owned renewables by the end of the decade. But it has some issues to sort out to get there. Many groups, including the IET’s policy unit, believe the government needs to bring in more favourable pricing mechanisms to encourage investment. These changes may lead to bigger underlying changes that help with balancing distribution networks by letting groups and firms trade locally without having to go through mainstream energy suppliers.
University of Nottingham researchers worked on the Trent Basin project to show how combining different energy sources and storage could deliver both flexibility and a way of relieving stress on the distribution network. This would be by forming ‘energy bubbles’ or microgrids using a derogation from Ofgem to
allow trading inside the microgrid boundary during the experiment. For larger-scale local trading, Northern PowerGrid has been recruiting projects in its territory in an experiment to see if this could translate to creating community-based distribution systems operators.
Even with more guaranteed income, larger projects must contend with the growing queue for higher-voltage grid connections. One option that the Energy Systems Catapult and others favour is giving community groups priority over comparable commercial projects. Similar competition affects projects at the planning stage. The Supreme Court ruled in 2019 that community benefit should not play a part in the decision-making process of local authorities. Some are now calling for changes to the law to reverse this. Community projects may receive fewer planning objections in any case; however, the Supreme Court ruling came about because of a challenge by a local resident to a community benefit society’s plan for a 500kW wind turbine. Research by Jessica Hogan and colleagues at the University of St Andrews found community ownership and the belief that the local area would gain greater benefits helped to improve acceptance.
of a long-term need to upgrade the network, the government and operators see the ability to shift demand away from peaks as an essential tool for maintaining reliability. As consumers continue to struggle with energy bills and the upfront costs of installing the systems that can bring them down, a renewed focus on community schemes may help accelerate the changes needed – if that translates into consistent support for the initiatives.
derived from decades of experience with the boiler-based district heat networks commonly used in Europe and some parts of the UK.
The team behind NZTS believes the lessons learned as the retrofits progress will be transferrable to other organisations around the country.
Though Ofgem has warned against relying too much on flexibility in the face s as reliabil to strug upfron that ca focus acce that t Mind t rogrid ment. For orthern ng ent to see ating on ed d t the d others groups mmercial
Groups involved in community energy have welcomed the government’s announcement of a £400m fund for low-interest loans for future projects. But the wait for it to begin signals another example of the stop-go policymaking that has led to so many projects stalling over the past decade.
The far smaller Community Energy Fund runs out in May, triggering calls for some kind of interim funding to prevent experts in existing groups from being forced to find other work.
Scaling can also prove an issue because each locale has its own characteristics. This may include harnessing more unusual sources of energy such as tidal or the flow water through underground seams. In 2023, the UK Energy Research Centre noted that district heating networks lack the design guides and codes of practice
Engineering practice Buro Happold, which is consulting on the Bacup build, will compare how the upgraded homes work with similar stock in Bridgend as part of that town’s Heat Pump Ready project. Work with a digital twin of houses in a community in Barcombe, East Sussex, has indicated that energy performance certificates may be too pessimistic when it comes to sizing heat pumps for real-world conditions.
Similarly, groups such as Congleton Hydro and Whitby Esk have exchanged ideas and skills to help maintain their Archimedes screw hydropower generators. Bob Owen, a member of the Congleton group who helped develop the IET’s response to the ongoing parliamentary inquiry into barriers to community energy, says the government could facilitate these exchanges to help other schemes get off the ground.
Amajor challenge facing the UK’s net zero programme is moving the current state of the wired transmission (national) and distribution (local) networks from problem statement to coordinated action plan.
A key moment in this transition will be the publication next year of the UK’s strategic spatial energy plan (SSEP). It will set out a framework for coordinating the development of Great British energy system infrastructure for the next quarter-century. However, some work is already costed, organised and under way.
The transmission network was able to meet the last period of peak demand at 63GW in 2005-06. This number has been falling thanks to various energy-saving initiatives, but the UK now faces steep rises in demand.
The National Infrastructure Commission (NIC) forecasts that demand will rise by 50% between now and 2035 and double by 2050. Relative to the 44GW peak grid demand in 2024, this would represent respective rises to 59GW and then 88GW.
In a paper published in Energy Policy, Ahmed Gailani and Peter Taylor from the University of Leeds took a still stricter view: “Without solving these network constraints, around 65% of industrial sites that are large point sources of emissions would be constrained in terms of electric capacity by 2040.”
Given such forecasts, the government reacquired the part of the National Grid that manages the main network last October, although ownership remains private.
It is now housed in the National Energy System Operator (NESO), charged with developing the SSEP as a more holistic approach to the grid’s upgrades and expansion.
The work on the transmission network is expected to cost £77bn.
There is, however, a further complication. The SSEP will also need to incorporate the lowervoltage distribution networks that deliver power to consumers. Complementary regional energy strategic plans (RESPs) will look more into the local issues and distribution networks.
Transmission networks typically operate in the 275-400kV range; distribution networks have a medium voltage range between 6.633kV to substations and a low voltage range of 240-400V (single and three-phase supply) for consumer and small business supply. High voltages reduce loss over long distance.
The complication is that distribution networks are carrying an increasing amount of the
While electrification marches onwards, it depends on having the infrastructure in place. And our transmission network is struggling to keep pace
energy generated by renewable sources on an ‘embedded’ basis. The NIC says this accounts for 35% of UK generation, up from 15% in 2011.
Widely distributed generation has grown in popularity because renewable installations tend to favour rural and offshore sites some distance from the main grid. But the national grid also faces a major connections backlog.
“The overall capacity of these delayed projects is staggering,” Haush says. “It is estimated that up to 95GW of renewable energy capacity is stuck in the queue, unable to connect to the grid.”
An overarching response was set out by Rishi Sunak’s government in November 2023. The Transmission Acceleration Action Plan calls for cutting the time needed to identify, commission and build new projects from 14 years to seven.
The problems set out above are not exhaustive but are broadly indicative. They illustrate some of the nitty-gritty tasks. These broadly fall into
five categories:
● Coordination
● Skilled workers
● Supply chains
● Permitting
● Resilience.
The Great British transmission network comprises 11,500km of 400kV grid, 9,800km of 275kV grid and 5,250km of 132kV or lower grid. The distribution network is made up of 838,000km of wires, 230,000 substations and 348,000 pole-mounted transformers. The efficient coordination of the work necessary is horrendously complex and being further complicated by the shift to net zero.
Nationally, forecasts can anticipate sources of increased demand that require upgrades or newbuilds. Typical examples cited are heat pumps and electric vehicles.
However, there are also regional ‘pinch points’. As of February, there are an estimated 140 operational data centres to the West of London along the M4 corridor. These already stress the local power supply.
“Future growth in foundational technologies like AI and quantum computing will mean larger-scale, energy-intensive computing infrastructure,” noted National Grid CEO John Pettigrew at last year’s Aurora Spring Forum. “Demand from commercial data centres will increase six-fold, just in the next 10 years.”
Then, there is the ongoing shift to advanced or Industry 4.0 manufacturing, which is again largely being introduced at existing industrial sites.
For Pettigrew, meeting all these demands will require the coordination of a “super-supergrid imposed on the existing supergrid” capable of power transfer in huge bulk between “strategically located ultra-high-capacity substations”.
But the what, where, when and how of the work are up against a ticking clock and skill shortages.
Engineers and technicians are in short supply. The UK needs more project managers too. The Public Accounts Committee did not mince its words last May: “The [Infrastructure and Projects Authority] says that nearly 1,000 accredited project professionals have now passed
Isles
Northern
Scottish
Western
through the government’s major project leadership academy and that it has an ambition to get another 1,000 accredited professionals through the programme by the end of March 2025. However, that is only a small proportion of the 16,000 government project professionals that need to gain accreditation.”
These managers are not just demanded in the energy sector, making competition for staff even more intense. The same applies when it comes to workers with the digital and data expertise needed to plan and manage smart grids.
Excavation workers are also vital for underground cabling as well as the construction of substations. They are subject to a wider shortage of skilled construction workers.
Cable jointers and overhead-line workers play various roles in the installation, maintenance and repair of high-voltage networks. It is an ageing workforce and these trades require lengthy training.
“The UK energy industry’s skills shortage is an urgent concern that requires immediate attention,” says Linda Mason, managing director of specialist recruitment consultant Utility People. “With early retirements, inadequate training and challenges in attracting fresh talent, the sector finds itself at a crossroads.”
February saw construction begin on the first of two submarine Eastern Green Links high-voltage direct current (HVDC) cables running from Torness in south-east
Scotland to Murton in County Durham. It will carry 2GW at a voltage of 525kV from wind farms north of the border. A second cable is planned, linking Peterhead to the Drax Power Station in Yorkshire with an operational target of 2029.
as the UK and other countries battle to decarbonise. Lord Philip Hunt, energy minister, warned in January that highvoltage equipment is subject to delays of up to four years, and low-voltage equipment lead times are at two years. These figures cover elements such as transformers, switchgears and circuit breakers.
NESO’s response is expected to follow the lead of continental rivals by bundling projects into portfolios on the back of longer-term strategic planning to increase confidence among network operators.
As has long been the case for infrastructure, planning permission and other permits are a major contributor to delays. Lowering thresholds for substation footprints, both for new build and upgrades, is one likely solution.
A more radical approach aims to solve the connections backlog.
HVDC is one of the enabling technologies for upgrading the UK’s transmission infrastructure. It has higher capacity than the existing cable, with claims now going as high as a voltage of 1,100kV for an HVDC overhead line project in China.
HVDC is particularly well suited to submarine connections (although at only around half of the voltage of the Chinese overhead line project) from wind farms but also attractive for upgrades of land-based networks. Every network wants some and that again means shortages.
Eastern Green Links has seeded construction of two HVDC cable factories in Scotland. However, cable is not the only critical element suffering from shortages
The 95GW of renewable in the queue appears, at first sight, to be roughly in line with UK targets of 50GW for offshore wind (2024: 17.6GW) and 45-47GW for solar (2024: 8GW), but analysts note the presence of many ‘zombie’ projects – applications that have been made in the hope of connection rather than expectation.
These kinds of applications have been encouraged because connections have primarily been provided on a ‘first come, first served’ basis. The plan is to switch to an approach closer to the kind of ‘shovelready’ criterion applied during post-Covid recovery projects.
There will be three primary criteria: Is the project ready? Does it have planning consent and the land needed?
Is it aligned? Does it meet the conditions of the UK’s Clean Power 2030 Action Plan and its main target of achieving 95% of energy generation from low-carbon sources within the next five years?
Is it consistent with the Strategic Spatial Energy Plan? And its view out to 2050?
Another issue the SSEP will need to address is network resilience.
Readers who would like to find out more about electrical transmission and distribution could visit these upcoming IET events:
28th Conference and Exhibition on Electricity Distribution 16-19 June 2025
Geneva, Switzerland
Energy Security for the Future 2-5 December 2025
Glasgow, UK
At high temperatures, lines sag and capacity drops. The NIC expects there to be more summers like 2024, where temperatures reached 40°C.
Increasingly severe storms are also an issue. January’s Storm Eowyn left 66,000 homes in Scotland without power as gusts reached over 170km/h. After December’s Storm Darragh, some 259,000 homes suffered cuts at its peak, and 60,000 were still waiting for power to be restored on the day after.
Building a network for climate change requires accounting for the effects it is already having.
New transmission lines are now expected to be able to withstand storm gusts of up to 240km/h. Advanced techniques beyond simple strengthening include the use of hightemperature low-sag conductors designed for extreme weather and higher capacity. Operators are also looking to wrap fibre-optic cable around transmission lines to provide real-time monitoring and early fault detection.
The SSEP has a lot of heavy lifting to do, though the scale of the challenge ahead appears to have been exhaustively determined. It’s no longer just about ‘keeping the lights on’; and more about ‘getting a move on’ towards a masterplan that makes 2050 feel much closer than it did yesterday.
overnments all over the world agree that the protection of lives and livelihoods from the massive impacts of climate change demands the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. For that to happen, energy systems must be transformed over time to eliminate the unabated use of fossil fuels. Although that is extremely challenging, the means to do it are available, primarily through wind and solar energy.
In Britain, we’re lucky to have fantastic wind resources and an industry that has proven its ability to deliver wind farm projects with a lower average cost of energy production than new gasfired electricity generation, certainly at current gas prices. Moreover, making more use of low-carbon energy reduces our reliance on an uncertain fossil fuel market – one that has cost the UK taxpayer tens of billions of pounds in recent years to protect energy users from the worst impacts. However, only in certain locations does the availability of space and good wind speeds add up to it being possible to build wind farms. And these are not the places where the existing electricity network was built, most particularly in the 1960s.
If we’re going to make use of cheap energy from wind farms and ensure electricity bills are as low as possible, we’re going to need the network to be developed to access it. (That’s not the only thing we’re going to need to do, though the rest of it is a discussion for another day.)
The IET’s new report on electricity transmission highlights lots of different technologies that could be used, many of them already in use somewhere in Britain’s network. The National Energy System Operator (NESO) responsible for strategic network planning and network owners responsible for detailed design and delivery must evaluate all options. The ‘right answer’ depends on future power needs, current capacity and local conditions such as terrain, land use and natural resources. These factors, along with electrical engineering basics like managing voltages on long AC cables, determine the viability of different solutions.
The first thing the network owners need to do is consider ways of getting the most out of existing network infrastructure. The report outlines options such as using existing overhead line towers – pylons – but with different
conductors that can carry more current than the existing ones without risk of breaching limits for the space that needs to be kept clear underneath the line. Owners also need to check that these conductors won’t exceed the mechanical loading that the towers can handle. Another option, first used more than 30 years ago, is technology that can modify the share of power carried on several parallel routes in order to make full use of the capacity of each individual line.
The amount of additional network capacity that these options can unlock is quite limited and, eventually, it becomes necessary to rebuild the infrastructure in an existing network corridor or make use of a new one. That’s when things can become contentious. Although many opponents of overhead lines argue that lines should be undergrounded, this is not only technically challenging but has its own environmental impacts. It is also, as the new report shows, much more expensive. Energy users would have to bear the brunt of this, contradicting the goal of affordable energy, tackling fuel poverty and boosting British industry’s competitiveness.
Something else the network owners have been doing in the past few years
is building new long-distance capacity offshore. This reduces the need for onshore network capacity but doesn’t eliminate it as it’s still needed to reach the places where energy is used. It’s also expensive.
The decision-making on which network option is the right one for any given set of
circumstances isn’t easy, with lots of dimensions to consider.
The report shows a summary finding that, on average, it costs between four and five times more to move each MW of power over each km of distance using AC underground cables than overhead lines, more than five times more to do so using high-voltage direct current (HVDC) subsea cables between two locations in the onshore transmission network, and more than 10 times more ffshore HVDC network that connects multiple locations. However, the actual ratio depends on the context and the relative impacts of fixed costs to connect new infrastructure into the existing network and the costs that vary with the length of a new or rebuilt route. The report provides a large set of examples of such effects with different technologies, capacity additions and distances.
There is pressure to get on with the necessary investment in the electricity system: the sooner we can get access to cheap low-carbon energy, the more benefit we can gain from it. However, the infrastructure development decisions that are taken need to have legitimacy: all stakeholders – people living and working local to a development and those who need to pay for it – need to be confident that their views are being heard and all options evaluated correctly.
The new report – the product of lengthy, independent research – is intended to give everyone access to information they can trust. It won’t tell you ‘the right answer’ in any given circumstance and it needs to be used in the right way, but it will tell you a lot of the things that need to be taken into consideration.
The report can be viewed here: b.link/IET-transmission-report
NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that the Annual General Meeting of the Institution of Engineering and Technology will be held on Thursday, 19 June 2025 at 2.00 pm (BST) at the Institution of Engineering and Technology, Austin Court, 80 Cambridge Street, Birmingham B1 2NP, United Kingdom, for the following purposes:
1.To receive the minutes of the previous meeting.
2.To receive a report from the President on the Institution’s achievements in the previous year and its plans for the future.
3.To receive a report from Council.
To receive and consider the Trustees Report and Financial Statements for the year ended 31 December 2024.
To approve auditors for 202
Vote of thanks to:
The honorary officers and members of all Institution Boards and Committees; The staff of the Institution
By order of the Board of Trustees Ed Almond, Chief Executive and Secretary 14 March 2025
theiet.org/about/governance/annual-reports
NOTES: The event will be held as a live webcast. The meeting does not have the power to accept or reject the Trustees Report and Financial Statements. Copies of the Trustees Report and Financial Statements will be available on the IET website approximately 14 days before the date of the meeting.
ith the US floating a multi-billion dollar deal to gain access to Ukraine’s precious mined resources – an agreement that may help advance the end of Russia’s war – the strategic global importance of critical minerals has arguably never been more clearly demonstrated.
Critical minerals – a set of metals and other raw materials needed for the production of various high-tech products (see What are critical minerals?) – are particularly important for the green energy transition as nations retool to tackle climate breakdown and move away from fossil fuels.
Elements including copper, cobalt, lithium and nickel are needed in the electrification of power networks, industry and transport, and required for the manufacture of wind turbines, solar panels and batteries for grid storage and electric vehicles (EVs).
Geopolitical competition for access to critical minerals has soared in recent years, increasing their value. According to the latest figures from the International Energy Agency (IEA), the market for energy transition minerals reached £320bn in 2022, double its value five years earlier. Demand is expected to triple by 2040 if climate pledges are met in full.
Critical minerals are abundant in the Earth’s crust. However, the dominance of certain countries in their mining and processing – most notably China – and reliance on illegal, unsafe or unenvironmental practices has left Western
democracies scrambling to find new ways to bolster their supplies and keep clean energy commitments within reach.
The paradigm shift is fuelling efforts to open up new mines, identify alternative, less damaging forms of extraction, and invest in innovations designed to either substitute critical minerals or boost their reuse and recycling.
Professor David Knowles, chief executive of the Henry Royce Institute, tells E+T: “Governments and decisionmakers are starting to take this issue seriously – they recognise that a move away from critical materials is a way of de-risking the process … The biggest challenge is transforming materials innovations into investable technologies so it becomes clear to the investment community that they represent a commercial opportunity.”
Many countries have adopted strategies to decarbonise energy by shifting electricity generation towards zeroemission sources and electrifying various sectors. But the move to clean energy involves another environmentally tricky proposition: the switch from a fuelintensive to a material-intensive system.
Solar photovoltaic (PV) arrays and wind farms do not require fuel to operate, but they generally require more materials –including harder-to-find critical minerals and rare earths – to construct than polluting power stations. According to the IEA, an onshore wind plant requires nine times more mineral resources than a gasfired plant of the same capacity, while a
typical electric car requires six times the mineral inputs of a conventional car. With deployments of low-carbon tech on the increase, decision-makers are increasingly concerned that certain critical minerals may become harder to source, putting climate targets in jeopardy.
Minerals including lithium, cobalt and nickel and rare earth metals such as neodymium, dysprosium and copper are vital for the production of energy storage systems, efficient electric motors and renewable energy infrastructure.
Yet according to projections by the IEA,
Critical minerals will underpin the global clean energy transition, but the threat of constraints on supply is forcing investment and research into new and alternative forms of extraction
confirmed supplies of copper are only sufficient to meet 70% of global demand by 2035, while lithium supplies can only meet 50% of demand in that timeframe.
A 2023 study of material scarcity related to wind energy found that demand for glass fibre, nickel and rare earth elements could be so high that, without increased production, competition for access to them will escalate.
A major challenge in satisfying the world’s hunger for critical materials is the geographical concentration of mining and processing operations. This narrowing
of supply exposes global markets and supply chains when there are disruptions such as trade conflicts, wars or political instability, increasing geopolitical risks.
China has spread itself “across the periodic table because they’ve been very strategic and built up global positions in a whole range of different metals and minerals, not just in mining, but in refining through to the manufacturing”, explains Gavin Mudd, director of the Critical Mineral Intelligence Centre.
A major concern is the level of control China exerts beyond its borders, he
says. “Australia is responsible for over 50% of world lithium production and Indonesia around 50% of world nickel production, but the vast majority of that is Chinese money … China also takes cobalt concentrates out of places like the Congo then refines it to bring into its manufacturing ecosystem.”
Geopolitical factors aside, reports of unsustainable and inhumane material extraction practices at large-scale mining operations further undermine
confidence in the sector and demand a rethink of supply. The EU is also under mounting pressure to suspend a controversial minerals deal with Rwanda blamed for fuelling the conflict in the east of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
A 2019 Business and Human Rights Resource Centre report found that 20 out of 23 of the largest companies mining key minerals essential to renewable energy had faced allegations of human rights abuses including violence and death.
According to Tom Streather, technical director for social performance at Mott MacDonald, human rights considerations are increasingly taking centre stage in decision-making at energy network operators, utilities and financiers involved in energy transition projects. This is supported by evolving regulation and ESG guidance, such as EU Regulation 2017/821, which sets out supply chain due diligence obligations for EU importers of tin, tantalum, tungsten and gold originating from conflict-affected and high-risk areas.
“Dependency on equipment and materials for the transition to renewable generation and electrified networks often ties us to regions with poor human rights records, which includes the significant amounts of copper needed for distribution networks and other critical minerals for wind turbines and solar PV panels, which have been known to be mined using forced and child labour,” says Streather. “In response, companies are taking action to increase transparency.”
This transparency should raise standards, but could exacerbate interim shortages as organisations realign.
Dr Arjan Dijkstra, assistant professor in earth materials at the University of Twente
Source: iea.org
in the Netherlands, tells E+T: “If we don’t want to buy from those countries anymore, we don’t have a lot of alternatives at the moment and that leads to scarcity.”
Western democracies may have been complacent, becoming dependent on dubious critical mineral imports, but work is underway to rectify that situation and diversify import sources.
Geological investigations have revealed significant untapped resources covering most metals and minerals needed for the energy transition in Finland, Norway, Sweden and Greenland. Finland is the most promising in the short term due to its streamlined permitting process and a national strategy to expand extraction of lithium, nickel, cobalt and graphite.
Last summer, the EU trumpeted plans to reopen one of Europe’s largest lithium
What are critical minerals?
Critical minerals are metals and other raw materials needed for the production of high-tech products, particularly those associated with the green energy transition.
Lists of critical minerals vary from country to country, based on local domestic and geopolitical objectives. For example, a 2023
list of critical materials drawn up by the US Department of Energy includes 18 materials considered critical for energy technology, among them aluminium, cobalt, copper, dysprosium, iridium, lithium and neodymium.
Rare earth elements are a subset of 17 chemical elements,
mines – a crucial material for EV batteries – in Serbia’s Jadar Valley. However, activists claim the move will cause irreversible environmental destruction.
Mining has a poor reputation in Europe, and its lack of popularity with the public and planners is making the establishment of new mining operations difficult. The EU’s Critical Raw Materials Act aims to address this issue and bolster supplies by requiring the fast-tracking of mining permits for new projects, with less room for public objection.
Sensitivity around new mining operations has led to a focus on exploring alternative projects that recover critical materials as a byproduct of existing
several of which are vital for the energy transition. Neodymium, praseodymium, dysprosium and terbium are key to the production of permanent magnets used in electric vehicles and wind turbines. Yttrium and scandium are used for certain types of hydrogen electrolysers, while
europium is used in nuclear power station control rods.
Most of the rare earth elements are not in fact rare, but their extraction and refining is notoriously difficult and environmentally highly destructive so production is concentrated in very few places, mainly China.
mining or industrial processes. Salty water brines associated with geothermal power plants can contain high concentrations of lithium and several projects in Europe are looking at how to optimise extraction.
In the UK, Cornish Lithium’s Trelavour Hard Rock project is aiming to produce 10,000 tonnes of sustainable domestic lithium a year by 2027 using acid to extract the element from granite, as opposed to the fossil fuel roasting method commonly used by China.
Reliance on critical minerals can be reduced through the development of innovative substitute materials for products and systems. The National Materials Innovation Strategy, published by the Henry Royce Institute to guide future UK government decision-making, highlights opportunities to develop a range of new materials in the switch to decarbonised energy.
Next generation battery chemistries needed to run EVs and store energy to increase grid capacity include postlithium-ion cells based on sodium ion, solid state and lithium-sulfur. “At the moment, it’s about moving to solutions like sulfur ions and sodium ions – a gradual reduction in cobalt is key,” says Knowles.
Copper is vital for electricity generation, storage and transmission, and more will be mined over the next decade than was extracted in the whole of the last century. Scientists say this will have enormous environmental consequences, principally because mining uses acids that poison rivers, contaminate soil and pollute the air.
The newly established Rio Tinto Centre for Future Materials, based at Imperial College London, has $150m of funding for its first 10 years of operation with an initial challenge being to find sustainable new ways to extract and recycle copper. The centre plans to turn its attention to other energy transition materials in future.
According to the university, research efforts will explore how to extract copper from fluids in the Earth’s crust, utilise micro-organisms to harvest metals from
Solar PV is set to become the dominant global power source by 2050 and materials innovation could boost energy harvesting efficiency while reducing reliance on China’s silicon-based systems. These include perovskites, a hybrid organic-inorganic lead or tin halide-based material used as the light-harvesting active layer in panels.
Alongside investment in extraction and alternatives to critical minerals, reuse and recycling can create a valuable secondary supply source to enhance the security of supply. According to figures from the IEA, successfully scaling-up recycling could lower the need for new mining activity by 25-40% by 2050 in a scenario where national climate pledges are met.
Although EV batteries are not yet available for recycling at scale, because most cells have not expired, global recycling capacity is increasing rapidly. In Europe, recycled batteries are projected to meet about 30% of the region’s lithium
rocks with minimal copper content and optimise waste recovery from old mining sites. Mining copper typically involves extracting it from minerals that have crystallised out of very saline, copperrich brines, a process that requires huge amounts of energy.
To get around this issue, the centre and its partners have been looking at underground geothermal sites where copper-rich brines are created by volcanic systems.
Speaking to The Guardian, Professor Matthew Jackson, chair in geological fluid dynamics at Imperial College, said: “That means we can extract the copper by pumping the brines to the surface via boreholes – which is relatively easy – and also use local energy to power the mine itself and possibly provide excess energy for nearby communities.”
and nickel demand by 2050, based on announced pledges, which is notably higher than the global average of around 20%.
However, recycling still presents challenges. Lithium iron phosphate cathodes have gained a significant market share from nickel-based chemistries in recent years. According to the IEA, the associated lower material value impacts recycling economics. This underscores the need for new business models and regulations to prevent batteries from ending up in landfill.
As global efforts to cut carbon emissions intensify, and demand for critical minerals rises significantly, recycling represents a key challenge for authorities to grapple with as they strive for more responsible and sustainable approaches. Society needs clean energy solutions well in advance of 2050 to keep climate targets within reach, so decisions made today will be fundamental to all our futures.
The UK automotive industry now has until 2030 to reach government zero-carbon targets
Ministers bring forward the ban on the sale of new petrol and diesel vehicles by five years; government investment for electric vehicle (EV) charging infrastructure and batteries announced in budget; huge increases in required battery capacity predicted by 2040. The UK automotive industry’s race towards a zero-carbon 2030 is underway. But with numbers of people driving EVs still below the required amount, what’s needed, now and next, if the UK is to meet its zero-carbon targets?
Government waved the chequered flag on 17 September last year, when ministers scrapped the previous 2035 deadline for banning the sale of new vehicles powered solely by petrol and diesel and announced £88m funding for new zero-emission vehicle (ZEV) technologies. Now, 80% of new cars and 70% of new vans sold in the UK must be ZEVs by 2030, 100% by 2035. Towards the end of 2024, ministers also promised a review of the controversial ZEV mandate, under which vehicle manufacturers must sell a minimum of 22% EVs in 2024, or face fines of £15,000 for every extra non-EV sold.
Lots of promises, lots of plans, but if the UK automotive industry is to reach its 2030 targets, what’s needed now is action. And according to Ade Thomas, founder of the annual World EV Day summit, the engineering and technology emphasis needs to shift away from EVs themselves, and on to charging.
“UK consumers already have around 300 EV models to choose from,” he says. “What we need now are technologies that make electric vehicle charging quicker and more reliable.”
Last year, McKinsey reported that 42% of prospective EV buyers worldwide want to see as many EV chargepoints as there are petrol stations, and charging times of less than 30 minutes, before they would consider making the switch to electric. As of October 2024, the UK has 36,000 charging locations, with around
71,500 devices (14,000 rapid or ultra-rapid chargers) and 109,000 connectors, according to Zapmap.
Despite this, a Vauxhall study found that only 19% of UK households with EVs are close enough to a public chargepoint. Driver concern over the lack of charging infrastructure is a major reason why sales of new EVs will miss the government’s 2025 target of 28%, according to an Auto Trader report published last December. Two weeks later, the National Audit Office tried to ease concerns by announcing that the UK is on track to install 300,000 chargepoints by 2030. But the spending watchdog also warned that under current plans large areas of the country could miss out on the chargepoints needed, particularly in areas outside London and the South East. “The challenge now is to get the charging system to work seamlessly and simply,” Thomas says.
The time it takes to charge an EV depends on the size of the battery and the power the charger is putting out. Non-rapid charging (up to 50kW) takes between six and 12 hours, rapid charging (50-100kW) from 30-60 minutes, and ultra-rapid (typically 150kW, but up to 350kW) 15-30 minutes.
Three new 480kW EV chargers were installed in a Blackpool filling station last September – at the time, the UK’s fastest chargers. Each can fully charge a vehicle in 17 minutes, depending on the make and model. Tesla’s superchargers offer up to 500kW. But in March, Chinese EV maker BYD unveiled a 1,000kW system allowing two new models to travel 400km on a fiveminute charge.
Unfortunately, most EVs can’t use these ultra-fast chargepoints. “It's to do with the voltage system architecture,” Thomas says. “A 400V architecture EV might max out at around 150kW, while an 800V EV could potentially handle charging rates of up to 360kW or more. Higher-voltage systems, like those in Tesla's Cybertruck or the Porsche Taycan, can accept faster charging rates.”
A 2024 Faraday Institution report suggested that the UK battery industry would need six gigafactories by 2030, and 10 by 2040, to meet the demand for EVs. These large-scale battery manufacturing facilities would need to produce 20GW a year. However, from 2031 vehicle batteries sold in the EU, the UK’s largest overseas market, must contain specific amounts of recycled content: 6% minimum for lithium and nickel, 16% cobalt, rising to 12%, 15% and 26%, respectively, for these minerals in 2036.
Before this, the EU will introduce compulsory EV battery passports for any new vehicles sold in member states. The passport, to be introduced in 2027, must include details on the origins of the battery’s raw materials, how much of the battery is recycled and its lifestyle carbon footprint. Mining and refining companies, recycling, battery production and component manufacturing will be required by law to declare their practices. In addition, the documents will make supply chain information publicly available.
The automotive industry, of course, has an abundant supply of batteries. For large-scale recycling, the issue is collecting them. In the UK, Nissan is working with battery recycling experts Ecobat to find new ways of recovering, recycling and repurposing batteries from Nissan Leafs no longer
on the road. British recycling firm Altilium and Jaguar Land Rover plan to build and test battery cells made from old Jaguar i-Pace EVs. Last October, the UK’s first battery recycling plant opened in Plymouth.
Liana Cipcigan, professor of transport electrification and smart grids at Cardiff University, explains that large-scale battery collection could also help develop greener chargepoints. “Before old vehicle batteries are recycled for raw materials, they can be reused for several years as stationary storage in chargepoints and to store power in homes and offices,” she says. “The batteries are glued together and could be used with solar power to collect and store energy in the day and provide charge in the evenings.”
Cipcigan, who is also co-lead at the Clean Energy and Equitable Transport Solutions NSF-UKRI Global Center (CLEETS), adds: “Extracting materials from old batteries at the end of their life, for use in new batteries, means less reliance on imported chemicals from China.”
There are three main reasons Western battery manufacturers would like to be self-sufficient. First, the existing supply chain is fragile, and could easily be disrupted by conflict with key supplying countries, or if they decide to impose trade tariffs or export controls. Second, mining companies in mineral-rich countries are often accused of human rights abuses, damaging the environment and creating high-carbon emissions. Most significantly, though, is a growing realisation that battery manufacturing is quickly becoming a major money-spinner. According to data analytics experts MarkNtel, the global EV battery market will be worth $495.6bn by 2030 – four times the market’s 2023 value. Last year’s Faraday report claimed that a British battery-making industry could create 270,000 jobs by 2040.
640 Northern Ireland
How many charging points are rapid or ultra-rapid?
The majority of chargepoints installed are low-powered devices, mainly under 8kW, which are typically found on streets, in car parks, at hotels or at other destinations. For the rapid and ultra-rapid chargers, the key trend is the shift towards higher-powered 150kW+ ultra-rapid chargers. As of February 2025, there are 15,109 rapid or ultra-rapid charging devices across 5,850 charging locations in the UK. The power bands used are in line with the government’s new Public Charge Point Regulations. Rapid chargers are from 50kW to 149kW and ultra-rapid chargepoints from 150kW+.
Public charging points by region, as of February 2025
6,592 Scotland
Growth of number of public charging points in the UK
2,391 North East
5,102 North West
3,234 Wales
Between February 2024 and February 2025, the public network has grown by 32%.
Source: zap-map.com
3,836 Yorkshire and the Humber
6,649 West Midlands
5,517 South West
3,245 East Midlands
5,661 East of England
9,579 South East
23,008 Greater London
Some of the UK government’s £88m zero-emission funding will be spent on designing new battery technologies. Of particular interest are lithium-sulfur batteries – low-cost alternatives to lithium-ion – which, experts believe, can drastically reduce charging times.
Sulfur is more abundant in the Earth’s crust than nickel and cobalt. It’s also a by-product of natural gas processing and oil refining. The US produced 8.6 million metric tons in 2023 and Canada 4.9 million, although China is still the leading sulfur producer, with 19 million metric tons in 2023.
Lithium-sulfur batteries were first designed in the 1960s, but they were deemed unsuitable for EVs as the sulfur inside the batteries tends to degrade and short-circuit the battery after a limited number of charge cycles. Recent advancements in materials technology could solve this problem – for example, coatings that prevent polysulfides from corroding the electrodes. UK firm Molyon, which received government funding last September, has created cathode technology that it claims stabilises the sulfur, enabling batteries to perform reliably over hundreds of charging cycles.
Theion, Stellantis and LG Energy Solutions are also using UK government funding to examine ways of making lithium-sulfur batteries work for EVs.
Silicon Valley start-up Lyten plans to build the world's first lithium-sulfur gigafactory in Reno, Nevada. Lyten executives have stated that its batteries
will be 40% lighter than a lithium-ion battery, and cheaper to manufacture due to minerals being sourced locally. The factory is set to open in 2027.
Confident drivers?
Ade Thomas says that the UK government’s commitment to the new 2030 zero-carbon deadline has given the industry the confidence boost it needs to move forward. Now he believes it’s time to build similar confidence in drivers.
“The first 15% of people who bought EVs were tech evangelists, people who
like complexities and enjoy solving problems,” Thomas says. “Now we need to convince ordinary people to buy electric. These people don’t like problems, don’t want complexities; they just want the technology to work.”
Financial incentives for buyers would be a start. Last December, William Brown, UK and Ireland MD at International Motors, called for the return of government subsidies, which he thinks should be paid for by taxing petrol and diesel cars. Ford’s UK boss Lisa Brankin thinks grants should be between £2,000 and £5,000 and has also called for VAT cuts on EVs. Towards the end of 2024, ministers were also considering cheaper car finance for EV buyers and scrapping the luxury car tax on EVs. Thomas would also like to see means-tested grants for people on lower incomes. “Previous incentives have been for people who are already rich,” he says.
The UK automotive industry is well on its way towards a zero-carbon 2030. This doesn’t mean, though, that the internal combustion lobby has given up the race.
Last November, Auto Trader, Charge UK and the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders felt compelled to publish a series of facts to combat EV misinformation, in particular relating to lack of range, manufacturing emissions and fire risks.
Across the Atlantic, in April President Donald Trump imposed 25% tariffs on imported vehicles to protect US vehicle manufacturers. Trump has also pledged to support the US gasoline industry by ending government subsidies for EV buyers and scrapping the previous administration’s plans to make 67% of US vehicles electric by 2032. The US is the UK’s largest vehicle export market after the EU. Chancellor Rachel Reeves has said that the UK government will make strong representations to the Trump administration about the benefits of free trade between the two countries. Thomas believes that a massive consumer campaign is needed to show people the benefits of switching to EVs.
“Electric cars are just much better technology, 21st-century technology, whereas the internal combustion engine is from the 19th century,” he says. “We need to do much more to show people this.”
GOPINION FROM THE IET: FAROOQ YAQUB
Farooq
rowing up, many people warmly remember the freedom of learning to ride a bicycle and travelling longer distances. This feeling of excitement, especially coasting downhill, doesn’t fade as we get older; it simply shifts gears or changes lane. Think of car enthusiasts who develop a desire for performance, from hot hatches to supercars. While European and global legislation pushes for electric vehicles (EVs), manufacturers often miss a key question, drowned in shortterm financial obligations: what do customers really want?
Different consumers have different priorities. It’s crucial for product positioning to align with the target audience, from a small city car to an off-road adventure and everything in between. Porsche, a niche sports car manufacturer, understands this and more specifically what its customers want. It’s pivoting its strategy and reinvesting in engine technology, despite facing potential penalties in several countries for its powertrain choices. But most car owners aren’t the typical sports car enthusiasts. For them, vehicles aren’t about thrills.
, automotive and mobility expert, chartered engineer and member of the IET’s Council
They’re focused on practicality and convenience, not the roar of an engine. This is where connectivity and in-cabin technology come in. These features make EVs not just efficient but uniquely appealing. Instead of a rumbling engine, the quiet, smooth EV ride creates a calm, tech-focused environment that is ideal for modern commuting. A 2021 McKinsey article, ‘The new key to automotive success: put customer experience in the driver’s seat’ by Volker Grüntges, Alexander Matthey, Florian Peter and Jakob Stöber, builds on the customer experience narrative and highlights this shift from engineering-driven design to data-enriched customer experiences.
Charging infrastructure remains a challenge for EV adoption, impacting car companies’ ability to develop and sell them at scale. To succeed, we need a focus on charging infrastructure and subsidies and incentives for EVs to make the transition viable. Multimodal travel – common in cities where people use various transportation methods – is often overlooked in EV discussions, but is potentially key to unlocking new revenue models. With advancements in autonomous vehicles,
there are opportunities to make EVs more convenient, potentially boosting adoption. There are currently legislation challenges associated to deploying autonomous vehicles ‘in the wild’ – but imagine an on-call EV that drives away when not needed and returns charged, or even incorporating an alternative revenue model to have access to a vehicle on a subscription basis. This is a compelling vision for the future that we could be close to realising.
The desire for efficient, enjoyable personal travel remains a constant, yet the way we achieve it is evolving. While the appeal of high-performance combustion engines persists for a niche segment, the future of mobility for the masses lies in understanding and addressing the needs of everyday drivers and leveraging technological advancement. EVs, enhanced by smart technologies and seamless integration with other modes of transport, offer a compelling path forward. By prioritising customer experience, investing in robust charging infrastructure and embracing the potential of autonomous driving, we can accelerate the transition to a cleaner, more convenient and ultimately more convincing transportation future.
It is a painful clip to watch – an elegant swan in flight collides with the highest wire strung above power cables and sinks to earth in a tangle of bent and broken feathers.
In another incident caught on video, a startled white-tailed eagle crashes into overhead cables and drops like a stone after a sudden flash.
Singed feathers and tell-tale burns can reveal how a bird died, but if these incidents had not been filmed they might have passed unremarked. In the UK and across most of the world, no one is required to count the millions of birds that crash into or are electrocuted by live overhead wires spanning the countryside. Eagles, storks, bustards, vultures and other endangered species – not to mention hapless crows, pigeons,
starlings and magpies – meet their death on power lines, and there is currently no UK policy to deal with this.
Millions of animals and birds die every year on the energised grid, says Brian McGowan of consultancy Scientias Energy, and utilities only take note if wildlife causes a measurable service interruption.
Up to 2.8 million birds in Germany alone collide with the country’s 60,000km of high-voltage power cables each year, says conservationist association NABU. Without action, these numbers will only grow as the grid expands to supply electricity, the lifeblood of the green economy.
By 2050, electricity consumption in the UK and US is forecast to more than double. By 2030 the UK will need nearly 620 miles (1,000km) of new transmission lines, and many more of supporting
distribution lines to meet targets to decarbonise. Twice the number of pylons and transmission cables must be installed in the next five years as in the last decade – doubling the energy from onshore wind and trebling it from solar farms in the same time.
“The grid hasn’t had an upgrade in a long time. It isn’t fit for purpose for the renewable energy that we need – we accept that. Addressing climate is critical to addressing the nature crisis,” says Isobel Morris, a senior energy policy officer at the RSPB who previously worked in renewable energy. Today, it is an often-acknowledged paradox – clean energy infrastructure, essential for tackling emissions, can also be deadly for the natural world.
But who is looking out for the birds?
Photography: Alamy
“To a bird, a collision is brutal – it’s like a car crash,” says McGowan, an expert in protecting energy assets from wildlife. Most incidents, he says, are avoidable. With the right technology, he believes 98% of electrocutions and 70-90% of collisions could be averted. Of European countries, Spain is probably the most advanced at tracking bird deaths and subsequent power cuts – but not on a par with the US, where it is illegal to kill protected birds, enforcement is strong and authorities have charged North American utilities $10m for killing eagles.
“We [in the UK and EU] have directives but weak and inconsistent enforcement,” says McGowan. “Let’s not wait for the next best thing – we have to use the best available technology today to support the green revolution.”
Across most of the African continent, where millions of birds migrate each year, there is very little monitoring of bird deaths from contact with power lines, say NGOs. Sometimes the flaming body of an electrocuted creature falls and triggers a wildfire – as in California, where a lively squirrel was blamed for a power outage for some 45,000 residents. Two fires at the same Californian substation cost an estimated $1.5m in one year alone.
In the UK, a National Grid report estimated animals and wildlife cost electricity transmission and distribution companies about £10m or more a year back in 2019 – not only from bird collisions but other interactions such as cattle rubbing against pylons and poles.
In central Scotland back in 2020, village residents were puzzled by
mysterious power outages – until an engineer spotted starlings in their thousands landing and taking off from power lines, causing them to bounce, and tripping the power. Wires, poles and pylons are natural places for birds to perch and roost, says Morris – particularly amid a dearth of trees across arable land.
Bats, squirrels and pine martens all meet their deaths on wires too. While NGOs are more concerned about endangered species, even common crows can wreak havoc as temperatures rise and summer wildfires become more likely. Any decline in scavenging birds –the clean-up workers of the natural world – could upset ecosystems, says Manon Quetstroey, manager of energy and nature at the Renewable Grid Initiative
Millions of birds are dying every year – what can we do to protect them from the growing electrical network?
the which runs until bird nd of rare r threat s, tion avelling
(RGI) in Europe. She leads the Europeanfunded SafeLines4Birds, which runs until 2028. This project aims to prevent bird deaths from power lines and campaigns for 13 species of rare birds, including birds under threat in the UK such as lapwings, curlews and Bewick’s swans.
In Australia the distribution network contends with possums travelling along power lines, once causing the lights to go off in some 12,000 homes in Sydney. But birds are more prone. “Birds don’t know boundaries,” says Quetstroey. Some 50% of all bird species migrate every year, and this means billions flocking to the skies, often travelling through windy corridors and channels. Flight paths are natural locations for wind farms, and power lines encroach upon seasonal migration routes. “It’s critical to have national and crossborder collaboration in efforts to protect wildlife and maintain system reliability,” says McGowan. “Small local projects here and there are not enough.”
Flight diversions
ydney “Birds ays
Birds have famously good vision, so why can’t they see power lines? They see the world differently, says McGowan. Many birds have poor vision in the direction of travel – eyes on the side of the head are better for foraging up close, for instance. Larger birds such as geese, swans and bustards are less agile than smaller birds and raptors and cannot always avoid a collision in time. Large flocks and birds at the back are more likely to collide with lines. And while birds of prey can spot a mouse from afar, this downwards laser focus might come at the expense of what is in front of them. Birds such as waterfowl, which are active at dawn and dusk, are more prone to collisions, while larger winged raptors are more likely to be electrocuted. Weather also plays a role. Migrating flocks typically fly above power lines, but on foggy, wet or windy days they will try to fly beneath the clouds. “These bring them down into the ‘kill’ zone, to the level of conductors – and then they’re in trouble,” says McGowan. Studies show
Endangered
thatbirdsaremorelikely to collide
that birds are more likely to collide with the lighting ground wire on transmission lines than the more visible live parts.
It is the wingspan of larger raptors, storks and cranes that makes them vulnerable as they roost, perch or hang on energy infrastructure. A large bird stretching its wings has a higher risk of creating a circuit (phase to phase or phase to ground). Over time, a build-up of conductive bird guano (excrement) on insulators can cause them to flash over or even electrocute the birds as they deposit, which they typically do when leaving their perch. Some birds even nest among the spikes put upon poles and pylons to deter them, and many are electrocuted as they touch uninsulated components.
So what can be done? There’s a growing awareness that biodiversity and conservation of wildlife should feature in new infrastructure before it gets off the ground.
A preferred option is to avoid overhead lines and wind parks in important wildlife areas such as wetlands or busy migratory routes by re-routing them or putting them underground. “Undergrounding is the best solution of all, but it’s very costly,” says Quetstroey, “and not possible everywhere – you can’t bury a cable on a mountain, for instance.” It is a solution favoured in parts of Europe such as Austria and France. But it is also disruptive – 14 times as much earth is moved to install cables underground as overhead. “But anywhere high-risk for birds we’d want to see [it] put underground,” says Morris.
A next best approach to avoid electrocution is to insulate the lines
completely or redesign them to allow enough clearance for wildlife, and these steps are best taken at the design stage. For existing infrastructure, a combination of insulation, barriers and diversion will help cut the risks of wildlife interaction. Most power interruptions in the UK from wildlife occur in substations and on pole-mounted transformers – the best approach here is to retrofit insulation on live components.
Half of all bird species can see UV light, and researchers in the US have investigated whether directing ultraviolet light onto wires is effective. Suspending bird flight diverters – spirals, balls and flaps – on the lines makes them more visible, says McGowan. This is the traditional approach to avoid overhead line collisions. These devices incorporate UV and light-reflective surfaces to be more visible.
Today drones are used widely – they can install up to 400 units in a day, cutting costs and improving safety. But how long they last varies, says McGowan. Utilities should choose with local environmental
conditions in mind. Whether high or low voltage, DC or AC, all overhead live components threaten wildlife.
“If you’ve got a conductor in the air in the wrong place, it’s a risk,” he says.
When farmers at a Northumberland farm began to notice the bodies of curlews and black grouse beneath power lines, Northern Powergrid installed some 25 diverters on the line. Although this worked over this patch of farmland, the range of these birds extends far beyond this spot. Diverters should be installed more widely, as in the US, but there is little appetite or budget in the UK, says McGowan.
If he had his way, all new overhead distribution lines would be insulated, but existing lines are costly to retrofit. As for the ageing poles and pylons of existing grids, sturdier and more extensive insulation around the live components where birds perch could pay for itself in the prevention of fires and outages.
If only all grid projects entered the world with a sympathetic approach to nature, says Battaglini. “It’s expensive to undertake nature protection, but these are not costs, these are investments – if you don’t do them, you will have huge costs in the future.”
By including wildlife corridors beneath pylons and sensitive planting, sites can even improve biodiversity. In Hungary, campaigners collaborated with the government to encourage electricity providers to fit better insulation and design new poles, dramatically cutting bird deaths among rare falcons and eagles.
Meanwhile, a collection of UK network operators has embarked upon efforts to understand how to prevent the risk of deaths from wildlife and overhead networks, and a follow-up report is anticipated. It will not come a moment too soon, say campaigners.
“We support the renewables rollout,” says Morris. “We know it needs to be done very, very fast. But we want it to be done in a way that is nature-friendly – and a big part of that prioritises avoiding areas that are sensitive for nature.”
It is the speed at which statuesque offshore wind turbines turn that catches birds unaware – with diameters the size of more than two football pitches, some can spin at 290km/h at the tips.
Every year an estimated five million birds and bats are killed by more than 341,000 turbines worldwide. With many more planned, turbines have been getting ever taller.
In Norway, South Africa and the Netherlands, researchers are investigating whether painting red or black stripes on turbine blades to break motion blur is effective as a relatively cheap and effective deterrent.
New AI-enabled bird protection technology is now widely used in the airspace around wind farms. These systems use high-resolution cameras to detect objects within 1,000 metres of the turbines.
Machine learning and IoT can identify the bird species, flight speed
and trajectory, and recognise if the bird is on a collision path before taking action. Some companies use bright strobe light and sirens – if these do not work, the software can temporarily slow or stop the turbines as the birds pass by.
Polish company Bioseco has now installed its bird protection systems in wind farms around Europe, the US and Canada.
Data on passing birds is collected for science, say the Bioseco founders, and the tech can be fitted on existing turbines. Ultimately, it could also ease the way for environmental permits for new wind farms in sensitive areas.
The success of these systems depends on the species, environment and topography, but they have cut bird deaths by more than 85%, although they are less effective at night or in fog. Researchers are now trying to improve AI recognition of smaller species.
Researchers in the UK have built a ‘diamond battery’ that could power devices forever – but how did they do it, and what will it be useful for?
WORDS HEIDI VELLA
t was 2015 and Neil Fox, a professor of materials for energy at the University of Bristol, UK, had been drafted along with his colleague Professor Tom Scott to assist with the decommissioning of graphite core reactors at the UK’s Magnox fleet. The Nuclear Decommissioning Authority wanted to know how much carbon-14 – a long-lived isotope – was present. At the time, Fox and Scott were developing diamond radiation detectors for CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, that could help them find out.
As their work progressed, the duo noticed something strange: the detectors were recording a radiation signal, even when switched off. “Somehow,” explains Fox, “the radiation sensed from the cores was causing the detectors to switch on.”
This was their lightbulb moment. They started to wonder: what if the carbon-14 within the nuclear waste could be extracted and harvested for its energy, instead of being buried in a repository costing billions of pounds?
Having had this realisation, Fox says they decided to get working on developing a new diamond-based nuclear battery – one that would be ‘carbon on carbon’ [diamond and carbon-14] and last for thousands of years, given the isotope’s 5,700-year half-life.
Adapting the diamond recipe
Nuclear batteries – devices that harness energy from a decaying radioactive isotope to generate electricity – are not new. They are mostly voltage devices that work like solar cells, meaning output is governed by the voltage applied across their input terminals, except they are harvesting radiation from a radioisotope instead of sunlight. The most notable example is radioisotope thermoelectric generators (RTGs) that power various Mars rovers using plutonium.
These devices, however, can experience high levels of loss because the energy source is outside the device. Therefore, for their solution, Fox and his team endeavoured to place the radioisotope within a diamond casing – something that had never been done before.
Diamond beta-batteries from Arkenlight are based on a diode: a semiconductor device with a p–n junction and two electrode terminals, the anode and cathode, sandwiching the device (see cross-section below). A layer buried within the structure contains all the radioactivity. The ‘normal’ diamond on either side of this layer provides containment of the radioactivity as well as performing an electronic role in converting the beta energy to electrical current.
“At a stroke, you eliminate this massive loss of beta energy by removing the physical interface between a source, which is outside the device, and the active region of the device, which is buried well within the bulk of the structure,” says Fox.
Carbon-14, consisting of six protons and eight neutrons, is the most important radioactive isotope of carbon. It occurs predominantly as the stable isotopes carbon-12 (98.89%) and carbon-13 (1.1%) – and during the lifetime of a nuclear power reactor all the carbon-13 within gets converted to carbon-14. Therefore, Magnox had much more of the radioactive isotope than they realised, says Fox.
Due to its long half-life, when it has decayed by half, any battery harnessing its power would last forever. In human terms, this means it would produce continuous energy, have no moving parts, be emission free and require no maintenance – a potentially ground-breaking device in decarbonising an increasingly electric-powered world.
The problem was encasing the carbon-14 within the diamond at the microscales needed. The conventional method of growing a diamond typically involves flowing litres per minute of hydrogen, and a small amount of methane, through a reactor system where the two are dissociated to form the ingredients of the diamond. This was impossible with the eight cubic centimetres of carbon-14 per glass tube the scientists had.
Source: Arkenlight
“We had to adapt to growing this small volume. This was something that hadn’t been done before, and that most of the computational chemistry calculations suggested wasn’t possible because the turnover time – the time for the methane in the mix to stay resident within the reactor – is very short,”
explains Fox. “Unless you activate and use it immediately, the consensus was it would get swept away, making it impossible to incorporate into a film [for the battery].”
Working with the UK Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA), they eventually found a way to use a restricted volume from which to grow a diamond, with only a small amount of feedstock – a novel process Fox says the university has patented, alongside creating spin-off company Arkenlight to commercialise the technology.
The process then had to be downscaled further and made compatible with UKAEA’s systems for dealing with the growth of an active feedstock material.
Eseosa Ekanem, a technology and research, process and project engineer at UKAEA, says some of the challenges they faced were designing the life cycle process, ensuring operators could reach different components, putting all the safety systems in place, and integrating the method within UKAEA systems. They also had to generate a plasma, making sure they had stable pressures.
An astronaut’s best friend The challenges have not been merely technical. Despite Magnox having an abundance of carbon-14, trying to access it has seen the researchers buried in paperwork – something they have yet to navigate past. The team could only continue after being gifted the isotope from the Plymouth Marine Laboratory, where it was languishing in a store collecting dust. The alternative – buying from the commercial market – was out of the question, given it is only sold by Russians for around $40,000 a gram.
in carbon-14 batteries or harvesting devices in China,” he says.
Having access to only a very small amount of carbon-14, they were never going to make a “very beefy battery”, he says. But in December 2024 they unveiled what they say is the world’s first diamond battery, marking a major milestone in their work.
battery would not be super-powerful. So what could it actually be used for? Space application is one area being explored by the scientists, along with the European Space Agency (ESA). The sector, Fox says, could afford to pay the premium price such a device might (at least at first) demand. He thinks it could be cheaper than using plutonium-powered RTGs, with the added benefit of having a much longer life.
Plutonium-238 has a half-life of 87.7 years.
In making access prohibitively difficult, the UK government is “missing a trick”, Fox suggests. He points out that the Chinese are showing interest in the isotope, and some companies looking to sell it commercially – such as RC14 based in Canada – are being approached by them. “So there’s clearly an interest
The prototype devices use a very small fraction of a milligram of carbon-14 that produces mere picowatts of energy – not powerful enough to operate sensors, one of the potential use cases.
As it decays, carbon-14 emits beta particles with the maximum energy of 154keV – therefore, at any scale, the
“What attracted the ESA was putting an independent micro power source linked to a transponder onto something like a satellite or a space probe,” says Fox, “and then tracking that asset for not just the entire duration of the mission, but beyond its service life, or as long as it’s still within a reasonable range of Earth.”
This application could be increasingly useful given the proliferation of the
The University of Bristol and UKAEA are not alone in their efforts to develop new nuclear batteries. Competing directly is New York-based NBD (Nano Diamond Battery). CEO
Nima Golsharifi says the company has very recently been granted a patent for a sandwich nuclear battery using different isotopes.
The patent covers how the isotopes can be embedded inside a diamond, charge extraction, design, safety and other key innovations.
In simple terms, NBD’s technology works akin to
solar panels, with radiation emitted that is collected using another material –a semiconductor – from which it is converted to electricity. In six months to a year, Golsharifi says it will deliver prototypes of its two most advanced batteries for testing on 33,000 applications. If it works, it could be moved into Airbus’ contractual supply chain.
The first battery uses promethium and the second americium. For the latter, Golsharifi says NBD has shifted away from diamond because, although
it is the most efficient semiconductor, it can be damaged by higher power isotopes, reducing efficiency over time.
He adds that this is a different type of technology he cannot talk about because it is under patent – but the breakthrough is finding a new transducer material that can be used instead of diamond.
The promethium battery will be used to power items such as sensors and the americium higher-power applications, which could include electric vehicles. But
work is “a remarkable achievement” – but the fact it is based on radioactivity is a major drawback.
space economy and rising concerns over space junk. In addition, it could be used to ping messages to and from a space base station. Or, alternatively, they could be used for much more mundane but imperative things such as smoke alarms, hearing aids and pacemakers (diamond is biocompatible) or monitoring boreholes for carbon dioxide storage (they are solid state and temperature insensitive). Essentially, they would be useful for when low power is needed, but where changing or charging batteries on the regular is not ideal.
However, not everyone is convinced by the game-changing potential of the technology. Principal scientist at National Physical Laboratories Pierre Kubiak, a battery scientist of more than 20 years and the NPL’s technical leader for battery technology, says Fox and his colleagues’
“Radioactivity has to always fight for public acceptance,” he says. For this reason, he does not envisage the technology working with medical or electrical devices when there are more established alternatives. However, he sees the potential for space applications where conventional batteries cannot be used.
And when it comes to whether nuclear batteries could rival lithium-ion batteries, as some other companies have suggested (see The race to develop the commercial diamond battery, above), it is a “definitive no,” he says, as they do not produce enough energy and it is not on demand.
challenges include keeping costs down and the difficulty of acquiring isotopes.
However, emerging efforts are coming from startup Curio, founded by Ed McGinnis, who says he is on a mission to recycle nuclear waste, including supplying isotopes for nuclear batteries. NBD has already signed a supply agreement.
Golsharifi says early commercialisation involving a small number of products for specialised use cases could happen as soon as next year, but mass adoption is three to four years away.
In 2019, then Arkenlight CEO Morgan Jay Boardman, who stepped down in January this year, said he hoped the company would have batteries appearing in devices in 2024. That has not happened, and given the issues with carbon-14 supply it is not likely to in the immediate future. Timelines will be dictated by how quickly the nuclear industry moves into recycling, which he hopes will be driven by the new impetus on rolling out small modular reactors, which could drive more interest in repurposing nuclear waste material.
In addition, much more optimisation of the process is needed, which – until carbon-14 is more readily available – the firm plans to do using non-radioactive carbon-13. This work includes checking the diamond for defects and doing simulation studies to better understand how to incorporate carbon-14 using a slightly different chemical vapour deposition technology.
“When we have more of this valuable feedstock,” says Fox, “we can funnel these changes into the recipe to achieve higher-quality material, which will then more efficiently harvest the energy produced within it.”
Ask ChatGPT to come up with party ideas, write a plan or analyse data and it will return an answer in seconds. Ask it follow-up questions and it will use memory and context to update its response. Ask it to use its initiative, however, and the AI suddenly becomes more cautious. It will not commit to making a decision because it has been designed to sit firmly on the fence – always acting as a servant, never as its own entity. This is partly deliberate, to negate claims of bias and similar, but it is also an inherent, technical limitation of the type of large language model (LLM) that has soared to prominence in recent months. In fact, this is one of a number of limitations, coupled with growing controversy over LLMs’ use of copyrighted data, that is fuelling the next generation of artificial intelligence known as agentic AI.
As its name suggests, agentic AI refers to models that have the agency to act on their own initiative. “Unlike passive AI systems that respond to commands or queries, agentic AI is proactive and often capable of interacting with its environment, assessing situations and
making decisions for itself that align with its goals,” explains Loris Degioanni, chief technology officer (CTO) and founder of software firm Sysdig. This represents a paradigm shift in AI development because agentic AI can perform tasks without the need for human intervention. “Instead of asking questions and expecting answers, agentic AI can be given projects and produce its own solutions,” says Stefan Leichenauer, vice-president of engineering at AI firm SandboxAQ.
With agentic AI, multiple agents can work together to solve complex problems –even beyond the capabilities of traditional AI. “You might have one agent tasked with editing code,” says Andrew Bolster, senior research and development manager in
Neuroscience is being used to build human-like agentic AIs – and you don’t need copyrighted data to do so
data science at the Synopsys Software Integrity Group. “Another that’s tasked with natural language summarisation, another that’s very good at spotting security vulnerabilities in code, and another that’s tasked with the decomposition of a larger task or project.” This can be cheaper than having what Bolster describes as “one agent to rule them all”.
However, there is a key and somewhat nuanced distinction between the multiagent, autonomous systems used in the likes of self-driving cars, which have elements of agency, and what is meant by true agentic AI. Self-driving cars rely heavily on reactive systems and pre-trained models that respond to real-world stimuli. They take data from onboard sensors and,
using machine learning and computer vision, can perceive, decide and navigate. Yet while these systems can adapt to certain driving conditions, they still have to operate within set rules and predefined scenarios and they cannot make autonomous, real-time decisions beyond their programming. In short, they lack initiative.
In a true agentic AI system the car would make independent decisions in entirely new and novel situations, learning and adapting on the fly. It could even, in the distant future, make ethical or moral decisions as a human driver would. It is this desire to build AI models that mimic human decision-making that is key to
Image: Attensi
understanding the power and potential of true agentic AI.
To build models that are as close to having human-level autonomy as possible, today’s most advanced agentic AI approaches lean heavily on neuroscience principles: specifically free energy, active inference and homeostasis. These principles work hand in hand to help all living organisms, including us, make sense of the world and respond to change. Our bodies automatically regulate our temperature, pH levels and glucose to keep everything in balance and make sure our cells and organs work as they should, known as homeostasis. We strive for homeostasis by making predictions in a millisecond about what is going
to happen next based on an internal ‘model’ of the world that is created by our brains. At a basic level, this internal model predicts that stepping out into the sunshine will make us feel warm or that walking on rocks will be painful. It can even tell us what sound to expect when we close a door. At a more sophisticated level, it is what causes our body to release insulin when we eat. The model ‘predicts’ our blood sugar will spike, based on experience, so it responds accordingly. We develop this internal model from birth and our predictions grow, learn and adapt in real time as we encounter new environments and stimuli.
Whenever our modelled predictions come true, everything feels balanced and
homeostasis is achieved. However, when there is a mismatch and the reality does not align with what our brain was expecting, it creates a rise in something called free energy. Free energy as a concept was pioneered by Professor Karl Friston at University College London, but it is effectively a signal to our brain that we are experiencing surprise and uncertainty, and we need to do something about it.
At the same time, our brains hate surprises. They do everything they can to minimise uncertainty, and thus minimise free energy, by either updating their expectations or changing the situation to make the world ‘fit’ what they expect. This can be as simple as putting on a jacket when the sun does not generate the warmth expected. This action to update or adapt is then what is referred to as active inference – a minimisation process thought to lie at the heart of human perception, action and learning.
So how does this relate to AI? Firstly, because free energy effectively represents the difference between the predicted state of the world and actual sensory input, it is considered a mathematical concept and lends itself well to the nature of AI algorithms. Our brains use probabilistic models to predict what is going to happen next, thus minimising free energy.
In the same way, AI models can build and predict ‘beliefs’ and models about the state of their world. They encode these predictions as probability distributions, and this makes them capable of updating the probability of something happening as more evidence or data becomes available. Taking things a step further, such AI systems can then use these probabilities and ‘beliefs’ to predict the outcome that taking different actions will have, before choosing the one that best aligns with whatever goal it wants to achieve – akin to how our brains use active inference.
Friston recently launched the start-up Stanhope AI, dedicated to building the next generation of agentic AI systems.
Led by Friston and and CEO Professor Rosalyn Moran, the start-up is piloting systems that can actively seek out information that helps them refine their understanding of the world. When faced with an unknown situation, the systems
use their initiative to make autonomous decisions about where to find and gather data. This includes deciding what data will be the most useful to minimise uncertainty and free energy.
This ability to learn and adapt, rather than relying solely on pre-programmed knowledge, is a critical element in unlocking true agentic AI. Stanhope AI has already partnered with the German Federal Agency for Disruptive Innovation, as well as the Royal Navy, to test drones capable of autonomously completing missions in unknown environments, where traditional AI models have failed.
“Our mission at Stanhope AI is to bridge the gap between neuroscience and AI, creating a new generation of AI systems that can think, adapt and decide like humans,” says Moran. “We believe this technology will transform the capabilities of AI and robotics and make them more impactful in realworld scenarios.”
However, whenever the concept of developing AI with human-like traits is raised, there are concerns too.
“The potential benefits of agentic AI are clear: greater efficiency and the ability to help us solve harder problems,” says Leichenauer. “However, there are several downsides and pitfalls. When we give AI more capabilities, we are giving up a level of control, which leaves open the possibility that the AI does something we did not intend. Security risks are also a concern.”
For all the intelligence that humans have, we are also unpredictable. Adding unpredictability into critical systems, such as self-driving cars, could set a dangerous precedent. There is also the argument that agentic AI lacks true humanlike capabilities.
“Many speculate that agentic AI is a stepping stone towards some generalpurpose AI with human-like capacities, but it’s important, from a technical perspective, to think about the interplay between these tasks and how our own minds operate,”
Agentic AI and large language models (LLMs) such as ChatGPT differ in their design, capabilities and use cases. LLMs process and generate text – and, in an increasing number of cases, images –based on patterns learned from analysing huge amounts of data. Their strengths lie in answering questions, translating languages, summarising text and
performing repetitive tasks, but their knowledge is limited to the data they have been trained on. They can only provide responses based on the inputs, or prompts, they receive and they have been at the centre of controversy concerning the use of scraping copyrighted data. This makes them reactive and best suited for use in chatbots and automated customer service,
adds Bolster. “Neurophysiology research has demonstrated that areas of our brain specialise in different operations and often have specialised neural network structures that appear to be more active during particular tasks or sub-tasks.”
Even at its most advanced, today’s agentic AI is, as Leichenauer states, “still a few breakthroughs away” from achieving this level of complexity. Ole J Rosendahl, CTO at Attensi, adds: “[Today’s] models are narrow in their use cases and contain
‘Instead of asking questions and expecting answers, agentic AI can be given projects and produce its own solutions’
content generation and translation services.
Agentic AI models, on the other hand, are proactive. They possess agency, or the ability to act independently and with initiative, to make decisions and perform tasks autonomously in a given environment. They can interact and adapt to their surroundings or other systems, and typically involve multiple AI agents
inherent flaws. Solving them will require not only more power and compute, but a considerable amount of ingenuity to address.”
Yet there’s little sign of its recent trajectory slowing down. Sysdig is using agentic AI to handle complex, multi-step investigations into cloud security breaches, while Attensi has adopted agentic AI for its RealTalk simulation tool. There’s even a rise in agentic AI systems being used as
working together to achieve complex goals beyond the capabilities of LLMs and often without requiring explicit instructions for each action.
Agentic AI is increasingly common in robotics and is best suited for use in autonomous vehicles and drones. It is particularly useful in environments where tasks are dynamic and require real-time decision-making.
‘watchdogs’ to keep an eye on the potential hallucinations of GenAI.
“Agentic AI is now central to our strategy and will likely remain so in the future,” continues Rosendahl. “It has proven to be a creative catalyst, unlocking new products, new opportunities and completely new ways of working.”
This suggests that if 2024 was the year generative AI hit the mainstream, 2025 could be the year agentic AI unlocks the next level of what AI can achieve.
There have not been many engineering novelists. In fact, it is a profession that generates mainstream literary figures at a rate of roughly one per century. In the twentieth there was Nevil Shute, aeronautical engineer and designer of airships. In the twentyfirst there is the UK’s Fiona Erskine –“engineer by day, writer by night” – who has “turned rock into fertilizer, recovered and recycled precious metals, brought medicines to market, made amazing new polymers, exported electricity and directed international construction projects”.
Erskine would be the first to admit that she has not reached anything like the level of literary immortality attained by the author of such classics as On the Beach and A Town Like Alice. But she shares enough characteristics with the legendary Shute to reveal from this admittedly small sample a trend in British engineering novelists. Both refuse to underestimate their readership by drawing heavily and unashamedly on the complexities and technicalities of their profession. Both write about the concept of work as a component of the human condition. And both felt the need to adopt pen names to shield the serious nature of their engineering careers from either (in Shute’s case) the spotlight of celebrity or (as Erskine puts it) “feeling exposed if you get terrible reviews, or your books don’t sell”.
Of course, Erskine is being modest. Since she arrived on the literary scene in 2019 with the publication of her debut novel The Chemical Detective, she has produced a book a year to consistently strong reviews. The first in a series centred on Dr Jaq Silver – “skier, scientist, international jetsetter, explosives expert” – The Chemical Detective was heralded by this very magazine as “a first-class thriller” and “a must-read for engineers”. Literary Review name-checked it on its 2021 top 10 crime novels list. Since then Erskine has further explored the Jaq Silver universe in the form of sequels The Chemical Reaction, The Chemical Cocktail and The Chemical Code, as well as the ongoing online Substack title The Chemical Tiger With Phosphate Rocks – described again
‘In my stories, I desperately wanted female characters with agency... if you’re an engineer, you learn that it’s all about the tools you have and the way you make use of first principles’
Fiona Erskine is both a chemical engineer and a mainstream thriller writer. While the ‘engineer by day, writer by night’ dictum keeps her careers separate in real life, there is plenty of crossover in her fictional worlds
WORDS NICK SMITH
by E+T as being stuffed with “the sort of chemistry clever-cloggery we’ve come to expect from her” – she branched out into semi-autobiography. And with her latest offering, Losing Control: Terror in Teesside, we have an excursion into the police procedural genre of which, she assures us, there will be more.
Writing from experience
Losing Control, as with most of Erskine’s novels, addresses the question of whether engineers have landed on the wrong side of history. “I write to understand,” says Erskine, “and to explore what I don’t know about my own industry.” In this book she returns her authorial attention to her first and unpublished attempt at fiction, which examined the “worst industrial disaster in the world” at Bhopal in 1984. The polluted industrial site remains abandoned 40 years later: a “horrible, wicked injustice. I’ve written about the failure to clean up the former Union Carbide factory as a professional engineer through the Institution of Chemical Engineers.”
But writing from the perspective of a Bhopal survivor “was someone else’s story to tell. So I decided to tell it from the point of view of something similar being about to happen where I live. I wanted to experiment with a police procedural and, without giving away too much, my main character DI Julie Cadell needs to dig into what looks like a cut-and-dried case before cyber crime brings terror to Teesside.”
When asked why there aren’t more engineers writing novels, Erskine prefaces her comments by stating that she is “not a great fan of the arts-sciences divide”. She remains an advocate for the idea that human intelligence thrives on variety, which is why “I find it important to spend time on things that are not mathematically based”. That being said, “engineering is fantastically creative, and I get cross with people who think otherwise”. For Erskine, engineering is about ingenuity, which means that “at its best it can be every bit as creative as painting a picture or writing a novel”.
And yet, there is something about the way in which engineers are trained that throws up a psychological roadblock
when it comes to producing text “that is primarily for entertainment rather than to instruct. Technical writing has to be super-precise, with lots of bullet points, tables, graphs and formulae. But when you’re writing fiction – and it took me a good few years to get my head around this – you want to elicit emotion in your reader. And that requires a whole different set of tools.”
For Erskine, engineering not only comes first, but came first. She recalls how at the age of 15 she went to a BP oil refinery and “absolutely loved the freedom that came with that. They gave me a bicycle and told me to go and take samples from a distillation column.” Despite being surrounded by science – both parents were academic scientists – Erskine, as a product of the Scottish education system, was still studying Russian and History at the age of 17 when she went to the University of Cambridge to read natural
‘I write to understand, and to explore what I don’t know about my own industry’
sciences followed by engineering. This was where she also suffered the indignity of coming to realise that she “wasn’t as smart as I thought I was, and didn’t get a good degree”.
Meanwhile, Imperial Chemical Industries was looking for women engineers as part of an early inclusivity initiative. As a diversity hire, Erskine “definitely benefited from positive discrimination then”. She says: “I was on my own later when it came to promotions, but I definitely got a leg up at the start.”
Then followed a four-decade (and counting) career in engineering where
her greatest satisfaction has always come from the collaborative experience of “being the glue, working with a bunch of cleverer or more experienced people”. There would be frustrating times. She once applied for a job that involved shiftwork, but was told that she “obviously” could not do that. In response she argued that nurses “obviously” worked shifts. When a subsequent role became vacant, attitudes had become slightly more progressive. “Whenever I hit a glass ceiling, I simply changed employer. For me, variety and breadth of experience was key.”
It is tempting to assume that writing might be in Erskine’s blood. Her greataunt was the formidable Dame Rebecca West, who was a tough act to follow. Harry S Truman, the 33rd president of the United States, is on record as calling her “the world’s best reporter”. George Bernard Shaw showed the extent of his vanity when he asserted that West “could handle a pen as brilliantly as ever I could”, while Time magazine described West as “indisputably the world’s number one woman writer”. West was not so generous to her descendant, describing Erskine as an “illiterate alcoholic”: an insult Erskine wears as a badge of honour to this day. “I’ve always wanted to see it in print,” she says (glad to be of service –Ed.) before explaining that the slander occurred when, as a 17-year-old, Erskine had dared to consume two G&Ts in the matriarchal presence before letting slip her fondness for romantic novels.
Although Erskine had another far kindlier literary aunt who extended the hand of encouragement, she is not convinced that writing talent derives from any genetic predisposition. Neither was Shute, who wrote in his autobiography Slide Rule that he did not see “a great deal in the theory that writing ability is dictated by heredity, but I think there is a great deal in environment. My father and my grandmother both wrote a number of books, so that the business was familiar.”
Predestined or not, Erskine showed no outward signs of becoming a novelist until she had been a professional engineer for a long time.
Erskine recalls three simultaneous realisations that combined to bring about the new frontier of writing fiction. First was being isolated in a new job
Photograph: Getty
where, following a restructuring, no one in management got on with each other. “I was the wrong fit for the new organisation. I think it’s something to do with a misunderstanding about people who are civil and pleasant, in that these attributes are seen as weak. There have been times in my career when I’ve had to be steely. But I still think you can do tough things with compassion and recognise the humanity in others.”
Second, working in India caused her to reflect on “things that I thought I knew. That’s when I first visited Bhopal. I’d worked all over
the world and had a fantastic career, and always felt that what we were doing was basically good. I was making medicines in Portugal and fertiliser in Scotland.
“But being in India made me turn around and wonder if I’d become the villain in my own story. Have I been too naive? Have I become too pleased with myself? The India experience made me feel we’re treating the world as a sewer we can spew things into without end.”
‘Engineering is fantastically creative, and I get cross with people who think otherwise’
Third, at the age of 50, she made the mistake of going skiing and breaking her leg. “I’m not an athlete. It was a bit pathetic really.” Feeling stuck again – this time in a ski resort “with a lot of French painkillers” – she started writing. “I was amazed when Jaq Silver appeared. The words just tumbled out. I couldn’t stop it.”
The problem for Erskine was that the 150,000 words were “basically rubbish. So I sulked for a bit, and paid for a professional to come up with a beautifully excoriating list of everything that was wrong with my writing.”
To start writing novels properly, Erskine stopped writing novels completely and learned the craft of short stories. The rationale for this is that “in short fiction you’ve got nowhere to hide. You’ve got to get the words right.” She deconstructed her output and that of others in workshops and gradually got better at the technicalities of the process. This allowed her to escape back to her “bigger and braver” alter ego Jaq Silver “who was good at things”.
“In my stories, I desperately wanted female characters with agency. I was so bored with female sidekicks. If you’re an engineer, one thing you learn early on is that individual physical strength is neither here nor there – it’s all about the tools you have and the way you make use of first principles. There are no limitations other than your ability to be ingenious.”
Losing Control: Terror in Teesside by Fiona Erskine is published by Snickered Mole and is available on Amazon
Europeanresearcherspursuedasatellitefallingfromthesky tolearnhowitsburn-upa ectsEarth’satmosphere.Theirfindings willhelpthespaceindustryunderstandtheharmitisdoingto theenvironmentand,hopefully,reduceitsimpacts
It was shortly after noon local time on 8 September 2024 when a streak of smoke, burning as brightly as the midday moon, visible at the same time, appeared on the blue sky above the dark waters of the Pacific Ocean. Flying towards that fireball was a Falcon business jet carrying 12researchers working under the banner of the European Space Agency (ESA). None were able to observe the daytime fireball as the windows of the aeroplane, which had taken off from Easter Island about three hours earlier, were covered with black fabric.
After that fleeting occurrence had passed, the passengers assembled around their computers to see whether any of the 26 cameras attached to the jet’s blacked-out windows had captured the event. The team had arrived at Easter Island, one of the remotest inhabited pieces of land on the Earth, only two days earlier, having calibrated their cameras using the island’s iconic stone figures as targets. They must have done a good job as 10 of the cameras not only captured the fireball but also collected precious data about its disintegration. This, indeed, wasn’t an ordinary fireball,
constellation. Cluster’s four satellites had been monitoring Earth’s magnetic field since the early 2000s and had just reached the end of their useful life. Salsa was the first to fall to Earth, and the researchers travelled across the globe to capture its final moments and find out how satellite ash produced during satellite incineration affects the planet’s atmosphere and thus life on Earth.
“Mass doesn’t simply evaporate. It gets deposited somewhere,” Stijn Lemmens, senior space debris mitigation analyst at the ESA, who oversaw the campaign, told E+T. “We want to know where it happens, at what altitude. We want to understand what chemical reactions take place there and how long it takes before it affects us lower.”
Satellite re-entries have become a concern for the global atmospheric science community over the past few years. The arrival of mega-constellations – vast fleets of internet-beaming satellites – has spurred a rapid growth in the number of spacecraft orbiting Earth. A decade ago, a little over a thousand satellites resided in near-Earth space, but the number has soared to nearly 11,000 as of late 2024. Analysts predict that within a decade 100,000 satellites may circle the planet, most of them belonging to mega-constellation operators such as
SpaceX’s Starlink. These operators want customers to benefit from advancing technology and therefore design their satellites to last a mere five years.
To prevent the build-up of clutter in Earth’s orbit, they take the satellites down into the atmosphere at the end of their missions, where they perish in balls of fire, just like the ESA’s Salsa did. These satellites turn into ash at altitudes of between 60km and 80km, causing a gradual increase of potentially harmful pollution in otherwise pristine atmospheric layers – the mesosphere and upper stratosphere.
“There is a lot that happens during the fragmentation of a satellite,” Jiří Šilha, CEO of Slovakia-based company Astros Solutions, which coordinated the Salsa re-entry observation campaign, told E+T. “There is a lot of material being put into the atmosphere, for example aluminium oxide. And we want to measure and quantify how much of it gets created.”
Aluminium oxide is a white powdery substance that forms during the incineration of satellite bodies, which are mostly aluminium. The growing concentrations of this compund in the upper layers of the atmosphere, resulting from satellite re-entries, worry some scientists due to its ability to triggerozone destruction. Aluminium
oxide also changes the atmosphere’s albedo – its ability to reflect sunlight –possibly altering Earth’s thermal balance. But to measure what exactly happens during a satellite re-entry is challenging. Most of the satellite disintegration and incineration happens at altitudes too high for weather balloons and too low for sounding instruments aboard satellites to reach. Aeroplane chases, such as the expedition that took off from Easter Island on 8 September, offer the best view into these events.
To pull off such a chase, however, is no easy feat. Since the beginning of the space age, only four such measurement campaigns have taken place, according to Lemmens. In the past 20 years, the ESA once chased the re-entering upper stage of its Ariane 5 rocket and once tracked the Earthbound fall of the Automated Transfer Vehicle – a giant cargo spacecraft that used to supply the International Space Station (ISS). Nasa has also made two attempts to observe re-entries from aboard a plane – in both cases the US space agency focused on the Cygnus ISS resupply vehicle.
All these spacecraft, however, were 10 or more times more massive than the 500kg Salsa. The modest size of the Cluster constellation satellites is what makes them an ideal target for study, says Lemmens.
“The destructive process depends on the size of the satellite,” he continues. “The observation of Cluster gives us data about the average kind of spacecraft, representative of the vast majority of spacecraft coming down.”
SpaceX’s Starlink satellites weigh around 300kg each. Satellites of Amazon’s planned constellation Kuiper will come with a mass of 500kg.
When Salsa turned to dust above the Pacific, the Falcon business jet was still some 300km away. “It could be dangerous to fly too close. The plane
could get hit with some surviving fragments,” said Šilha, describing the chase as an “extremely stressful” operation, which required months of meticulous preparations.
Lemmens says it took ESA flight controllers eight months to prepare for the experiment. The four satellites of the Cluster constellation circled the Earth every two and a half days, following an
elliptical orbit with the farthest point some 119,000km and the closest 19,000km away from the planet’s surface. The controllers set Salsa on an Earthbound spiral in January 2024, allowing it to dip closer and closer to Earth with each pass. But even though they maintained communication with the satellite until its final moments, they could only predict with limited certainty where exactly it would break up.
“We knew it was going to be somewhere in one-third of the Pacific Ocean,” says Lemmens. “But the Pacific is actually very large. We could only finalise the prediction during the satellite’s final passage through the atmosphere. Then the rest of its trajectory would be determined by gravity.”
Lemmens described the chase as “executed in the blind by pilots who only had a flight plan based on a prediction”. To make that prediction as accurate as possible, the researchers enlisted the help of astronomers observing near-Earth asteroids and comets. Using telescopes
by specific molecules arising during the burn-up, such as the problematic aluminium oxide, lithium, titanium and cadmium.
Scientific questions
“It was a heart-warming moment, when we were browsing the recorded data, when the plane was actually circling back, to see it was there, in the corner of the image,” Lemmens recalls.
“We did collect molecular bands, which we can now correlate with certain altitudes. That will help the scientific community to accurately correlate the measurements, with probable chemical reactions taking place during satellite disintegration.”
Because the re-entry took place in bright daylight, the researchers couldn’t make more complex spectroscopic measurements that would reveal in greater detail the chemical imprints of the satellite break-up. They plan to supplement the data with further observations when Salsa’s three siblings – Rumba, Samba and Tango – come down in 2025 and 2026.
all around the globe, the observers tracked the spiralling Salsa throughout the summer of 2024 and up until 20 hours before its demise.
“These objects come in at about 10 kilometres per second,” Lemmens says. “The plane flies at about 800km/h. But in the end, we had an accuracy of about 10 seconds on the trajectory.”
The researchers photographed the fireball in visible and infrared light, using special filters to separate the signal emitted
“The Cluster re-entries are a unique opportunity,” says Šilha. “The four satellites are identical, and we know virtually every detail about them, which will allow us to repeat the experiment in a way that has never been done before.”
Lemmens hopes the measurements will help atmospheric scientists figure out whether satellite Earth pollution could grow into the world’s next big environmental problem a few decades from now.
The space industry could easily find itself choosing between three unfavourable solutions – polluting the atmosphere with further climate-altering substances, leaving dangerous junk in Earth’s orbit, or having to curtail its ambitious growth plans set out by proponents of satellite mega-constellations.
Some researchers think that all might not be lost and that solutions exist to limit or even eliminate the satellite air pollution while allowing space companies to grow their fleets. Here are the three most promising solutions.
Scientists think the effects of satellite re-entries on Earth’s atmosphere could be mitigated by altering the satellites’ re-entry trajectories. The angle at which a satellite hits the thickening air affects the temperature at which it will burn up. Altering the temperature could in turn alter the composition of the resulting air pollution. For example, if the re-entries produce more gaseous by-products compared with particulate pollution, they might be less damaging. If the resulting particles also happen to be larger, they will fall to Earth faster, reducing the time they keep affecting the climate. Controllers could also guide the satellites to burn up at much lower altitudes, which would move the bulk of the air pollution closer to the Earth, from where it would rain out more quickly.
Some technologists propose an entirely new concept of satellites designed to survive rather than break up during the re-entry. They envision these satellites could be recovered after their missions and refurbished for another use, just like capsules carrying astronauts to and from the International Space Station. Such a technology, suitable for massproduced satellites, has, however, not yet been developed.
Another not-yet-reallythere tech idea is to gather defunct satellites in orbit and reprocess them in orbital foundries to make propellant or raw material for constructing new satellites or habitats on the Moon. Australian company Neumann Space is developing a novel thruster that could use fuel made from aluminium alloys, but a practical application of this idea is probably still decades away.
Part technology demonstrator, part educational project and part sustainability showcase – the Waste2Race car is motoring into a net zero future
WORDS DR CLAIRE MALONE
Motorsport has long been the pinnacle of speed, technology and performance. It is an intensely exhilarating and evocative environment to showcase cutting-edge engineering. Sustainability, on the other hand, can be seen to lack excitement – despite being a major driver for young engineers seeking employment – and is perceived as being dry and dull, especially with the incremental redesign of existing technology to be greener.
Bringing the atmosphere of the race to sustainability development is the goal of the collaborative Waste2Race project led by the UK’s Warwick Manufacturing Group (WMG), which is showcasing state-of-the-art technology with its Le Mans Prototype car crafted from discarded materials and running on hydrogen derived from sewage. The Waste2Race team is not just redefining sustainable engineering – it is aiming to set hydrogen-powered speed records, proving that sustainability and exhilaration can go hand in hand.
While motorsport often serves as a proving ground for cutting-edge technology in the automotive sector, the Waste2Race project also aims to extend its innovations far beyond the track. Alex Hale from the National Composites Centre (NCC), which manufactured the car’s steering wheel, says: “[It’s] a demonstrator car as a proof of concept for a wide
variety of different sustainable technologies … [the point is] to demonstrate opportunities for making manufacturing sustainable.”
It is not the first time WMG has ventured into the world of sustainable motorsport. In 2009, the team, led by Professor Kerry Kirwan, developed the WorldFirst Formula 3 race car – a pioneering project that laid the groundwork for the innovations seen in Waste2Race. The car was powered from a biodiesel blend derived from waste cocoa butter and vegetable oil. It was dubbed ‘chocolatefuelled’ and utilised many innovative natural materials such as a flax fibre composite seat shell filled with soybean oil-based flexible foam, a carrot fibre steering wheel and potato starch and flax wing mirrors.
In contrast, Waste2Race represents a significant evolution in sustainable engineering. While maintaining the internal combustion engine’s evocative power, the new car uses a hydrogenpowered system that emits only water vapour instead of the typical by-products of a hydrocarbon-based fuel. The hydrogen is derived from wastewater, pushing the boundaries of alternative fuels in motorsport.
Additionally, the car incorporates a hybrid powertrain with a recycled battery system built from cells salvaged from a crashed road vehicle repackaged to be half the size of a typical configuration.
Waste2Race also takes material engineering to the next level. The car was constructed by Ginetta, a British sports and racing car manufacturer, in collaboration with students from WMG. It employs recycled carbon
fibre for structural elements – a leap from the natural fibres used in the WorldFirst car – and integrates entirely bio-sourced components such as a steering wheel crafted from cellulose and a display screen made from a repurposed mobile phone.
The car also uses parts that would otherwise end up in landfill. The wing mirrors, for example, are made from beetroot cellulose reclaimed from food manufacturing. “It’s about finding value in that commodity,” Kirwan says. “We’re not suggesting wing mirrors in the future be made of it, but it’s a great example of what you can do with these materials.”
These promising advances in sustainable engineering aside, the aim of the project remains consistent: to showcase a range of sustainable technologies in a highperformance vehicle and encourage people to engage with them. As Kirwan states: “It’s a knowledge exchange exercise and an educational exercise, but obviously there’s research in there as well because it’s a real testbed.” The car is a continuously evolving endeavour, and the project team is always keen to discuss new ideas – whether from universities, industry or students – to test their feasibility in this highperformance environment.
Engineering meets the circular economy
One of the most innovative aspects of the Waste2Race project is its powerful demonstration of how circular economy principles can drive cutting-edge engineering. The entire life cycle of each material is considered – from manufacturing to disposal – to ensure sustainability. Traditional materials are replaced with renewable or recycled alternatives, challenging the notion that high performance requires unsustainable practices.
One of the best examples is the steering wheel. Crafted from a natural fibre composite and entirely made from cellulose – the primary component of plant cell walls that gives them strength and rigidity – it highlights the innovative potential
of bio-based materials. The design was developed through a partnership between researchers from the University of Leeds Soft Matter Physics Research Group and the NCC.
Jacob Holmes from the NCC says: “The design process was relatively simple in that we took the design of a standard steering wheel, [such as] the thickness of the carbon panel, and worked out how stiff that was. Then we redesigned it using alternative materials with a lower environmental impact and produced a steering wheel that had the same stiffness and performance.”
In addition to its high durability, cellulose-based bio-composites are attractive because they are sustainable. At the end of their life cycle, the components
can be easily disposed of or composted without harming the environment. They can even be recycled. Professor Michael Ries, who led the construction of the steering wheel from the University of Leeds, says: “These materials are not 99.9% natural; they are 100% natural.”
‘These practical projects are vital for helping students understand how to apply that knowledge to an industrial setting’
DR JAMES MEREDITH
Creating this innovative component wasn’t without its challenges. As Ries explains: “The biggest obstacle in making the steering wheel was producing a thick enough sample. Previously, we’ve worked with materials at a thickness of 0.8mm, but the steering wheel needed to be over 1cm thick. The challenge was creating a piece, roughly A4 size, with that level of thickness to cut the steering wheel out of.”
The focus on using sustainable materials extends throughout the car – from the battery repurposed from a smashed-up vehicle, recycled lubricants and regenerative braking motors incorporating magnets salvaged
from previous applications, to the driver’s seat constructed with PET foam made from recycled bottles.
The widespread use of hydrogen as a fuel source could play a key role in achieving net zero emissions but it also presents significant engineering challenges. The Waste2Race project is pushing these boundaries by employing hydrogen derived from wastewater – a renewable and relatively untapped source.
aimed again to showcase the benefits of circular engineering. Instead of letting the hydrogen from the water treatment process go unused, they repurposed it to create something valuable.
In contrast to battery electric power, hydrogen offers benefits for racing, particularly concerning energy density and rapid refuelling. By integrating hydrogen fuel cell technology and custom hydrogen injectors, the Waste2Race vehicle aims to achieve an impressive performance while attempting to break multiple land speed records.
On the Waste2Race initiative, students had the opportunity to apply their classroom knowledge and gain experience working to industrial timescales and solving real-world challenges. “They learn a lot of the sort of detailed mathematics and engineering [though their course],” Meredith says, “but these practical projects are vital for helping them understand how to apply that knowledge to an industrial setting.”
This hands-on involvement aligns with the University of Warwick’s engineering curriculum, where sustainability is embedded from day one.
The transportation sector is one of the largest contributors to greenhouse gas emissions. Projects such as Waste2Race aim to change that narrative. By embracing a whole-system approach and conducting life cycle assessments on every component – from biomaterials to recycled parts – the team has optimised the car to have minimal environmental impact.
The technologies highlight the potential for sustainable end-of-life solutions for the materials used in automotive manufacturing, renewable energy and aerospace. For example, Ries’ team is researching methods to turn the composite used in the car’s steering wheel back into a yarn and then a fabric.
Kirwan says: “It’s a water treatment process but the hydrogen is a product that comes off as a waste. It’s actually a waste product, but it’s obviously not a waste product.”
WMG had two primary motivations for utilising hydrogen. First, while hydrogen engines have been tested in large vehicles such as trucks, no one had yet attempted to apply this technology to
ously y n. First, while ave been vehicles such ne ply nology racing car. Second, e research po with the urge
A defining aspect of the Waste2Race project is the involvement of students from WMG. Project manager and student coordinator Dr James Meredith says students worked across the whole car, from designing engine mounts and uprights to working out how all the electrical systems plug together and talk to each other. Their innovations included the repackaging of the battery system, redesigning the recycled batteries to be half the previous size and designing components like motor mountings using 3D printing. Such projects are vital for producing the next generation of successful engineers, equipping them with skills to address the challenges of tomorrow.
Moreover, the principles of circular economy embedded in the project provide a template for addressing waste management challenges across sectors. By repurposing and salvaging materials, the project demonstrates how resource efficiency can coexist with high performance. In addition, the compostable and recyclable nature of other components of the car makes their development particularly appealing for industries seeking to reduce their environmental footprint.
Motorsport has always been about pushing limits. Waste2Race is pushing the limits of what is possible, not only on the track but also in how we think about materials, energy and the future of our planet. By turning waste into power, this car is leading the charge toward a net zero transport future –one that balances the thrill of speed with the urgent need for sustainability.
The gaming sector has always resided at the cutting-edge of computer technology as advancements in graphics and compute power bring new creative possibilities to ever-more complex worlds
WORDS JACK LOUGHRAN
Just as the necessities of space travel inspired inventions that are now commonplace, such as vacuum-sealed food or LED technology, discoveries originally made with gaming in mind have also left an indelible mark on technological progress. Cryptocurrencies are mined with graphics processing units (GPUs), voice recognition systems were made for hands-free commands in games, and multiplayer games of the late 1990s could be considered as some of the earliest social networks.
Between 1990 and 2010, gaming tech progressed in leaps and bounds, from games reliant on 2D sprites and side-on, simplistic perspectives to fully rendered worlds full of characters and environments that react much as one would expect in real life. However, since 2010, the pace of change has slowed and the cost of developing games has spiralled upwards. Chipmakers are also struggling to innovate at the same pace, now that the physical limitations of microchips have nearly been reached.
But the appetite for games that set a new bar in gameplay, immersion and realism has not been quenched. Will AI, virtual reality (VR) and cloud computing meet the demands of gamers hungry for more – or will they end up being a mere footnote in gaming history?
AI is the buzzword on the lips of any company remotely involved in futurefacing technologies, and gaming is no exception. The immersive possibilities for the end user are palpable – think non-player characters (NPCs) that could directly respond to you in the game world, or even a story that is generated ad hoc, depending on the players’ actions. At the moment, AI is mostly used to help speed up the process of game-making through procedural generation and coding tools.
Making it personal
Rob Moffat, who works at Taiwanese chipmaker MediaTek in London, says that early examples of the technology might not be user-facing, but rather tools that help developers quickly build more complex worlds without having to handcraft every element.
“The gaming industry itself has had a tough couple of years,” he says. “PostCovid, the cost of developing AAA games has become an issue.” Triple-A is an industry term referring to the high-budget heavy hitters of the gaming industry.
Generative AI could help developers streamline the coding process and create assets on the fly. Development budgets for AAA games typically start at $200m in 2025, and big hitters such as Call of Duty can easily eclipse the $300m mark. Meanwhile, Grand Theft Auto (GTA) VI – arguably the most anticipated title in recent times – is rumoured to have a total budget of up to $2bn over a projected lifespan of 10 years.
But Moffat also says AI could be used in real time to learn the play style of the gamer in order to create a more
tailored experience: “I would like to think that there’ll be more variety in terms of levels and NPCs taking advantage of using generative AI to make it more adapted to the individual user’s play style,” he says.
Alex Battaglia – a video producer and writer for the tech-focused gaming site Digital Foundry – agrees, but wonders how such technology could be scaled to meet an audience for a typical AAA title.
“There are demonstrations of using cloud computing combined with local machine learning processing to make NPC interactions more reactive to environmental factors or player inputs … but they have yet to have been proven at scale for AAA games,” he says.
While promising, such technology cannot run locally, so games would have to be perennially online and linked to data centres, incurring a power and computational cost. “I am sceptical about infrastructure being ready and how financially viable it is to run data centres doing intense things for individual game clients unless the game is a suresales behemoth like GTA Fortnite,” Battaglia adds.
AI’s neural rendering capabilities could also be used to drastically enhance the detail and scalability of hand-crafted worlds including “more accurate geometry, textures and motion simulations rendered more cheaply with machine learned approximations”, he says. “The ceiling for scaling there is potentially very high as it is a new frontier for computing.”
mid-2010s. The best headsets offer a level of immersion that traditional flat screen gaming cannot come close to, so what happened?
Due to lengthy development times, it may appear as though gaming is slightly behind the curve in terms of utilising the latest wave of AI. But ironically, much like cryptocurrencies, large language models rely heavily on the unique architecture of GPUs. This is because they are designed to perform a massive number of calculations simultaneously through a technique known as parallel processing, which allows them to churn through huge training datasets at speed.
Once heralded as the inevitable future of gaming technology, the hype around VR headsets has dampened significantly since reaching a fever pitch in the
“It started off prohibitively expensive, and there are issues around social acceptance,” Moffat says. “We see a high potential for VR to continue to make strides in the coming five years or so, especially as the hardware compute capability increases.”
Despite the loss of enthusiasm, the technology has continued to improve in recent years, helped in part by Mark Zuckerberg’s mission to make the metaverse a mainstream VR product.
am VR ere a t” that
compelling it can be. It requires home space, extra hardware typically, can be physically clunky and its ‘killer apps’ never get as much press as they perhaps should,” Battaglia adds.
Broad acceptance of VR among gamers may continue to be elusive for now, but the technology has found greater acceptance in education and commercial settings.
Moffat believes there is a societal “tipping point” that is needed before VR becomes mainstream. “Is it a price barrier, a social barrier or a combination of those?” he says.
th tha t t company a failure of Go shows that c not be t home consoles
“I think VR will remain niche for the near future despite how
er or a ?” says ain espite how
Cloud gaming has been available to consumers in one form or another since the launch of OnLive in 2009. However, that company’s subsequent shuttering, and the later failure of Google Stadia, shows that consumers may not be ready to drop their home consoles yet. at says the “panacea for the likes of Xbox and Sony” is that they can “take
Moffat says t for the likes of X
a low-end smartphone but with high connectivity capabilities and run the game on the device” from the cloud.
In mobile gaming, 5G has certainly opened more possibilities in this space due to its reduced latency. Latency is always the killer issue with cloud gaming, as network delays as small as a tenth of a second can make a game feel sluggish.
But the financial incentive for the gaming sector could be huge if it can
light scattering and bouncing. But while it was a great technique for pre-rendered CGI footage, the high computational load meant that hardware had a long way to progress before any kind of real-time implementation was possible.
It was not until 2018 that the first GPU capable of basic ray tracing techniques in real time was finally released. But the technology continues to be computationally expensive. Battaglia describes it as “infinitely scalable”, with developers continuously looking to develop more complex models that can take advantage of modern GPU technology.
“Its potential ceiling is much higher than rasterisation [effectively the process of converting a 3D image into pixels on a screen], which completely plateaus and then becomes more expensive rapidly with little visual return,” he says. “If we look historically at other large graphical
innovations in games [such as the pixel shader or shadow maps], it takes about five to six generations of PC GPU hardware to cycle before an effect type becomes industry standard, replacing the previous status quo.
“Nevertheless, there is a base level of performance that can be achieved by GPUs to allow transformative ray traced effects at a reasonable performance cost – I would say modern PC GPUs are already there.”
Moffat says that MediaTek is already on its second generation of mobile chips capable of ray tracing technologies, while the functionality is also being developed and implemented by the likes of Apple and Qualcomm.
While the progress of gaming technology may have slowed over the last decade, there are still a number of technologies at the forefront that have a clear future at making games more realistic – both graphically and in their world-building capabilities.
For the next generation of consoles, Battaglia believes that Microsoft looks to be heading towards a PC-style model of upgradable hardware. The firm could “potentially offer multiple versions of the box, upgrades and multiple store fronts beyond the Microsoft Store, and even allow other manufacturers to produce their own version of an Xbox,” he says. The other players are likely to stay the course, with Nintendo recently announcing the iterative Switch 2 and PlayStation doubling down on its traditional business model with the PS5.
The gaming industry is going through a difficult time at the moment, Battaglia says, citing recent $100m-plus games such as Concord and Suicide Squad that proved to be a flop right out of the gate.
“The AAA model of game development no longer seems sustainable with its everincreasing budgets and risk potential,” he adds. “Here I see an opportunity for subscription services to get most of the customers and revenue with big tentpole projects and then using excess revenue to fund smaller experiences.”
Nanoprinters are finally helping us make use of AI breakthroughs in advanced materials
Materials science is undergoing a watershed moment.
The recent AI boom is helping researchers uncover novel materials at an unprecedented pace and we are seeing tech giants, from Meta to Microsoft and Google, channelling vast resources into this field. Thanks to these advances, researchers can now rapidly spot patterns, identify the best candidates for different applications, prioritise materials that are more sustainable and simulate how materials behave under a range of conditions. “AI
is removing a lot of the legwork,” explains Mark Bonner, senior research engineer at Fathom3, an innovation and development hub for A-SAFE in the UK. “With experimental data, for instance, AI can sift through it and find the correlations in a matter of seconds. That’s something we had to do by hand in the past, which could take a lot longer.”
Microsoft has used machine learning to cut the number of candidates from multi-millions to double digits in hours, not months. Deep tech startup PhysicsX, based in London and New York, can now run simulations of such candidates 10,000 to a million times faster, and researchers from Germany have shown such simulations can be done with up to 75% less computational cost.
Yet far from being just about riding the wave of AI, this shift is being driven by necessity. As the world grapples with climate change, antibiotic resistance and a growing lack of resources, demand for new materials that deliver long-term, sustainable impact is soaring. The market for advanced materials is on track to grow to $115.8bn by the end of the decade, up from $70.72bn just two years ago.
And for good reason. We need better, more efficient batteries and storage for renewable energy and electric cars.
Industries including construction and manufacturing cannot decarbonise without new forms of concrete and plastics. We need materials that can replace hazardous substances, enable the next generation of semiconductors and unlock groundbreaking new drugs.
Then there is the issue of protecting the materials we already use. The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development estimates that the extraction of raw materials has doubled since 1990, and global consumption is set to grow by 90% by 2060. This not only threatens supply chains but also our planet’s finite resources, putting immense pressure on scientists to find alternatives.
Ironically, even as AI is supercharging discovery, demand for large language models and other AI systems is further fuelling the need for better, more efficient materials to counteract the computational power, and thus energy, these systems demand. All of this combines to create a very real, very pressing need to make use of the latest wave of material discoveries as soon as possible.
Yet there is a fly in this ointment. “The challenge isn’t just discovering new materials – it’s turning those discoveries into scalable, deployable solutions,” explains Aaike van Vugt, co-founder and CEO of VSParticle in the Netherlands.
For starters, the advanced materials being pioneered worldwide are often produced in highly controlled, ‘unrealistic’ laboratory environments. “When you start with a material, you start off on a very smallscale reactor in the lab to prove that it works and that you are producing the material you are expecting to produce,” continues Bonner. “But then you have to scale that all the way up.”
“Phenomena that occur at small scales may differ when scaled up to tens or hundreds of thousands of litres,” adds Jacomo Corbo, PhysicsX CEO. More than a third of researchers (35%) say the
insights they gain in the lab are simply not usable at such scale.
The process of physically moving the discoveries from lab to manufacturing is the next significant challenge, continues Corbo, “because it involves sequential stages of testing and validation, which is both slow and laborious.” This is particularly true in risk-sensitive industries such as energy, where products have to demonstrate reliability under real-world conditions before they can be safely scaled, let alone widely adopted.
VSParticle has developed
Take hydrogen compression, for example – a key component in hydrogen fuel cells, one of the most promising clean energy solutions. This relies on mechanical seals made of advanced materials that can handle both the size of the world’s smallest molecule and its high speeds. “Developing such products requires long, rigorous and extensive testing to prove their compatibility and performance,” explains Mike Eason, CTO at John Crane in Oxford, UK. The seals are just one part of the process – different advanced materials are then needed for different stages, and for a growing range of applications, making the challenge exponentially hard.
This creates timelines that are untenable in a world in need of rapid, scalable solutions. It also causes costs to spiral. Almost a fifth of average R&D budgets in the UK alone are dedicated to testing and analysis, and globally the annual R&D budget for advanced materials and chemicals recently surpassed $41.6bn.
“Protracted timelines make it difficult to acquire consistent funding,” according to GlobalData analyst Isabel Al-Dhahir. “[This is] particularly from private investors who seek quick returns. Plus, the risk associated with materials innovation is heightened due to the necessity for regulatory approvals. This can make such advanced materials prohibitively expensive to produce, and only possible at small volumes.”
Thankfully, just as there have been significant breakthroughs on the AI side,
we are now seeing equally transformative advances in the synthesis and testing stages – often with different technologies working in tandem to help clear the bottlenecks.
Taking materials from lab to fab involves three key steps – discovery, analysis and deployment. The discovery step is well covered: AI models predict which materials perform best for different use cases. Yet these candidates need to be turned into physical materials that can be tested in the real world.
Historically, this has relied on techniques such as wet chemistry, which involves researchers dissolving compounds in liquids, mixing reactants and tightly controlling temperature and pressure to trigger reactions. Each step needs such precision that even minor errors can cause scientists to start over. Once the ideal reaction occurs, the material often needs to be dried and purified before researchers can even get a usable sample. This process takes weeks or even months, and has to be repeated for every iteration.
To expedite this, VSParticle has developed the world’s first and only nanoprinter designed to bridge the discovery and development gap. Using a process called spark ablation, its VSP-P1 nanoprinter transforms materials into nanoparticles in seconds. Two electrodes, made from the material being tested, are placed close together. A high-energy electrical spark then vaporises the material into nanoparticles,
which can be deposited onto thin, nanoporous films ready for testing.
SPEED TEST
The convergence of different technologies and approaches working together to clear the advanced materials bottlenecks is behind the rise of self-driving labs – labs that bring the benefits of AI, robotics and automation together to run thousands of experiments at the same time. Instead of testing materials in isolation, selfdriving labs combine tools to create, test and analyse multiple material samples in parallel. This not only speeds up the process but also generates vast amounts of data, which feed back into AI systems to refine predictions. The integration of discovery, synthesis and analysis allows researchers to move much faster, getting rid of many of the delays caused by traditional trial-and-error methods, and meaning they can innovate at the pace needed to meet growing demands and tackle our most urgent challenges.
“Unlike traditional multi-step, wet chemical methods, our approach is faster, cleaner and doesn’t require complex set-ups or lengthy drying times,” says van Vugt. It gives researchers greater control over particle size – something that is extremely difficult to achieve with wet chemistry – and helps researchers finetune the material’s different properties for specific applications. Yet one of the most significant advantages of the nanoprinter is its scalability. In a recent collaboration with Meta AI and the University of Toronto, the trio simulated, synthesised and tested 525 materials in months. This would have previously taken years. Companies such as Thermo Fisher Scientific in the US are leading the way in analysing the properties and performance of such physical samples. By combining scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and energydispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDS), its ChemiSEM Technology creates detailed images of each material’s surface, revealing structures such as cracks, grains or layers at a nanometre level. EDS then bombards these samples with electrons, which cause the material to emit X-rays. These X-rays carry a unique ‘fingerprint’ that reveals elements present in the material – such as carbon, iron or chlorine – and their exact locations. Together, these techniques help researchers see both what a material looks like and what it is made of in order to understand how it performs.
“It removes a lot of the barriers
for industrial researchers who aren’t specialists in advanced microscopy,” explains Chris Stephens, product marketing manager at Thermo Fisher. “Take, for example, the research, process control and failure analysis procedures that go into producing lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles [EVs]. Our technology helps scientists identify contaminants that could accelerate cell degradation in order to ensure the cells are safe and last longer.”
The VSP-1 printer, Thermo Fisher’s ChemiSEM technology and a growing number of breakthroughs in this space are individually, as well as collectively, helping researchers save time and money, and make sense of their materials faster. They are also, critically, helping to improve the data being fed into machine learning models at the discovery stage.
“Rubbish in, rubbish out. This is a common phrase used by people to highlight the importance of high-quality data, which can drive true innovation
Left is a ChemiSEM image of an NMC (lithium nickel manganese cobalt oxide) battery electrode. The contribution of the energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy information (bottom) highlights the presence of Zr contaminants in the matrix of the electrode. This would have otherwise gone unnoticed, as the compositional contrast in the concentric backscatter image (top) is insufficient to see the presence of unknown elements.
in the manufacturing sector,” says Nic Leszczynski, principal solutions engineer UKI at Riverbed Technology.
“We know data that’s inconsistent, fragmented or incomplete can significantly hinder progress. These issues make it difficult for AI systems to generate accurate insights, leading to delays in decision-making and time to market.”
Thermo
Fisher Scientific’s Apreo ChemiSEM System
And this will become even more important as material science advances further. “Replicating conditions across industrial sectors is critical,” says Corbo. “As we move toward larger, pre-trained models that understand broader physics and can be fine-tuned for specific applications, generating the foundational data will be a key requirement.”
These innovations, working in tandem, have far-reaching implications for clean energy systems. Electrocatalysts, for example, are at the heart of many energy conversion processes, and were the key focus of VSParticle’s collaboration with Meta. Traditional catalysts rely on expensive and rare materials, but with faster synthesising and analysis researchers can find and test more abundant, cost-effective alternatives. Similarly, ChemiSEM has been used to better understand materials used in LED lighting, wind turbines, EV batteries and more, and PhysicsX’s work spans applications such as aluminium and copper production. It recently launched a free AI platform for aerospace engineers to help them investigate millions of different aerospace concepts in hours. This all sees us stood on the brink of a new era. AI is supercharging discovery; companies are willing and ready to deploy the best candidates at scale. We just need to finally clear the synthesis bottleneck that has held progress in this sector – and in our climate change efforts – back for decades. That is why the advances in this space offer more than a technological leap – they are a watershed moment to shape the future of our planet.
The concept behind this laptop seems so obvious it’s a wonder no one has done it before: a suite of solar panels are built into the lid that Lenovo says convert enough direct sunlight in 20 minutes to power up to an hour of video playback. But you have to consider the logic of leaving a laptop – which is powered by a lithium-ion battery – in the sun to charge. Not yet commercially available, but Lenovo demonstrated prototypes at the Consumer Electronics Show in January.
From $349 (£270)
Al fresco tech this issue includes smart cycling glasses, a solarpowered laptop, and a powerpacked smartphone that doubles as a campsite projector
Start-up firm BleeqUp has jammed as much tech into these cycling glasses as it can. The camera can record an hour of cycling footage in between charges, while speakers along the arms allow for music without reducing your ability to hear the road. The AI can supposedly highlight important moments from your ride without needing to sift through the full video. A battery pack can be mounted to a helmet to provide four more hours of filming.
€279 (£234)
With its hefty size and up to 15 days of battery life, Honor’s latest smartwatch could pair quite nicely with the WP100 (right). The watch promises a suite of sensors capable of comprehensive sleep and fitness tracking, although the inclusion of a proprietary OS means third-party app support will be very limited. The bezel is made with a grade 5 titanium case and the screen is covered with sapphire crystal for extra hardiness. While its chunky design will look great on thick, masculine wrists, spindlyarmed journalists may want to choose something smaller and more refined.
T
£259
This decidedly gamer-orientated keyboard boasts the standard array of customisable LED lights and hot-swappable keys. It even includes a little LED screen for selecting various settings, alongside the standard array of media controls. The MX 8.3 has an impressive key polling rate of up to 4,000Hz to reduce split-second input lag that could make the difference in a multiplayer match. However, the gaudy LED design may not appeal to non-gamers.
$599 (£464)
Oukitel has gone in completely the other direction to slimmer and slimmer phones: the WP100 is roughly four times the thickness of a standard smartphone, needed to store the huge 33,000mAh battery. The back doubles up as a camping lamp, and a 100 lumen DLP projector allows users to watch movies outdoors.
LWORDS JACK LOUGHRAN
The device has been stripped back in various ways compared with the latest generation iPhone 16 to meet the less expensive £599 price point. This includes dropping support for MagSafe charging, eliminating the ultra-wide camera and omitting some niche features such as Camera Control.
With the inclusion of the latest generation A18 chip, which is paired with 8GB RAM, it’s clear that Apple is prioritising support for its nascent AI features over all else, even on its lowercost devices.
ike the previous SE models before it, the cheaper iPhone 16e borrows from earlier designs – namely taking the dimensions and display from the 2022 iPhone 14 rather than the more modern ‘Dynamic Island’ approach seen on more recent handsets.
But the most interesting new addition for a handset that otherwise walks a well-trodden path is the inclusion of the Apple C1 modem. Despite Apple excelling in developing its own systems on chips (SoCs) for well over a decade, Qualcomm has always been relied upon to provide the modems – until now.
The C1 shows that Apple finally believes its in-house design is capable enough to be used in production devices, even if it omits some advanced features such as
mmWave support that allows for the fastest data rates and lowest latency currently available. It’s rumoured that Apple has spent a decade or more designing the C1 after making some key acquisitions of chip designers PA Semi and Infineon in 2008 and 2011 respectively.
Reviewers have noted that the chip is slightly more power-efficient than Qualcomm’s alternatives, even if it’s not as performant. Anecdotal evidence also suggests it suffers from higher signal loss compared with the latest generation iPhone 16.
But turning to the teardown itself, iFixit has confirmed that the internals have been updated to match the more repair-friendly design of recent iPhone models. This includes a battery adhesive that releases once exposed to an electrical current. To demonstrate, the iFixit team simply hooked up some alligator clips supplying 9–30V DC to the conductive tab and the battery was free in seconds.
Nevertheless, they lamented the removal of MagSafe – the wireless charging feature that ensures the device is firmly aligned with a Qipowered pad. This system ensures maximum efficiency, helping with
charging speed while keeping excess heat to a minimum. High temperatures, in particular, damage batteries over time, and iFixit expressed concern this could have an impact on longevity for those who choose to charge their phones wirelessly.
Apple has also introduced a repair feature for the USB-C charging port (another minor upgrade from the SE) in a bid to adhere to stricter right-to-repair laws in the EU.
Elsewhere, the SE’s home button has finally been ditched, which is described as ‘a repairability win’ as it was one of the highest wear and tear components found
on the previous model. This also helps to reduce the potential for water and dust damage to the internals.
Overall, iFixit awards the 16e a score of 7/10 for repairability, praising the decision to bring much of the easier disassembly design from recent models and being wowed by the ease of removing the battery with the electrically triggered adhesive. Nevertheless, it loses points for the complexity of replacing the USB-C port, which is inevitably one of the most likely components to be damaged. The higher price is also a detractor, making it difficult to recommend upgrading from the SE.
Tracking the early stage developments: this issue we look at nanofiltration membranes, nanocatalysts and batteries made from nuclear waste
Lab: Vienna University of Technology (TU Wien), Austria
What: Using recovered nickel from spent batteries to create a nanocatalyst that produces methane
Stage: TRL-1
Battery waste poses a serious environmental threat. Nickel-metal hydride (Ni-MH) and lithium-ion batteries, for instance, consist erent components that if not disposed of properly can lead to chemical leaks, fires and pollution. While recycling and recovery processes for these batteries are technologically challenging, a team of researchers at TU Wien have developed a method that not only recovers nickel from spent Ni-MH batteries, but then uses that nickel to produce a nanocatalyst that converts CO2 into methane.
The extracted nickel is combined with recovered alumina from used aluminium foil. These materials are then converted into a highperformance nanocatalyst using green chemistry methods.
“Our nanocatalyst consists of 92-96% aluminium oxide and 4-8% nickel, which is optimal for converting the greenhouse gas CO2 together with hydrogen into methane,” said Professor Günther Rupprechter from the Institute of Materials Chemistry at TU Wien, head of the research project.
The process requires neither high pressure nor high temperatures; the catalyst works at atmospheric pressure and an easily achievable temperature of 250°C.
The researchers say this method provides an environmentally friendly way of converting CO2 into a valuable fuel.
“Now we want to investigate how this process can be scaled up for technological applications. We believe that this approach can transform sustainable fuel production,” said Rupprechter.
Lab: Ohio State University and Ohio State’s Nuclear Reactor Laboratory, US
What: Battery that converts atomic waste into electricity via light emission
Stage: TRL-2
Nuclear power plants create radioactive waste, the safe disposal of which can be challenging.
Using a combination of scintillator crystals, high-density materials that emit light when they absorb radiation and solar cells, researchers from Ohio State University have created a battery that harvests ambient gamma radiation to produce a strong electric output.
To test the 4cm3 battery, the researchers used two different radioactive sources, cesium-137, from spent nuclear fuel, and isotope cobalt-60, a nuclear activation product.
The battery was tested at Ohio State’s Nuclear Reactor Laboratory (NRL). The results revealed that with cesium-137, the battery generated 288 nanowatts. Yet with isotope cobalt-60, the battery produced 1.5 microwatts of power, enough to switch on a tiny sensor.
“We’re harvesting something considered as waste, and by nature, trying to turn it into treasure,” said Raymond Cao, professor in mechanical and aerospace engineering at Ohio State and director of the NRL.
WORDS TANYA WEAVER
While the power output is very small, the researchers believe the battery could be substantially scaled up to provide kilowatts of power.
Located where the nuclear waste is produced, such as in nuclear waste storage pools, the battery could generate power on-site.
“This process is still in its preliminary stages, but the next step involves generating greater watts with scaleup constructs,” said Ibrahim Oksuz, research associate in mechanical and aerospace engineering at Ohio State.
The researchers believe this battery has potential for use in both the energy production and sensors industry.
Further research will assess the batteries’ usefulness and limitations, including how long they might last once safely implemented.
For more on this area of research, see ‘Diamond batteries are forever’ on p42.
Technology
Readiness Levels (TRLs) is a scale developed by Nasa to categorise how advanced new technologies are, and this scale has been adopted by the R&D community. TRL goes up to level 9 –a proven marketready product.
But this column looks at the early stages. Full TRL explanation here:
Lab: Department of Chemical Engineering, University of Bath, UK
What: Sustainable plant-based nanofiltration membrane
Stage: TRL-4
Nanofiltration (NF) membranes are widely used in a variety of industries including water, food, pharmaceutical, chemical and petrochemical.
With pore diameters between one and 10 nanometers, these membranes filter away the smallest of particles.
Commercial NF membranes are manufactured using fossil fuel-derived materials and toxic solvents, particularly polymers.
While chemical engineers have focused on improving membrane performance, there is now an increasing urgency to switch to more sustainable manufacturing alternatives.
This is driven by regulatory frameworks, especially in the EU, which has banned several traditional solvents under the Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemicals (REACH) regulation.
Chemical engineers at the University of Bath have been researching an approach that focuses on both performance and sustainability.
Using two biopolymers – cellulose and lignin –they created a polyelectrolyte membrane that was fabricated via a layer-by-layer method, with water as the sole solvent and on a polyethersulfone support.
The thickness of the membrane can also be controlled, allowing its permeance characteristics to be tuned to the application.
During testing, the membrane effectively filtered water dyes of a range of different molecular weights, representing different pollutants’ sizes.
The membrane’s performance also remained stable after 30 days in water, proving its durability.
As such, the researchers say it could be used in water purification and wastewater treatment, particularly in the removal of PFAS or ‘forever chemicals’.
“The potential of this technology to reduce environmental impacts is particularly crucial, especially in light of upcoming EU legislation to curb the use of toxic solvents, and the proposed bans on fluorinated polymers in membrane manufacturing,” said Olawumi Sadare, a Royal Society Newton fellow in Bath’s Department of Chemical Engineering.
The research team have applied for patent protection for the technology and say they are taking steps toward commercialising the membrane.
Concrete is second only to water as the world’s most consumed resource and is the most widely used material in existence. And the history of cement, the glue that sticks all that concrete together, is far more exciting than you might think.
Hydraulic cements – cements that can set in wet conditions – are almost as old as building itself. Roman architect Vitruvius commented on the astonishing properties of cement made from the pozzolana volcanic ash found around Vesuvius that set even underwater, allowing the building of the quays, wharves and harbours that helped to forge the Roman empire, not to mention the huge dome of the Pantheon in Rome itself. Not that the Romans had invented the idea. The Greeks had for some time been using tuff from Thera (modern Santorini) as their pozzolana.
But it is really in the 18th century that the cement story takes off, powered by the needs of the Industrial Revolution. The first person to start experimenting with hydraulic cements was probably John Smeaton, who had a very good reason for needing it. He was building the third Eddystone Lighthouse off the coast of Cornwall, UK, and needed a concrete that would set in the 12 hours between tides. But while his experiments may have been the first step in modern cement production, he didn’t follow them up.
That job fell to James Parker, who in the 1780s was working on the thorny problem of how to provide materials in a building boom when there was a shortage of stone. His answer was to make buildings of brick and then cover them with a stucco of what he labelled ‘Roman cement’. This had nothing to do with the stuff that built the Pantheon, but it sounded good. His process entailed burning nodules of clay and calcium carbonate that were then ground into a powder and mixed with sand. This cement set in about 15 minutes and looked a lot like stone if you didn’t get too close, sparking a cement boom as competitors started experimenting with artificial hydraulic lime cements made of clay and chalk. They would have just copied Parker’s recipe if they could, but he wisely patented it.
The hard work of inventive engineers led to the ubiquitous building material we know today
WORDS JUSTIN POLLARD
The material we would call cement today, Portland cement, only emerged in the 19th century and its origins are still somewhat disputed. James Frost had been supplying Roman cement to the UK government but wanted to find a cheaper way to make it, so he began wet grinding clay from the River Medway with local chalk and burning the resulting fine slurry in a kiln. In 1822, he patented this method as the very patriotic ‘British cement’.
Two years later, the man considered the father of modern cement, Joseph Aspdin, patented a similar material but one that looked a lot more like the expensive limestone that came from the Dorset quarries at Portland. Aspdin’s material is not what we would today call Portland cement (even though he did) and it would be his somewhat wayward son that would make the next step towards the modern material. William Aspdin was a bit of a loose cannon, so much so that in 1841 his father expelled him from their business and put a notice in the press saying he would not be responsible for his son’s spending or debts. William responded by setting up his own cement works and seems in the process to have accidentally produced the calcium silicates needed for modern cement. I say accidentally as there is no record of him experimenting methodically to improve his father’s formula. Indeed, even though he made a better cement, he not only didn’t patent it but insisted it was the same recipe as his father’s.
The differences in his method also seemed rather counterintuitive. He used more lime and a higher kiln temperature – both increasing costs. The clinker this process produces was also extremely hard and quickly wore out the millstones used to grind it. But it was undoubtedly superior, setting slow enough to be manageable but quickly hardening into something far stronger than his father’s mix.
As the superior properties of his material proved themselves, however, he realised that he would have to at least make a show of doing something alternative with
his mix, even though he doesn’t seem to have known what he was doing different. So, as each batch was about to be put in the kiln, he would emerge from his office and scatter crystals of copper sulphate and powdered limestone over the mix – something he claimed was the ‘secret ingredient’ that made his cement so superior. To add to the mystery, he had six-metre-high walls built around his factory.
This rather caught the attention of Isaac Johnson, who had studied chemistry while working at a Roman cement plant so knew a lot more about what was happening in the industry than William Aspdin did. He may even have been aware of French engineer Louis Vicat’s work on the chemistry of cement. But he didn’t have
the secret and Aspdin was certainly not going to tell him, so Johnson, a diligent experimenter and a Strict and Particular Baptist, went about deconstructing Aspdin’s cement and reformulating it. In the process, he discovered that by sintering the cement mix in the kiln he could make a better material that gained strength earlier in the setting process. With this new mix he declared himself the ‘father of Portland cement’ – much to the fury of William Aspdin, who thought he had the title although he wasn’t quite sure how, and no doubt his father, who must have also thought that he invented it.
William Aspdin brought various wild charges against Johnson, claiming he had stolen the recipe, but as his own recipe was something of an accident that even he didn’t really understand and, owing to some unfortunate problems with a couple of bankruptcies, William eventually decamped to Germany, pursued by creditors, where he died aged 48. Johnson was left to claim the laurels, taking over his rival’s plant and becoming one of the main players in the cement industry up to 1911, when the company was sold to Blue Circle.
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WORDS HILARY LAMB
Dear Evil Engineer,
In 2021, I left the comfort of employment at a private security provider to found my own start-up, SNAKE.LY. For too long, the assassination sector has been a seedy space with no industry standards to speak of. SNAKE.LY aims to revolutionise the sector with an innovative end-toend service to assassinate anyone, anywhere, with a bite of the world’s most venomous snake: the inland taipan.
SNAKE.LY breeds the highest-quality taipans and delivers them to any address in the world, where sooner or later they deliver a fatal bite to the target.
Of course, no startup journey is without its obstacles. We began by delivering the snakes by hand, with each snake taken to the address in a tank and pushed
through the letterbox with a pair of extra-long tongs. Unfortunately, the snakes always put up a struggle, which often led to the contractor dying and the target staying alive. SNAKE.LY switched to delivering the snakes in an anonymous cardboard package. This caused fewer HR problems, but several targets refused to accept the package and I was forced to issue refunds to several dissatisfied clients.
Thankfully, I am awash with venture capital cash, and I would like to use some of this capital to develop an automated delivery solution that puts an end to my loss of snakes, contractors and customer satisfaction. Could you suggest how to proceed?
Yours, A venomous villain
Dear villain,
A much-needed service! I look forward to being able to order an assassination with peace of mind – you never know what kind of service you are going to get these days.
As to your question, this sounds to me like a job for a specialist delivery drone. Delivery drones are designed to transport things – often medical supplies such as blood or vaccines – directly to the recipient, usually providing a ‘last mile’ service. They can parachute their payload, lower it with a tether or land it safely. It’s not unheard of for drones to be used to deliver small animals, such as with an experimental ‘eco drone’ for dispersing ladybirds over crops to eat aphids and other pests.
Your drone would need to be fitted with a lightweight container featuring a simple mechanism for opening on command and depositing the snake at the address. There are several commercially available drones you could use as the basis for this – for example, the delivery drone model presented by Wing last year can carry
THIS MONTH, THE EVIL ENGINEER ADVISES A BUSINESS FOUNDER WITH A SOFT SPOT FOR THE SERPENTINE
more than 2.2kg in weight, which is more than enough for an inland taipan.
The difficulty, as you well know, is getting the snake inside the target’s house. For houses with chimneys, this is simple enough – a skilled drone operator or reliable image recognition algorithm could align the drone with the chimney before depositing the snake. Similarly, they could manoeuvre into the house through a large, open sash window. But what to do in other situations?
I’m pleased to say that the technology already exists to break into houses via drone. US-based BRINC Drones makes devices to assist with policing operations, and its Lemur 2 model has just what we need – a feature designed for breaking windows so that the drone can enter buildings that may be unsafe for police officers. It uses a tungstentoothed blade that spins at up to 30,000rpm, breaking through tempered, automotive and residential glass.
The Lemur 2 is a brilliant device, but it is not suitable for your application, in part because it can only carry a payload of 0.45kg. However, as its windowbreaking blade is an add-on feature that is attached to the front of the drone with three screws, I suggest that you acquire one and attach it to a specialist delivery drone. This would give you a remote-controlled drone capable of carrying a snake to the target’s address and – if no chimney or open window is available – breaking a window, entering and dropping the snake inside.
It can hardly be said to vanish without a trace, but it would do the job – and the whole scene is less likely to be captured on camera than any kind of front-door delivery.
Best of luck with your villainous venture. I’d better start thinking about whom to send my first snake with SNAKE.LY!.
Yours, The Evil Engineer
Well done writing about nuclear power (vol 20 issue 1).
Nuclear is the future of electricity generation and has been sadly neglected. Why? Because my generation is scared stiff ofnuclear war, ran protests and demonstrations – and made horror films.
The nuclear safety bodies revelled in this in the 1960s and came up with two ridiculous criteria. The first was that ‘all radiation down to zero is harmful’. The second was nuclear stations were to be built to ALARA – ‘as low as reasonably achievable’.
The first nearly killed off radiation being used by the medical profession because of the word
‘harmful’. Luckily, this was quietly ignored, and many people have benefited hugely from radiation treatment. The second, ALARA, was wishful thinking as we did not have instruments that could measure radiation accurately down to zero.
Humans have lived with radiation and adapted. It is high time the nuclear safety for power stations was brought up to date. Sensible radiation values must be made to cut some of the extremely high costs of meeting the criteria of ‘all radiation down to zero is harmful’ that is being built into the costs of electricity.
We need more facts about nuclear electricity in the public domain to cure this phobia. Mike Travers FIET
Over the last few years I have seen a number of articles (including Talk Back, vol 20 issue 2) about the positive side of SMRs [small modular reactors], but there is one downside I haven’t seen mentioned in the public domain.
How much of a military risk would they create? Effectively, SMRs would place deposits of radioactive material around the country as a target for hostile agents (foreign countries or terrorists) at times of unrest. How easy would it be to use explosives to compromise their security, releasing radioactive materials into the environment?
Ove num vol of S the me H the pla aro hos terr eas to c rele T nat the brin
This risk is compounded by the nature of SMRs in that, by design, they may be sited close to users, bringing the risk to where it could do most damage.
NJ Sellwood
Your article ‘The return of AI’s forgotten children’ (vol 20 issue 1) makes a very sound argument for integrating a GOFAI [Good OldFashioned AI] basics strategy with the current large language modelstyle AI strategies mix. Improved ‘predictability and transparency’ across AI platform offerings will no doubt be welcomed by all users. This especially applies to business users as they face the challenge of gradually incorporating the most cost-effective AI platforms across their whole organisations to boost and sustain company operational and economic performance.
Something any company would be well advised to consider before jumping onto the present-day AI platform mix bandwagon is a corporate AI strategy to address the following: where across the organisation is AI likely to be most
In response to Bob Cooper’s letter (vol 20 issue 1), where he proclaims that ‘it would be best if everyone understands, practically, that steel can only be made starting with a blast furnace’, I would like to turn his attention to northern Sweden. There Stegra (formerly H2 Green Steel) is constructing a 740MW electrolysis, DRI and arc furnace plant using northern Sweden’s abundant hydro and wind power and hydrogen expertise to
beneficial? What AI platform offerings best suit the identified workplace locations? What is their most practical acquisition and implementation sequence? What types of staff training should be set up, covering topics ranging from normal AI/interface working to platform irregularity emergency handling? What corporate regulations need to be put in place to ensure all implemented AI platforms achieve two complementary aims? No matter how any company delves into handling the above and similar issues, it will have least in principle followed a ‘look before you leap’ path into the far-from-stable AI marketplace. Thereby, this
produce steel that is over 95% carbonfree, removing seven million tonnes of CO2 from the steel industry each year. The region has even bigger plans from the mining giant LKAB, which – with Vattenfall and SSAB – is planning around 5GW of electrolyser capacity for the same purpose. So, like much transformative change, Sweden is leading the way, and hopefully it will arrive in the UK soon.
Peter
Haigh BA BEng MSc CEng MIET
greatly raises the chance of not only jumping on the AI bandwagon but riding along in a safe and trustworthy way.
George H Kelly MIET
I am always pleased to receive my copy of E+T – there are always absorbing articles with which to challenge my attitude to life in Great Britain and the world.
The last few volumes have seen an increase in articles discussing the impact of AI and robots. All of them consider the technology and its impact on society, industry, the home and the military.
As I am also a diligent reader of ‘Dear Evil Engineer’, it occurs to me that, while the ups and downs of AI and robots have been addressed, they mostly seem to consider whether they are generally a good or bad thing for society in terms of their impact on employment.
But what about the potential impact on crime? AI will inevitably find its way into the hands of criminals and despots – so what are we doing as a society to prepare for the misuse of robots and AI?
For example, if sometime soon there is a splintering crash of glass as my front door is kicked in by a robotic boot in the middle of the night, what protection do I have? Will the police immediately tell me that no crime has been committed if the robot owner says it was an accident? Is it incumbent on me to prove that the responsibility is theirs and not the originator of said robot and its in-built AI?
What if I catch it as it swiftly removes my 96.5-inch AI colour television and disable it with a well-aimed blow from my non-AI baseball bat? Will I then be arrested for criminal damage against another person’s property?
In short, is anyone looking at all the potential criminal implications of various less constructive applications of AI and robotics? We know that it will happen. Are we prepared – or at least looking at the possibilities so that we are able to prepare? Over to you, other readers of our wonderful magazine. Or possibly the ‘Evil Engineer’!
Cllr PR Smith BA CEng FIET FInstMC
Tanya Weaver looks back at the fiery end of the airship era, the longest bridge in the world, and performances plagued by spectres
88 YEARS AGO
On 6 May 1937, the Hindenburg airship spectacularly went up in flames when it tried to dock with its mooring mast in Lakehurst, New Jersey, US.
The world’s press was out in force for this momentous occasion but rather than the triumph it was meant to be – marking the commencement of a transatlantic passenger service to North America – it has gone down in history as ‘the Hindenburg disaster’, which killed 35 of the 97 people on board.
The well-documented explosion was seared into people’s consciousnesses and put a nail in the coffin of what was hoped to be the age of airships (although a renaissance is under way now).
At 245 metres long and powered by four reversible 890kW diesel engines for a maximum speed of 135km/h, this cruise liner of the skies heralded the start of luxury air travel.
The airship was originally designed for helium as its operator, the German Zeppelin Airline Company, was all too aware of the dangers of using 200,000 cubic metres of highly flammable hydrogen gas for lift.
But with the US banning the export of helium to conserve it for use in its navy airships, it was decided that hydrogen would be used – despite the risks.
Having embarked on its maiden flight on 4 March 1936, all was going swimmingly until that fateful day.
362
YEARS AGO
88
YEARS AGO
362 YEARS AGO
The Theatre Royal Drury Lane is known to be London’s oldest theatre still in continuous use, opening on 7 May 1663.
14 YEARS AGO
In 2011, the 164.8km-long Danyang–Kunshan Grand Bridge in China received the Guinness World Record for the world’s longest bridge, a title it still holds today.
The bridge is located on the rail line between Shanghai and Nanjing in Jiangsu province, and was built by 10,000 workers in just four years, at a cost of $8.5bn.
It elevates the railway line 100 metres above the ground, much like a viaduct.
The 9km section across Yangcheng Lake was built on top of 2,000 pillars, steel cables and a 450,000ton steel structure to withstand typhoons and earthquakes.
14
YEARS AGO
This is not strictly true, however, as the original theatre burnt down, as did the two theatres built in its place. The current, fourth, theatre opened in 1812.
As well as the oldest, it is also deemed the world’s most haunted theatre. A resident ghost, known as the Man in Grey, makes an appearance during matinees in a long, grey coat and tricorn hat. Legend has it that during renovations in the 1840s, a skeleton with a knife through its heart was discovered on the spot where the ghost disappears. I wonder why he chooses matinees in particular?
By the end of 2025, Volklec will begin production of its lithium-ion cylindrical battery cells from its Coventry facility – with plans to build a 10GWh £1bn gigafactory by the end of the decade serving the automotive, aerospace, marine and off-highway sectors.
E+T talks to Phil Popham, executive director at Volklec – who previously led brands including Jaguar Land Rover and Lotus Cars through periods of transformation and growth – about the start-up’s approach to scale
Volklec executive director Phil Popham is the first to admit that manufacturing batteries is extremely challenging. It is something he came across in his role as CEO of Lotus Cars a few years ago.
He says: “We were moving towards electrification, and I was quite naive as to how technical the chemistry and the technology is, and how difficult it is to not only engineer but to manufacture.
“If you try to do everything upfront on your own, it will take a significant period of time and investment before you even get into generating revenue.”
The collapse of battery start-ups Britishvolt and Northvolt are testament to just how challenging it is. But Volklec hopes to succeed where others have failed due to its pragmatic, low-risk approach to getting its products to market quickly.
Popham’s involvement with Volklec started with a discussion with its two founders, brothers Imran and Sameer Khatri, who both come from finance and accountancy backgrounds. With no technical know-how in-house but an aspiration to produce very technical products at scale, they had to come up with the right model to be successful.
Popham says: “First and foremost, we had to identify the market. And I’m very confident there is a definite need for an independent, British-based producer of battery cells.
“Manufacturers in the small to medium sector – both in automotive and specialist applications in marine, off-highway and aerospace – are concerned about surety and security of supply moving forward.”
Setting up any business is no mean feat – but one that plans to go from zero to gigafactory-scale in less than five years is quite an undertaking. This is exactly what UK battery start-up Volklec has set out to do
Having identified the market, they then had to decide on the technology to serve that market. Cylindrical cells using NMC (lithium nickel manganese cobalt oxides) chemistry seemed the obvious choice given its benefits in terms of energy density, size and weight.
The next step was finding a proven technology partner and a manufacturing partner to build these cells. “In keeping with our pragmatic and quick route to market approach, we decided that we needed a facility that already exists,” says Popham.
The facility they chose is the UK Battery Industrialisation Centre (UKBIC), which is a vast hangar on the outskirts of Coventry. It provides university labs, inventors and corporate R&D departments with labs, production lines and cell assembly facilities. Volklec signed the manufacturing agreement
with UKBIC last year to utilise the current 100MWh line to produce its energy cell, with a view to increase capacity.
The last piece in the puzzle was the technology. Earlier this year, Volklec signed a technology contract with substantial Asian battery supplier Far East Battery (FEB).
Popham says: “It’s not just a licence agreement to use their technology, which is already in production in China at a very high yield and very high quality – it is also a knowledge transfer agreement.
“We have a number of FEB senior process engineers and manufacturing engineers in UKBIC right now starting this process knowledge transfer to help us to successfully replicate what they do to get our production underway by the end of the year.
“We also have access to their supply base at the prices that they’re paying as well. That gives us a huge cost advantage as we ramp up production over the next two or three years. We will look to then localise that supply base back into Europe and in the UK.”
However, Volklec is not locked into only using FEB’s technology. In the future, it may decide to move to other battery chemistries or work with other tech partners.
“I think between now and the end of the decade we will be successful with that cell technology, but what we actually end up engineering and building for our independent gigafactory next decade will be dependent upon consumer demands and tech breakthroughs in the sector,” says Popham.
‘Manufacturers in the small to medium sector – both in automotive and specialist applications in marine, off-highway and aerospace – are concerned about surety and security of supply moving forward’
“But for now, this partnership with FEB gives us the ability to prove our technology, get it into production and start generating revenue quite quickly.
“So rather than doing everything all at the same time with no revenue, we’ve got some real logical stepping stones, which is what investors and customers want in terms of confidence that we’re still going to be here in five years’ time.”
This stepping-stone approach will also be applied to recruitment. While Volklec has said it will employ over 1,000 people, this will ramp up over time as production
of the cells moves from a dedicated line at UKBIC to its own gigafactory.
“We’re building up the skill base around us, but in these early stages the majority of that expertise will be supplemented by our technical partner and our manufacturing partner.
“But as we progress, we want to be a catalyst to encourage the whole ecosystem to develop – everything from supply chain through to skills and training. That’s an important role we’ve got to play for the UK in this sector,” concludes Popham.
Browse our range of engineering vacancies from top employers to nd your ideal role and apply online. Opportunities in a range of roles, from electrical engineering to mechanical engineering.
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Without Francis Bacon, it’s unlikely that engineering as we know it would exist today. Bacon challenged the status quo and developed the scientific method. Now, proper experimentation backed up theory. This video takes a wry look at Bacon’s career, his legacy and his unusual demise!
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ISSN 1750-9637
SOPHIE LOCKYER
Welcome to the May-June issue of Member News magazine.
In this issue, we showcase our recent media coverage highlights, ranging from national news outlets including The Telegraph and Sky News, to regional radio stations and key trade publications.
We explore pioneering radar sensors for healthcare and technology with our A F Harvey Engineering Research Prize winner, Dr Changzhi Li, and find out how his innovations are improving wireless human-machine interfaces and smart living.
We highlight the recommendations we set out for the comprehensive spending review on strengthening the resilience and security of critical national infrastructure with IET policy manager Jayne Black.
In our latest member profiles, we get to know our newest international Honorary Fellow, Justina Ho, and find out how she became an inspirational role model to the next generation. We also meet Pakistan’s youngest chartered engineer who shares his journey of juggling a PhD, career and fatherhood, all while giving back to the engineering community. We celebrate International Women in Engineering Day by shining a spotlight on an incredible member, Dr Evona Teh, and we sit down with Cameron Bee to explore how volunteering has been a defining factor in his life and career.
Plus, we share details of our 2025 disability research project which hopes to enable us to better support underrepresented groups in STEM fields and build a more diverse workforce where a broad range of experiences, identities and perspectives can be heard.
As always, the success of Member News relies on the stories we are able to tell, and we want to showcase the incredible work our members and volunteers are doing to engineer a better world for us all. If you’d like to get in touch to share your stories, please email membernews@theiet.org – we’d love to hear from you!
And don’t forget, we’ll be exploring subjects featured in the magazine in more depth across our social channels, such as EngX, and we encourage you to join the conversation.
We hope you enjoy this issue.
Sophie Lockyer, Member News editor
Our press office is always looking for members who can represent the IET in the media and share expertise that makes sense of engineering and technology news to the public.
Journalists and news outlets regularly contact us in the hope of finding a subject expert to provide background information, a quote, or be interviewed for television or radio on a specific topic that’s being spoken about in the news. This could include explaining technical terms in simple digestible language.
The media is also always on the lookout for those working on new innovations that are making a wider impact to the public, or those who have faced adversity to succeed with a great story to tell.
Topics that come up time and time again include AI, cyber security, nuclear fusion energy, nuclear reactor design, heat pumps, hydrogen for home heating, hydrogen transport, smart and immersive technologies, smart cities, gigafactories, autonomous vehicles, aerospace, satellites, robotics, retrofit, and telecommunications – so we’d love to have more of our global membership be IET spokespeople.
As a press office, we offer support and guidance to all of our spokespeople when a media opportunity arises.
From a full briefing to providing key messages you can weave into an interview, we’re on hand every step of the way to support you. We also often get direct requests for specific spokespeople, helping to build your profile.
Chair of our Sustainability and Net Zero Policy Centre Professor Peter Bannister (pictured) said: “I’ve been asked to represent the IET on a fairly wide array of local and national mainstream media and I’ve had some brilliant experiences, always expertly supported by the IET’s Communications team. Personally, I really enjoy the chance to share the knowledge we have within the IET with broadcasters and their viewers and listeners.”
If you’d like to find out more about being an IET spokesperson, please contact membernews@theiet.org
Our head of policy, Stephanie Baxter, was quoted in The Telegraph talking about the need for the next generation to learn to use AI tools at an early age with computer courses being broader and to begin earlier in schools.
We’ve been hitting the headlines across a range of media outlets
Our FIRST® LEGO® League Regional Finals kicked off in March throughout the UK and Ireland. Seventy-four regional tournaments took place with more than 9,500 students participating in this year’s SUBMERGED season. The programme allows young people to experience engineering in action. It gives students the opportunity to get hands-on experience with robotics and design innovative solutions to real world problems, all while bringing excitement to STEM subjects. Programming, teamwork, problem-solving and communications skills have never been so much fun and give students an insight into the creative careers that the wonderful world of engineering offers.
IET president Sir Warren East spoke to BBC Radio 4 about the uplift in defence spending from an industry point of view. He discussed what this will mean for jobs, as well as the government’s industrial policy and how this will have a positive effect on the engineering industry as the technology transfers out to other sectors.
Friday 21 March saw an electrical substation fire cause a power outage at Heathrow airport, disrupting more than 1,000 flights.
We worked with six of our members and fellows to gather their insight for written comments, with our technical regulations manager Mark Coles speaking on the London Standard Tech and Science Daily Podcast, Channel 5 News and LBC News Radio.
Professor John Loughhead, IET fellow and past president, appeared on Sky News.
EQUALITY, DIVERSITY AND INCLUSION
Multiple local and regional media outlets covered the competition in their areas, including Ireland Live, Dublin Gazette, Offaly Independent, ITV West Country and Shields Gazette
This International Women’s Day (8 March) we opened entries for our 2025 Young Woman Engineer (YWE) of the Year Awards. Dr Evona Teh spoke to BBC Radio West Midlands about the important work we’re doing to encourage more women and girls to consider engineering as a career, and how vital women role models are in inspiring the next generation. You can find out more about Evona on page 97.
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Our research from last year on how we can make STEM fields more welcoming and diverse featured in more than 40 articles across regional and trade publications.
Technology has always played a leading role in improving healthcare, with the latest innovations increasingly revolutionising how we identify conditions and improve outcomes for patients.
One such innovation is the work of Dr Changzhi Li, who is pioneering the use of radar sensors to monitor people’s health without the need for traditional on-body devices. This work saw Dr Li recently awarded the IET’s prestigious £350,000 A F Harvey Engineering Research Prize, our most valuable research award.
The sensors Dr Li is working on could help to detect otherwise imperceptible changes to functions like heart rate and breathing, providing early identification and treatment of hard-to-spot health problems that could otherwise prove fatal.
How the tech works
“This technology can detect irregularities in breathing and heart rate, which are critical for diagnosing and treating conditions like sudden infant death syndrome and sleep apnoea,” explained Dr Li, a professor at Texas Tech University.
“Furthermore, it can measure heart sounds and blood pressure without having to be worn. Biomedical radar is also being explored to remotely measure people’s pulses and blood pressure. By monitoring these patterns, behaviours and activities without images that compromise privacy, we can also improve fall detection without patients having to wear any special devices which could come off or which they may forget to put on.”
One of the key benefits of Dr Li’s work is that it’s being developed to ensure it will be cheap to produce in the future, massively improving accessibility in a healthcare sector where breakthrough treatments can often be out of the price range of those who need them.
“My team is making the most of advanced semiconductor and packaging technologies, leveraging the fact that biomedical radar sensors can be integrated into a small silicon chip, and its antenna can be integrated in the package of the microchip. Therefore, the final products are low cost and can be widely deployed in daily life.”
The practical applications of this technology could see a device set up and
Dr Changzi Li was recently awarded our A F Harvey Engineering Research Prize for his pioneering work in biomedical radar sensors
then left in situ in a bedroom or living space, where it would monitor sleep, movements and other activity. This would prove more reliable and accurate than wearable devices, which are reliant on users remembering to put them on.
A decade ago, Dr Li used an early version of the technology mounted on the crib of his infant daughter to monitor her heart rate and breathing. While that device was able to provide useful, reassuring information, the technology has developed
much further since then, offering improved readings of greater accuracy while being available in much smaller devices that are easier to mount and use.
A further issue with wearable technology is measuring body patterns when regular activities like turning, a change in direction or moving can interrupt the data recording. Dr Li’s technology is utilising radio waves to help overcome these obstacles and provide more accurate readings.
“In the past, we have developed several methods to address these difficulties. For example, one solution used multiple radar modules to detect a human body from different angles, thereby cancelling out noise caused by random body motion. However, the problem remains only partially resolved, and this is the exact focus of our ongoing research, supported by this award.
with minimal energy consumption, reduced maintenance needs and lower operational costs.”
Dr Li’s busy schedule has resulted in him already having 14 patents, with a further trio awaiting approval. His innovations largely relate to hardware, software, and system techniques to enhance the detection accuracy.
“Our ongoing research involves utilising multiple low-cost radar sensor frontends, or ‘simple eyes’, enabled by advanced semiconductor technologies. These sensors capture data from slightly different angles and across various radio frequencies, allowing us to implement a ‘compound-eye’ strategy to integrate various information together. This will facilitate the development of advanced radio-frequency vision capable of accurately recording the most relevant information.”
Dr Li’s team is continuing to develop this technology, and he expects to see it coming to market to offer real-world benefits for patients in around five years.
Dr Li’s work will also have a number of other applications, such as improving energy efficiencies in smart homes to help users reduce their carbon footprint.
“Modern radar sensors are being developed to serve as non-contact human-computer interfaces, enabling remote gesture recognition for interaction between users and electronic devices. Radar sensors can track the number and activities of users, allowing smart systems for heating, ventilation, air conditioning and more to optimise energy usage.”
‘The ability to integrate radar sensors into a small semiconductor chip enhances their robustness and reduces maintenance requirements’
DR CHANGZHI LI
This advantage allows radar sensors to detect motion with greater sensitivity and accuracy, even in challenging environments where other sensors might struggle. The ability to integrate radar sensors into a small semiconductor chip enhances their robustness and reduces maintenance requirements.”
“For example, one patent used multiple radar circuits to detect different angles from a human body, in order to cancel out the noise induced by random body motion. Another patent addresses the algorithm to process radar detected data to efficiently extract the signal of interest.”
While he is looking forward to seeing the progress on his radar sensors work and the real-world benefits it will deliver, he is also eagerly anticipating developments in using radio frequencies to improve people’s vision.
“I’m excited about the minimisation and ‘compound-eye’ approach for radio frequency technologies, which could help people see the world in a different way. Hopefully, radio frequency can illustrate new information about the world around us.
They will also play a role in improving security and surveillance, offering a costeffective solution for motion-tracking and detecting suspicious objects. Their ability to detect unusual motion and activity is much higher than traditional methods, improving the distance and accuracy of such technology.
“Unlike traditional sensors, radar sensors use radio waves, which propagate freely through the air, enabling them to operate over longer non-contact ranges.
Another benefit of the technology is reduced power consumption, making it more viable to use continuously, compared with traditional ultrasonic motion sensors. They can detect motion through walls, obstacles, or in low-visibility conditions to further swell their value for security where range, reliability and accuracy are paramount.
“With these benefits, radar sensors are increasingly favoured in the next-generation surveillance systems, offering advanced detection capabilities
“The next steps to develop this technology includes hardware design and minimisation, algorithm development, experimental design and testing. I would like to explore radio frequency and millimetrewave technologies.”
Dr Li presented his work at a keynote lecture at the end of March which is available to view now on demand:
Dr Li’s work promises to deliver exciting outcomes in the years to come as it improves healthcare outcomes for patients, while also playing a pivotal role in improving smart homes and providing a big boost for the security sector too.
“I would like to express my sincere gratitude to the IET for this recognition.”
You can find out more about the A F Harvey Engineering Research Prize on our website.
We recently had the privilege of speaking with IET member and newly awarded honorary fellow Justina Ho. Justina’s journey has been nothing short of inspirational, and her dedication to STEM has earned her this prestigious recognition. However, as she humbly puts it, “Being a role model that inspires the next generation was never intentional.”
Growing up in a family of engineers, Justina was introduced to the world of engineering from a young age. This early experience inspired her passion, which led her to explore computer engineering at school in Canada. At the time, computing was still in its infancy, so she took it upon herself to learn and master the subject.
Justina went on to obtain an impressive academic portfolio, earning a BMath in computer science and information systems, a Bachelor of Laws, and an MSc in engineering business management. Her expertise was further solidified when she trained with IBM Canada before working as a software engineer at the Hong Kong Productivity Council.
Today, Justina is the owner of several companies, including an engineering consultancy firm, an
IT consultancy firm and a talent cultivation organisation. She also served as the executive director of Hong Kong’s Institute of Big Data Governance until 2021.
As part of the Hong Kong Local Network (HKLN), she was
the first volunteer to introduce the concept of STEM into the network. She restructured local IET programmes to support STEM education, established the HKLN STEM Task Force, and headed initiatives such as the Hong Kong STEM Ambassador Programme and the STEM 4 Girls Mentorship Programme.
Beyond STEM education, Justina is a strong advocate for equality, diversity and inclusion in the engineering industry. She played a key role in launching the IET Young Woman Engineer (YWE) of the Year Award in Hong Kong in 2019, creating new opportunities for women in STEM.
Justina’s dedication and impact were recently recognised with the IET honorary fellowship. A celebration event was held in January, attended by IET president Sir Warren East and IET chief executive and secretary Ed Almond. On receiving the award, Justina reflected: “My work in STEM started off just having fun with children, but by the end of each day, they would say they wish to become an engineer just like us. Nothing is more encouraging than this.”
She also shared an important message about the future of technology and education: “In this technological generation, we cannot expect every child to become an engineer, but we hope that they can embrace technology and understand how to co-exist with emerging technologies – a skill necessary to survive in the future.”
For Justina, inspiring the next generation was never part of the plan – it happened naturally through her passion and dedication. “Starting out from just having fun, I’d unknowingly inspired generations who will become the role models of the future. Together as engineers, we are changing the world. This award reminds me that I should never lose faith in myself or the dreams I believe in.”
To learn more about IET fellowship, please visit our website.
The amazing contributions of women to the engineering and technology sector were given the royal seal of approval at this year’s WISE Awards
In February, Women into Science and Engineering (WISE), now part of the IET, hosted its annual WISE Awards at IET London: Savoy Place. This prestigious event celebrated the remarkable contributions of individuals and organisations working hard to make STEM a more equitable industry for women.
WISE had the honour of welcoming its Royal Patron, Her Royal Highness The Princess Royal, to present awards to this year’s winners and finalists. Among these impressive accolades, Her Royal Highness presented two special honours in her name.
Digital changemaker
Lella Violet Halloum was awarded The Princess Royal’s WISE Rising Star Award. Named one of the most influential women in UK technology, Lella has led
transformative initiatives that empower underrepresented communities worldwide.
Professor Elena RodriguezFalcon received The Princess Royal’s WISE Lifetime Achievement Award for her outstanding contributions in the sector. She was celebrated for her dedication to making engineering more accessible for underrepresented groups and for challenging and reshaping traditional concepts of teaching.
Reflecting on the honour, Elena said: “Having worked in the STEM sector, engineering specifically, for over 30 years, has not only been a joy, but also an eye-opener. We don’t have anywhere near the number of STEM professionals that we should have, or anywhere near the number of women working in the sector that we need, so I will continue to work to change that and strive to make a
real difference. I am deeply honoured to receive this Lifetime Achievement Award.”
The evening celebrated 33 incredible finalists across 11 categories, each receiving well-deserved recognition for their impact in STEM.
Other winners included:
● Nurturing New Talent Award: Laura Fogg Rogers, University of the West of England
● Outstanding Woman in Engineering Award: Sarah Badesha, Chivas Brothers
● Outstanding Woman in Science Award: Catherine Ross, The Scottish Government
● Outstanding Woman in Technology Award: Sharan Johnstone, University of South Wales
● STEM Ally Award: Paul Williams, Bloomberg LP
● STEM Returner Award: Maria Holloway-Strong, AtkinsRéalis
● Outreach and Engagement Award: Julie Feest, Engineering Development Trust and Industrial Cadets
● Women’s Wellbeing at Work Award: Network Rail
● EDI Organisation of the Year Award: AtkinsRéalis
During the event, Her Royal Highness met with award winners, finalists, and sponsors, engaging with attendees on the vital mission of advancing gender equity in STEM.
Dr Laura Norton, WISE managing director, shared her thoughts: “Our awards highlight the dedication, success, and commitment of those working to increase the representation of women in UK STEM. I’d like to congratulate all our brilliant winners and finalists.
“With only 26% of women currently working in engineering, science and technology, there is a huge untapped talent pool. WISE is working with partners across the world to increase the pace of change in gender equity within STEM.
“We were delighted to welcome Her Royal Highness
The Princess Royal to the Awards, and we would like to thank her for her continued support for women in STEM.”
The achievements serve as inspiration for the next generation, reinforcing that diversity is not just beneficial but essential for a thriving STEM workforce.
A heartfelt congratulations to all the winners, finalists and nominees.
To find out more about WISE events and how you can get involved, visit wisecampaign.org.uk/events
MEET MUHAMMAD ADIL GONDAL, PAKISTAN’S YOUNGEST CHARTERED ENGINEER
A changemaker juggling a PhD, a career, and fatherhood – all while giving back to the engineering community.
Becoming a chartered engineer (CEng) at any age is a big deal, but doing it before you hit 30, while finishing a PhD, working full-time in data management at Skanska, and raising a family, is remarkable. Muhammad Adil Gondal, driven by a love for science and technology, followed his passion into engineering and never stopped learning along the way.“Every step brought new challenges, and each one helped me grow, both personally and professionally,” he says.
Adil started documenting his professional skills early on, making sure every project, technical achievement and collaboration met the CEng standards. At the same time, he dived into advanced academic work, taking on a PhD as part of his continuing professional development (CPD).
Balancing coursework, a career and fatherhood was tough at times, but it helped him hone essential skills like time management and teamwork, which have been invaluable both at work and at home.
A key part of his success was the IET Mentorship Programme, which guided him through each step of the CEng process, from structuring his application to showcasing his competencies. This supportive network of mentors and peers not only provided technical insights but also the encouragement to keep going. Inspired by the help he received, Adil is now
committed to mentoring others within the IET, helping them on their own paths to professional recognition.
Beyond his immediate responsibilities, Adil has always believed in giving back to the community that shaped him. As a STEM ambassador, he shares his love for maths, coding and problemsolving with younger generations. His involvement with us, where he’s started volunteering, has been equally rewarding, offering a platform to guide aspiring engineers on the path to professional registration. “Inspiring the next wave of engineers is about more than just sharing knowledge – it’s about
‘Embrace each stage of the journey and find mentors who support your dreams’
sparking enthusiasm and showing what’s possible,” he says.
Becoming the youngest chartered engineer in Pakistan is a reminder that passion, hard work and resilience can come together to create extraordinary results. While the letters ‘CEng’ highlight his technical competence, for Adil they symbolise something deeper: a commitment to pushing boundaries, a readiness to seize new opportunities, and the joy of turning ambitions into reality.
He plans to keep expanding his skill-set, both academically and professionally, while maintaining that delicate balance of career, study and parenthood. Through volunteering, he hopes to empower future engineers, especially those who feel challenges like a busy schedule or lack of role models are too big to overcome. His message to those who aspire to earn professional credentials or break new ground is simple: “Embrace each stage of the journey, find mentors who support your dreams, and never stop believing in your ability to achieve the extraordinary.”
Just as engineering evolves, so does Adil’s own path. With the support of the IET community and his drive for lifelong learning, he’s excited to see how his career, and his impact on others, will continue to grow.
“I genuinely believe my story can inspire others – both within Pakistan and around the world – to pursue professional excellence.”
Find out more about professional registration on our website.
The IET has produced a submission setting out recommendations for the comprehensive spending review on strengthening the resilience and security of critical national infrastructure, alongside a case study of the National Grid.
The impact of cyber attacks can be wide-ranging and devastating for businesses, and there is no ceiling on the costs as it varies based on the depth and seriousness of the attack. The average cost for cyber breaches for big businesses last year was £1.46m and the breach at TalkTalk was estimated to cost £35m alone. With 90% of large companies reporting information breaches last year, it is common but no less serious when it happens.
So, given the scale of impact we see for business, where would the impact be for government?
Well, it’s not only financial costs at stake, but also critical public services and national infrastructure. Take the National Grid for example – energy infrastructure outages can have widespread and serious consequences for both individuals and society. The risk of energy infrastructure failing due to AI misinformation or cyber attacks can be significant. The cost of an electricity blackout to the UK economy depends on factors such as its duration, geographic impact and affected sectors. However, estimates suggest that a nationwide blackout lasting 24 hours could cost billions of pounds.
It extends further than this, because it would impact public service provision, including healthcare, transport and emergency response. Power outages could hit business services across the economy such as finance and banking, retail and e-commerce, and manufacturing – strangling growth and having huge knock-on social effects to regional economies.
As the National Audit Office recently highlighted, the threat to government is severe and advancing quickly. So what can be done?
With the introduction of Humphrey, the civil service AI support tool, there is considerable opportunity for streamlining processes and increasing productivity. Government estimates this could free up £45bn that could be reinvested back into
public services if AI is utilised effectively across all departments. However, the introduction of AI across government also leaves departments increasingly vulnerable to cyber attacks. The data that algorithms are trained with, and use, could be manipulated into making the wrong decisions on purpose through a major cyber attack from those seeking to target the UK. Given the potential scale and cost of cyber attacks on the public sector, we are calling on the Treasury, as part of the comprehensive spending review, to reinvest some of the money saved in efficiencies to bolster its cyber-security resilience.
Staff training that provides workers with clear examples of good outcomes of AI use is critical to ensuring misinformation is not used and perpetuated through the system. Investing in cyber-security literacy via reskilling and upskilling will ensure greater awareness of potential risks.
Secondly, the government should establish a chief cyber security and resilience adviser to ensure government has regular strategic advice on cyber security. Finally, government should assess the financial impact of cyber attacks on critical national infrastructure and growth sectors to help shape investment prioritisation.
The comprehensive spending review and forthcoming industrial strategy provides the opportune moment for government to take stock of its digital capability and resilience. It has already made headway with the use of AI but should now look to ensure its cyber-defence strategy is robust and prepared for any eventuality.
You can find out more on our website: 2025 comprehensive spending review submission at theiet.org
Being a volunteer can be a transformative experience, both personally and professionally, which has certainly been the case for renewable energy professional and IET volunteer Dr Cameron Bee.
Cam is a chartered engineer with a master’s degree and PhD in engineering from the University of Warwick. His career has spanned roles in construction, engineering, quality assurance and the fire service. He moved into a role in renewable energy in May 2023 and has decided that this is where he intends to stay. “Renewables is one of the fastest-growing sectors in the UK, with a huge range of technical and commercial challenges to overcome,” he said.
In June 2024 he became a project manager in clean energy advisory at Wood, a global engineering company in the energy and materials markets. He leads technical advisory and construction scopes in renewable energy, specialising in offshore wind.
Applying for his CEng status, Cam was impressed by the mentor who guided him through his application – so much so that he was inspired to follow in their footsteps. “After having such a positive experience, it was only fair to give something back and support other people.”
He applied to become an IET volunteer in January 2024 and started mentoring in early spring 2024. Cam finds it interesting and rewarding to support candidates at various stages of their career and professional registration journey. “A key skill is being able to support people with their own personal requirements. Often engineers have a huge level of skill and experience but need a little guidance to portray their achievements in an impactful way. Sometimes a third-person perspective can make all the difference. I really enjoy helping candidates with this aspect of their application.”
He’s worked with five mentees so far and said the IET has excelled in pairing mentees with suitable mentors.
“My first mentee is very close to submitting their CEng application. Working together to refine their application has been a 10-month process and I am very excited for them to achieve chartered status – they really do deserve it.”
Cam is keen to expand his volunteering responsibilities and activities, and to support us further, so in September 2024 he applied to become a professional registration adviser (PRA).
After completing his own professional registration journey, Cam wanted to build on his understanding of the routes to professional registration. He was also sure that he’d be able to provide sound advice to candidates on the things that matter most to them, like how to prepare a formal application, what to expect at the interview and what to do if their application is unsuccessful. Cam says: “Being a PRA complements and supports my mentoring role because I’m broadening my experience of the professional registration process.”
On average, Cam devotes one day a month to volunteering with us. “Sometimes finding the time to go through a candidate’s CEng application, especially to the level of detail it deserves, can be challenging,” he said. “But I never feel any pressure from the IET to do more. From the start, I have found the team to be very accommodating.”
Our flexible approach makes volunteering very compatible with Cam’s busy lifestyle. “My volunteering experiences have been a defining factor in my life and career. My advice is to make the most of opportunities and take time to get to know other members. After all, the IET has opened its doors to more than 156,000 members across the world.”
To find out more about volunteering with us, please email volunteering@theiet.org
To mark International Women in Engineering Day on 23 June, we shine a light on an inspirational member who is engineering a better world for us all – Dr Evona Teh
While for most eight-yearolds their Walkman cassette player breaking might mean asking their parents for a new one, for Dr Evona Teh it was the trigger to start examining technology and put her on the path to an illustrious career in engineering.
“For me, engineering has always been about solving problems and creating impact, and that’s what drives me every day,” said Evona, who went on to pursue an engineering degree at Imperial College London, followed by a PhD in human-machine intelligent systems.
Born and raised in Malaysia, Evona went on to earn two scholarships to study in the UK and chose to pursue a career in engineering.
After briefly working in Malaysia, Evona returned to the UK for her PhD. Following her graduation, she began her career with Jaguar Land Rover (JLR), which had sponsored her PhD.
“JLR has shown a growing commitment to diversity and inclusion, and I have experienced this firsthand, from engineering roles to strategy, where I co-founded the Strategic Foresight team. My first project was pioneering the new dualscreen curved infotainment system for the Range Rover Velar. It was incredibly rewarding to see the idea through from concept to launch.”
After the successful launch, Evona was promoted to JLR’s Special Vehicle Operation. She became a
chartered engineer and a mentor to support other aspiring women.
“Working in a maledominated industry has its challenges, but these challenges have shaped me, and that’s why I’m passionate about supporting women in engineering through organisations like the IET, where I serve as a professional review interviewer. I want to encourage more women and girls to look into engineering careers and gain recognition for their skills.”
Covid-19 pandemic was particularly challenging. They welcomed two children to their Warwickshire home: daughter Selene, now four, and son, Pharell, now two. Evona had to juggle her family and work commitments alongside her husband’s work in healthcare, though a supportive maternity policy and her mentoring role helped her to stay engaged with the sector.
In September 2024, Evona was appointed a visiting professor at Imperial College London’s Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, becoming the first woman awarded by the Royal Academy of Engineering at the university.
Evona was a finalist in the 2025 Women into Science and Engineering (WISE) Awards, where she met with WISE patron Her Royal Highness The Princess Royal at the presentation.
“The WISE mission resonates with me because of the commitment to promote gender diversity in STEM, which is important for driving innovation and progress in our industry. Having the opportunity to stand alongside Princess Anne is a moment I will always cherish, and a great motivation to many women out there.”
Starting a family with her husband, Dr Sing Khien Tiong, during the
“It takes a village to raise a child, and we’ve been fortunate to have supportive neighbours watching the children so we could attend the WISE Awards together. That sense of community has been invaluable.”
Evona is determined to continue breaking career ceilings for women in engineering, and to help others understand that having a family need not be a hindrance to professional achievement.
“I want my children – and all children – to know their worth. Every challenge is an opportunity to grow and bring a unique perspective. Take that first step, own your space, and you’ll inspire others along the way.”
The deadline for entries to our 2025 Young Woman Engineer of the Year Awards is 27 June 2025. For more information, please visit: youngwomenengineer. theiet.org
Throughout 2023, we carried out research into the experience of neurodivergent engineers and technicians across the globe. The outcome was a report in which we highlighted unique neurodivergent strengths, along with some of the associated barriers and shared recommendations for key groups and individuals on how to remove or reduce some of these.
Now in 2025, as we shift into our updated EDI strategy with a renewed focus on the broader area of disability, once again we’re looking to carry out some research that we hope will enable us to better support underrepresented groups in STEM fields, building a more diverse workforce where a broad range of experiences, identities and perspectives can be heard.
How do we define disability?
Here at the IET, we adopt the UN definition of a disability: ‘A longterm physical, mental, intellectual or sensory impairment which in interaction with various barriers may hinder their full and effective participation in society on an equal basis with others.’ 2022/23 research from the UK Department for Work and Pensions shows that approximately 24% of the total population has some form of disability, and this figure has been increasing relatively rapidly over the past decade. If disabled people make up almost a quarter of us, what is the impact
of not taking the time to ensure the world is accessible?
Well, we’re already seeing that impact in engineering and technology, where disabled people make up just 11% of the workforce in the UK. This discrepancy tells us that there are significant barriers that currently exist when entering the industry –and not having these broad perspectives in the sector affects all disabled people, as engineers help to design the world we live in.
How can I get involved?
If you’d like to support us with this project, we are looking for individuals who fit the following criteria to take part in quantitative and/or qualitative research in May or June 2025:
● Is working or has previously worked in an engineering or technology related role
● Identifies as having a disability or long-term condition
● Or is a carer for someone who is disabled.
Participants do not need to be a member of the IET to get involved, and we welcome insights and experiences from across the globe. Participants will have the option to remain fully anonymous throughout the process. If you would like to register your interest or find out more, please contact us at inclusion@theiet.org.
Did you know there are other ways you can get directly involved with EDI at the IET?
We now offer three EDI Networks for members to join, gain peer-topeer support and engage directly with the team.
Disability Member Network – meets every six weeks on a Thursday, 1.30-2.30pm GMT
Neurodiversity Member Network – meets every six weeks on a Friday, 1.30-2.30pm GMT
LGBTQ+ Member Network – meets every six weeks on a Friday, 12-1pm GMT
To join one of our networks, please email inclusion@theiet.org – we’d love to hear from you.
16 - 19 June 2025 | Geneva, Switzerland
Secure your seat at one of the most important conferences for the electricity distribution sector. You’ll hear from significant voices in electricity distribution – including keynotes from CERN, Swiss Federal Office of Energy, and State Grid Corporation of China – gain access to 700 peer-reviewed technical presentations, and meet over 1,600 engineers from 60 countries.
Call for Papers deadline: 20 June 2025
We’re looking for power system protection specialists at all career stages to be part of the DPSP Global 2026 conference programme. As an author, you’ll be in a prominent place to showcase your knowledge to your industry, present new results, and have your voice heard by over 250 international engineers. That’s as well as having your work published and indexed in IEEE Xplore, IET Inspec, Ei Compendex, and Scopus. It’s the ideal way to enhance your professional profile!
Attracting people into manufacturing
13 May 2025 | 12pm - 1pm (BST) | Online
Join our panel where we will be discussing: challenges facing manufacturers in a changing skills and employment landscape, skills needs for future employees and hence to promote manufacturing as a career and how to attract people into manufacturing from all paths of life.
spkl.io/6001ftB65
cired2025.org
2 - 4 December 2025 | Scotland, UK
Call for papers deadline: 31 July 2025
Powering Net Zero Week is back, bigger and better! This year’s focus is on energy security, AI, emerging tech in the future of energy, alongside a new track focused on nuclear power, highlighting its critical role in the net-zero transition. The call for papers is now open for all four tracks.
poweringnetzero.theiet.org
dpsp.theiet.org/2026-global
9 - 10 October 2025 | London, UK
Cyber Security for Critical Industries will explore current challenges and solutions for building resilient, responsive systems. Gain exclusive insights into new techniques and technologies, and network with UK cyber security leaders. Don’t miss this must-attend event for professionals in critical systems.
cyberconference.theiet.org
21 May 2025 | 2pm - 3pm (BST) | Online
Join this session to learn about the different set of enterprise AI applications and few in the perspective of specific fields or domains like Telecom, Healthcare, Manufacturing etc.
spkl.io/6003ftB6S
Pathways to the Decarbonisation of Aviation
12 June 2025 | 11:30am - 1pm (BST) | Online
The event will consider the various current developments on aircraft powered by Sustainable Aviation Fuel, Hydrogen and Hybrid and All-Electric Propulsion systems and how they can contribute to declared targets on aircraft emissions and noise.
spkl.io/6003ftBBV
+ Episode:09
Is the AI bubble about to burst?
The E+T editorial team were joined by guest Julie Wall, Professor of AI and Advanced Computing, University of West London.
Episode:10
Are we losing engineers due to burnout?
The E+T editorial team discussed all this with guest Simon Swales, Senior Consultant, Mindset Practice.
Episode:11 Forever Chemicals – Are they an environmental disaster in progress?
The E+T editorial team were joined by guest Stephanie Metzger, Policy Adviser, Royal Society of Chemistry.