UK Infrastructure Transitions Research Consortium (ITRC): PROGRAMME GRANT: Long term dynamics of interdependent infrastructure systems

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EPSRC
EPSRC
EPSRC
EPSRC
EPSRC

£23,654,210

Jan. 1, 2011

Feb. 7, 2011

National infrastructure (NI) systems (energy, transport, water, waste and ICT) in the UK and in advanced economies globally face serious challenges. The 2009 Council for Science and Technology (CST) report on NI in the UK identified significant vulnerabilities, capacity limitations and a number of NI components nearing the end of their useful life. It also highlighted serious fragmentation in the arrangements for infrastructure provision in the UK. There is an urgent need to reduce carbon emissions from infrastructure, to respond to future demographic, social and lifestyle changes and to build resilience to intensifying impacts of climate change. If this process of transforming NI is to take place efficiently, whilst also minimising the associated risks, it will need to be underpinned by a long-term, cross-sectoral approach to understanding NI performance under a range of possible futures. The 'systems of systems' analysis that must form the basis for such a strategic approach does not yet exist - this inter-disciplinary research programme will provide it.The aim of the UK Infrastructure Transitions Research Consortium is to develop and demonstrate a new generation of system simulation models and tools to inform analysis, planning and design of NI. The research will deal with energy, transport, water, waste and ICT systems at a national scale, developing new methods for analysing their performance, risks and interdependencies. It will provide a virtual environment in which we will test strategies for long term investment in NI and understand how alternative strategies perform with respect to policy constraints such as reliability and security of supply, cost, carbon emissions, and adaptability to demographic and climate change.The research programme is structured around four major challenges:1. How can infrastructure capacity and demand be balanced in an uncertain future? We will develop methods for modelling capacity, demand and interdependence in NI systems in a compatible way under a wide range of technological, socio-economic and climate futures. We will thereby provide the tools needed to identify robust strategies for sustainably balancing capacity and demand.2. What are the risks of infrastructure failure and how can we adapt NI to make it more resilient?We will analyse the risks of interdependent infrastructure failure by establishing network models of NI and analysing the consequences of failure for people and the economy. Information on key vulnerabilities and risks will be used to identify ways of adapting infrastructure systems to reduce risks in future.3. How do infrastructure systems evolve and interact with society and the economy? Starting with idealised simulations and working up to the national scale, we will develop new models of how infrastructure, society and the economy evolve in the long term. We will use the simulation models to demonstrate alternative long term futures for infrastructure provision and how they might be reached.4. What should the UK's strategy be for integrated provision of NI in the long term? Working with a remarkable group of project partners in government and industry, we will use our new methods to develop and test alternative strategies for Britain's NI, building an evidence-based case for a transition to sustainability. We will analyse the governance arrangements necessary to ensure that this transition is realisable in practice.A Programme Grant provides the opportunity to work flexibly with key partners in government and industry to address research challenges of national importance in a sustained way over five years. Our ambition is that through development of a new generation of tools, in concert with our government and industry partners, we will enable a revolution in the strategic analysis of NI provision in the UK, whilst at the same time becoming an international landmark programme recognised for novelty, research excellence and impact.

Potential Impact:
HM Treasury estimates that approximately 150 billion has been invested in National Infrastructure (NI) in the UK over the last five years. Increased levels of investment will be required to renew and maintain existing infrastructure and meet the new challenge of setting the economy on a low-carbon trajectory. Similar challenges are faced worldwide, with the OECD estimating that infrastructure investments between 2000 and 2030 will be about US$71 trillion worldwide, or 3.5% of world GDP. The UK Infrastructure Transitions Research Consortium (ITRC) aims to deliver models and analysis methods that will help to ensure that this huge investment is allocated in a way that has the best prospects for improving infrastructure services, increasing economic competitiveness, reducing risk of failure and improving environmental standards (including carbon emissions reduction). To ensure that this impact is realised, the ITRC has been developed in close collaboration over a period of more than a year with high level stakeholders from government and industry. The main beneficiaries and benefits of the research will be: 1. Government departments and agencies (e.g. Infrastructure UK, DfT, DECC, DCLG, DEFRA, Environment Agency, Highways Agency) involved in infrastructure planning, regulation and provision, who will benefit from methods for strategic analysis that provide improved understanding of NI systems performance in the long term. 2. Infrastructure owners and utility companies (e.g. energy companies, National Grid, Network Rail, water and waste utilities, telecom providers), who will benefit from tools for analysis of capacity, demand and risk, which can be used to inform investment planning and asset management. 3. Engineering and multi-disciplinary consultants, who will benefit from improved models to inform their consultancy services, both in the UK and internationally. Ultimately, consumers of infrastructure services will benefit through more efficient NI that is designed to exploit synergies between infrastructure sectors, to minimise risks and to be adaptable to an uncertain future. Though the tools we develop will be the most advanced modelling and simulation of its kind in the world, it is essential that we find mechanisms for fast-tracking cutting edge research to practitioners in a form that is both accessible and applicable. Our Project Partners in industry and government are therefore deeply involved in the research programme, through a process of continuous and iterative testing of models and tools and co-production of strategies for NI provision. This will start with a fast track analysis in the first year of the research programme, working with Project Partners to scope possible futures and present an initial set of NI strategies. This first cycle of co-production will be followed by two subsequent cycles during the five year research programme, which will demonstrate the powerful new assessment models and tools developed in the research and transfer them our project partners. By the end of the five year Programme Grant we expect key end users to be exploiting the tools for NI systems analysis. Collaboration with the project partners will be managed to maximise impact by Roger Street (UK Climate Impacts Programme), who has 25 years of experience of linking climate research with practice in industry and government. An Expert Advisory Group with representatives from key end users will help to advise upon the research direction and enhance dissemination and uptake. Our Project Partners include representatives from the engineering institutions, who will be able to disseminate results to the professional groups that they represent. The Impact Plan has been developed by Roger Street in consultation with the project partners and includes a series of workshops, three dissemination conferences (at the end of years 1, 3 and 5 of the research programme) and knowledge transfer seminars.