Transport Decarbonisation Demonstrators
UK businesses can apply for a share of up to £2m to work with Local Authorities to develop place-based solutions to transport decarbonisation.
Innovate UK, part of UK Research and Innovation, will work with the Department for Transport (DfT) to invest up to £2 million in innovation projects.
These projects will demonstrate innovative solutions which support the decarbonisation of transport systems within a local area.
The aim of this competition is to support innovative R&D solutions that can demonstrate the potential to:
- reduce transport carbon emissions in local areas
- facilitate collaboration between Local Authorities (LA) and businesses
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To lead a project your organisation must be a UK registered business of any size.
To be an eligible collaboration, the lead must collaborate with a minimum of at least one grant claiming Local Authority (LA) as part of their project team.
The term Local Authority includes, county councils, district councils, unitary authorities, metropolitan districts and London boroughs. Regional collaborations coordinated through bodies such as combined authorities are also eligible.
Associated transport bodies such as local transport authorities, integrated transport authorities and sub-national transport authorities will also be eligible. In addition to this, we are allowing National Parks to also apply as a considered LA.
In addition, you can also invite other collaborative partners. To collaborate with the lead, your organisation must be one of the following UK registered:
- business of any size
- academic institution
- charity
- not for profit
- public sector organisation
- research and technology organisation (RTO)
A business can only lead on one application but can be included as a collaborator in a further 2 applications.
Local Authorities, or similar organisations as described within the Project Team section, can only collaborate on two separate applications.
Academic institutions, research and technology organisations (RTO), charities, not for profits or other public sector organisations can be included as a collaborator in any number of applications.
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Your project must:
- have a grant funding request of between £100,000 to £500,000
- start on 1 June 2024
- end by 31 March 2025
- last between 6 to 10 months
- carry out all of its project work in the UK
- intend to exploit the results from or in the UK
- involve a minimum of two collaborative grant claiming partners
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Your proposal must:
- detail the potential to reduce carbon and other harmful emissions from the existing local transport network
- demonstrate the consideration of a place-based approach and how the solution proposed best meets the needs and attributes of the selected demonstration area
- identify the Local Authority capacity to support and be involved with the project
- illustrate how the innovation activity fits in with, and will support local strategies or plans, such as a Local Authorities’ Local Transport Plan (LTP) or Net Zero strategy
- provide evidence of Local Authority senior leadership or senior level support for the proposed activity
- detail how the solution will be demonstrated
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We are not funding projects that are:
- looking solely at data gathering
- focusing on large scale infrastructure and not considering a place-based approach
- maritime projects including shipping and ports
- based on developing airport infrastructure or urban airports
- solely focused on on-vehicle developments
- using vehicles which are not zero-emission
- using vehicles are that over 7.5 tonne that do not support passenger transport, local authority operations or emergency services
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Innovate UK will hold an online briefing event at 11am on Tuesday 28 November: click here for the joining link.
If you would like help to find a project partner, contact Innovate UK KTN’s Transport team or our Place team.