National Highways – the UK’s government-owned company responsible for operating, maintaining, and improving motorways and major A roads in England – has launched a new £1.7m competition to find innovative solutions for net-zero-carbon maintenance and construction.
The competition, launched with Connected Places Catapult, could see winners receiving grants of up to £30,000 to create a detailed trial proposal to test their idea on the road network and a further £80,000 to make their plan a reality.
As well as wanting to make its road network net-zero by 2050, National Highways also aims to have its maintenance and construction emissions net-zero by 2040.
Accelerating innovation
Dr Joanna White, National Highways Roads Development director, said: “We want to speed up innovation within our sector and adopt new solutions.
“The innovation accelerator will help take potential solutions and drive them through the research and testing phases.”
National Highways project manager Melissa Giusti added: “We are hosting this open competition to attract new ideas that we haven’t yet trialled, tested, or even thought of ourselves.”
National Highways is offering the funding to innovators for the development of novel solutions that could make “a real difference” to how highways are built and maintained.
The aim of the competition is to reach a wider pool of innovators, exploring the innovation potential outside of National Highways’ existing supply chain, that will help to lower the carbon footprint of the UK’s roads.
National Highways says the scheme will allow smaller enterprises, which haven’t traditionally had the opportunity to work directly with National Highways, to showcase their ideas and win the chance to take them out on the road network.
Image: TTstudio/Shutterstock
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