Projects

Project Background

This project examines UK (and global) industrial innovation associated to decarbonisation. Our analysis combines data from multiple sources, including UKRI funding, patent data and firm level information. We aim to delineate key knowledge assets of industrial decarbonisation clusters and suggest optimal innovation practice and policy.

Co-investigators/ RAs/ PHDs

• Professor Umit Bititci EBS-HWU
• Professor Dimitris Christopoulos EBS-HWU
• Dr David Dekker EBS-HWU
• Professor Heather McGregor EBS-HWU
• Professor Gareth Peters, UC Santa Barbara
• Dr Matthew Smith Edinburgh Napier University
• Professor George Tzougas, AMS-HWU
• Ms Marta Campi, EBS-HWU
• Post-doc researcher (from February 2022)

Funding 

UKRI - A project associated to IDRIC innovation centre

Project Background 

Green bonds are financial assets that have become crucial means for institutions, NGOs and governments to raise funding for green investments. Green Bonds are critical to industrial decarbonisation. Despite being a US$1 trillion global market, their relatively recent emergence means they are understudied in academic literature. There is a major gap in our understanding of the association between a number of interrelated processes.

These include the capital raised to fund green infrastructure projects; the disbursement of funds for such projects; the project selection success and mechanisms; and the environmental impact of these funds on climate mitigation and carbon neutralisation. For industrial decarbonisation to proceed at pace there will need to be an equivalent speed in decarbonisation funding innovation. This will depend on issuers and underwriters understanding the risks associated with this funding, which in turn depend on a complex set of interrelated socioeconomic systems.

Project Leads 

H.McGregor and D.Christopoulos

Co-investigators/ RAs/ PHDs

G.Peters (UC Santa Barbara)

Research Aim

Introduce and measure new variants of risk that will improve innovation in the funding for decarbonisation. Furthermore we aim to:

• Identify resilient structures among the finance networks of decarbonisation
• Identify other risk frameworks, such as environmental or policy risk
• Identify opportunity areas with low levels of risk and latent potential
• Develop practical decision frameworks for funding decarbonisation
• Report on Policy Implications and Strategic Guidance

Methods

Natural Language Processing, Network Science, Econometrics

Funding 

UKRI via IDRIC

Project Background 

Technological invention and scientific research does not readily translate into innovative practice. This is evident in the variance of innovation performance among UK industrial clusters. In this project we look at the way regional industrial clusters innovate and implement new green technologies. We identify effective innovation dissemination by looking at knowledge creation, as well as the collaboration and patent networks behind it. We map this complex landscape and identify industries where there are opportunities for optimizing the interaction between critical nodes. Of particular interest here is the innovation potential from ties between industry and academia. We compare these complex network structures between UK industrial regions and highlight best practice in knowledge network clusters. This with particular reference to the knowledge created and disseminated by partners in the IDRIC project. We therefore intend to assess the impact of IDRIC in the creation and dissemination of knowledge.

Research Questions 

• Identify and compare optimal structures and best innovation practice in UK clusters (including UKRI knowledge transfer partnerships)
• Identify latent capacity (and any redundancy) in systems of knowledge exchange

Project Lead

D.Christopoulos

Co-investigators/ RAs/ PHDs

H.McGregor and M.Smith (Napier)

Research Methods 

Multi-mode network analysis to identify optimal collaboration patterns in innovation networks. Graph matching algorithms to identify the robustness and resilience of knowledge exchange in industrial clusters. We have designed a project that innovatively integrates a group of cogent methods in a mixed methods research design. These take advantage of our expertise and include network analysis, econometric methods, the snowball sampling of expert stakeholders and advanced statistical analysis.

Funding 

UKRI vis IDRIC

Project Background 

We propose a new theoretical framework that captures social movements and possible political and social cleavages.

Project Leads

Marco Pelliccia, Arup Daripa, and Sandeep Kapur

Funding

Self-funded