Shortlist for Changing the World Award at the Knowledge Transfer Partnership Awards 2022 announced
03/10/2022 Innovate UK
The finalists for Changing the World Award at the Innovate UK KTP Awards, which celebrate the UK’s most innovative R&D projects of the last 12 months, have been revealed. They are:
- Network 2 Supplies Ltd, Coventry University, Mahsa Baniasadi
- Royal Horticultural Society, Cranfield University, Janet Manning
- W & J Knox Ltd, Abertay University, Ryan Ganfield
The awards, organised by Innovate UK KTN, celebrate the best three-way innovation partnerships between businesses, academic research teams and individual graduates looking to address climate change and social issues, or improve the UK economy.
The Changing the World Award highlights partnerships that demonstrate a wider impact of their KTP, delivering societal, social or environmental impact – in particular inclusion and diversity – to make our world a better place.
The three strong contenders competing for the Changing the World Award include Network 2 Supplies Ltd, Coventry University and Mahsa Baniasadi who together developed a way for the company to recycle rare metals from e-waste, whilst preserving the environment and preventing health-related issues for those involved worldwide. By embedding bioleaching as a new sustainable technology in the business, the company demonstrated a viable solution to a global issue costing $55bn annually in lost rare metals.
The second finalists have examined the key dependency on water in the ornamental horticulture industry, to drive behaviour change amongst professional and amateur gardeners and promote the better use of water. The KTP of the Royal Horticultural Society, Cranfield University and Janet Manning successfully delivered project outcomes which included curriculum changes in RHS horticultural qualifications, significant increase in online traffic to water management web pages, widespread media coverage and audience participation pledging to save 34.6 million litres of mains water per year. This will continue post-project.
Also in the running are W & J Knox Ltd, Abertay University and Ryan Ganfield. This partnership team developed process to extract high-value commercial products from aquatic waste materials, retrieved during aquaculture net servicing, reducing waste sent to landfill. When operational, these processes may result in over 30% of net service waste being diverted into other uses, potentially providing an income stream to the company. This brought about acquisition by a Norwegian multinational, meaning that the innovation behind the redirection of waste is becoming embedded across the global aquaculture sector.
The awards ceremony, compered by Professor Suzannah Lipscomb, will showcase the most innovative, impactful, and inspiring projects over the past 12 months. It will feature a keynote speech from Innovate UK CEO, Indro Mukerjee.
Dr Kirsty Hewitson, Interim CEO at Innovate UK KTN, says, “For 45 years, Innovate UK and IUK-KTN have worked to bring together people from disparate sectors and walks of life to form Knowledge Transfer Partnerships. Every year, around 800 incredible KTP projects make progress in addressing some of the biggest issues facing the world. They are all worth celebrating, but some are really blazing a trail and are bound to positively impact society, the environment, and the economy. That’s what the KTP Awards are all about, and just to be shortlisted is an incredible achievement.”
The Award categories are:
- Best Knowledge Transfer Partnership
- Technical Excellence Award
- Business Impact & Transformation Award
- The Changing the World Award
- Academic of the Year Award
- Best Knowledge Base KTP Support Team Award
- Future Leader Award
For more details, and to register your place, visit https://www.ktp-uk.org/awards/
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Email: support@innovateuk.gov.uk
Web: https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/innovate-uk
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