Funding competition Tackling non-exhaust and non-road vehicle air pollution: phase 2 SBRI
Successful applicants from phase 1 can apply for a share of £4.5 million to develop new solutions to reduce air pollutant emissions from road vehicle brake or tyre wear, non-road mobile machinery used in construction and transport refrigeration units.
- Competition opens: Monday 9 September 2019
- Registration closes: Wednesday 9 October 2019 12:00pm
This competition is now closed.
Competition sections
Description
This is phase 2 of a Small Business Research Initiative (SBRI) competition. The overall programme is being delivered in 2 phases. Only successful applicants from phase 1 can apply for a share of £4.5 million.
Innovate UK, part of UK Research and Innovation, will fund organisations to further develop, test and demonstrate new products or services which reduce the harmful emissions from one or more of:
- road vehicle brake and tyre wear and/or road surface wear
- non-road mobile machinery used for construction, such as excavators, bulldozers, front loaders, cranes and compressors
- transport refrigeration units
Funding type
Procurement
Project size
In phase 2 projects can range in size up to a total cost of £1.5 million each, including VAT.
Who can apply
Only organisations who were successful in phase 1 of this competition are eligible to apply into phase 2.
Your project
Projects can range in size up to a total cost of £1.5 million each, including VAT.
Projects should start in January 2020 and can last up to 18 months.
Lead organisation
To lead a project you must:
- be an organisation of any size
- work alone or with others from business, the research base, the public sector or the third sector as subcontractors
- have been successful in phase 1
Subcontractors
We aim to award development contracts only to individual organisations. However, if you can show that collaboration will benefit your overall project, you can sub-contract specific tasks.
Ideally subcontractors will be sector specialists and/or demonstrate a strong connection to the academic community. Any subcontracted work is the responsibility of the main contractor.
Previous applications
Failure to exploit
If you applied to a previous competition as the lead or sole organisation and were awarded funding by Innovate UK or UK Research and Innovation, but did not make a substantial effort to exploit that award, we will award no more funding to you, in this or any other competition. You will not be able to contest our decision. We will:
- assess your efforts in the previous competition against your exploitation plan for that project
- review the monitoring officers’ reports and any other relevant sources for evidence
- document our decision, which will be made by 3 team members, and communicate it to you in writing
Previous projects
Under the terms of Innovate UK funding, you are required to submit an independent accountant’s report (IAR) with your final claim. If you or any organisation in your consortium failed to submit an IAR on a previous project, we will not award funding to you in this or any other competition until we have received the documents.Funding
A total of up to £4.5 million, including VAT, is allocated to this phase 2 competition.
We expect to fund up to 3 projects in phase 2 for individual research and development (R&D) contracts up to £1.5 million, including VAT.
Your application must have at least 50% of its contract value attributed directly and exclusively to research and development (R&D) services. R&D can cover solution exploration and design. It can also include prototyping and field-testing the product or service.
R&D does not include:
- commercial development activities such as quantity production
- supply to establish commercial viability or to recover R&D costs
- integration, customisation or incremental adaptations and improvements to existing products or processes
Your proposal
Organisations will work with Innovate UK to develop and demonstrate new products or services which build on their findings of the phase 1 feasibility studies to help reduce harmful impacts on air quality.
Phase 2 focuses on advancing the phase 1 feasibility studies to develop and demonstrate prototypes. This phase should result in fully functional prototypes which have been comprehensively tested, and convincing approaches to commercialise these solutions following the end of this SBRI project.
Your proposed solution must:
- be innovative
- be practical and deliverable
- take affordability into consideration
We particularly encourage applications that:
- demonstrate a clear plan for commercialisation and route to market for developed solutions
- demonstrate a strong connection to relevant academic research which links proposed activities and solutions to current research
- demonstrate scalability and replicability
- gather and analyse data to demonstrate the long-term benefits of the solution
Specific themes
We are looking to gain research and development (R&D) services for technologies that address air quality issues caused by one or more of:
- emissions which come from brake and tyre wear, or from road surface abrasion
- vehicles or transportable industrial equipment used on construction sites not intended for carrying passengers on the road but equipped with a combustion engine
- refrigeration systems designed to cool perishable products transported by road in vehicles including vans or heavy goods vehicles
Research categories
Projects we will not fund
We will not fund projects which:
- are submitted by organisations other than those shortlisted in phase 1 of this SBRI competition
- are not informed by research carried out in phase 1 of this SBRI competition
- focus on exhaust emissions from the engine of road vehicles
- focus on removing pollutants from the air rather than reducing the causes of emissions
- address air quality issues unrelated to road vehicle brake and tyre wear, non-road mobile machinery used in construction or the operation of transport refrigeration units
- shift the pollution to other areas, or make an overall negative contribution to the environment
- 9 September 2019
- Competition opens
- 9 October 2019 12:00pm
- Registration closes
- 16 October 2019 12:00pm
- Competition closes
- 6 December 2019
- Applicants notified
Before you start
To apply:
- register online using the green button
- read the guidance for applicants for this competition
- consider attending one of the briefing events listed in ‘Dates’
- complete and upload your online application to our secure server
We will not accept late submissions. Your application is confidential.
A selected panel of experts will assess the quality your application. You must use Microsoft Word for the application form or your application will be ineligible.
Background and further information
About SBRI competitions
SBRI provides innovative solutions to challenges faced by the public sector. This can lead to better public services and improved efficiency and effectiveness. SBRI supports economic growth and enables the development of innovative products and services. It does this through the public procurement of research and development (R&D). SBRI generates new business opportunities for companies and provides a route to market for their ideas. It also bridges the seed funding gap experienced by many early-stage companies.
Further help and information
You can find information on how to enter this competition in the invitation to tender document, which is available for download on our secure site after registration.
If you need more information, email us at support@innovateuk.ukri.org or call the competition helpline on 0300 321 4357 between 9am and 5:30pm, Monday to Friday.
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