News

Professor Peter Guthrie appointed Vice-President at the Royal Academy of Engineering

Congratulations to Professor Peter Guthrie who has been appointed Vice-President at the Royal Academy of Engineering. Peter Guthrie is the first Professor in Engineering for Sustainable Development in the UK, and was the Director of the Centre for Sustainable Development from 2000 to 2016. He continues to work on various...

Launch - Green Recovery: A Blueprint for a Green Future

Cambridge Zero was pleased to announce the launch of the “Green Recovery: A Blueprint for a Green Future” report this month at the Cambridge Zero Climate Change Festival 2020 . The report is an ambitious multidisciplinary report from the Cambridge Zero Policy Forum on how we can ensure a green recovery from the COVID-19...

Easy-to-make, ultra-low-power electronics could charge out of thin air

Researchers have developed a new approach to printed electronics that allows ultra-low-power electronic devices which could recharge from ambient light or radiofrequency noise. The approach paves the way for low-cost printed electronics that could be seamlessly embedded in everyday objects and environments. Electronics...

THE ‘P’ WORD – Plastic in the UK: practical and pervasive … but problematic

The Resource Efficiency Collective ( Dept of Engineering ) report, The 'P' Word, was released last week, which focusses on use of plastics in the UK. Plastics are ubiquitous in modern society, owing to their usefulness, durability and how cheap and easy they are to produce. This makes plastics both a blessing and a curse...

Cambridge to divest from fossil fuels with 'net zero' plan

University plans to cut greenhouse gas emissions to zero by 2038. The University of Cambridge aims to divest from all direct and indirect investments in fossil fuels by 2030 as part of the University’s plan to cut its greenhouse gas emissions to zero by 2038, more than a decade before the date set by the UK government. The...

Whittle Lab research key for accelerating the development of zero-carbon flight, says Prince of Wales

Last week HRH The Prince of Wales gave the opening address to the American Society of Mechanical Engineers Turbo Expo conference, the largest annual conference on the subject of flight and land-based power generation, due to have been held in London earlier this year but which is being held online due to the pandemic. In...

Coffee stains inspire optimal printing technique for electronics

Using an alcohol mixture, researchers modified how ink droplets dry, enabling cheap industrial-scale printing of electronic devices at unprecedented scales. Have you ever spilled your coffee on your desk? You may then have observed one of the most puzzling phenomena of fluid mechanics – the coffee ring effect. This effect...

New insights into lithium-ion battery failure mechanism

Researchers have identified a potential new degradation mechanism for electric vehicle batteries – a key step to designing effective methods to improve battery lifespan. The researchers, from the Universities of Cambridge and Liverpool, and the Diamond Light Source, have identified one of the reasons why state-of-the-art ‘...

Finding a place for the pandemic's plastic: The Cambridge Creative Circular Plastics Centre

by Eleanor Palmer, Cambridge Zero COVID-19 has led to a resurgence in plastic use across society, from PPE to the likes of Pret, Caffè Nero and Starbucks no longer accepting reusable cups and exclusively relying on disposables. However, Taylor Uekert (Department of Chemistry) is hopeful that this plastic renaissance will...

ARPA-type funding gives green technology an ‘innovation advantage’

Startups funded by US agency Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) file patents at twice the rate of similar cleantech firms. The UK should trial its own climate-focused ARPA as part of COVID-19 recovery package. The “innovation advantage” bestowed by ARPA-E – an energy version of the legendary DARPA (Defense...